The UNHCR staff at Maungdaw is now distributing rice among the elderly villagers reading under Adult Education Program of UNHCR, said a villager.

In the morning of 22nd May 2002, a team of the UNHCR staff from Maungdaw headed by Field officer Ms. Mila had visited the villages of Pan Bey Chaung, Maung Nama and Zee Done in the area of Na Sa Ka camp No-20 under sector No. 9 of Buthidaung Township, Arakan, Burma. Daw Khin Khin Oo, Kabir Ahmad, Salamat Ullah and Mohammad Ahmad are among the team members of the UNHCR.
The UNHCR team had helped each adult learner with about one pound of rice for a day. But it is still not known how long the help to the elderly readers will continue.

According to the UNHCR and UNDP, the illiteracy rate in Arakan has reached 90% of the adult population as compared to 29% for the whole country (figures in 2000 and 1994).

It may be mentioned herein that there is at least a teacher in one village school. But, the very low pay is a strong discouragement for teachers not to even show up at school. While the UNHCR has helped to renovate or/and build numerous schools in the region, the World Food Programme (WFP) has also set up a training programme for the teachers. However, the WFP stated in February 1999 that 70 newly opened schools still had no teachers said a source in the WFP.

NGOs working in the Arakan state stated that the Buddhist teachers, badly paid, refuse to be appointed to the remote villages where Rohingyas live, while the Rohingyas have been forbidden to be appointed as school teachers since 1978. Even in villages where there is a primary school, some of the children cannot go to school, because of both the school fees and the loss of earnings a child in school represents for a family. However, the Adult Education Programme of UNHCR and WFP is of interest and help to the villagers in north Arakan.

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