The Nicaraguan woman, and in particular the woman of the farming area, is constantly suffering within the home because of domestic violence and equally in those areas where she is involved in her work and even in her community.
On March 8, 2006, in commemoration of the International Day of the No Violence Against Women, the Network of Women Against Violence, to which Cantera belongs, demanded that the government of Nicaragua sign the (Protocolo Facultativo???) of the Convention For the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women. This demand was issued two decades before which gives evidence of the lack of responsibility and the obligation of the State to guarantee the rights of women.
On the same occasion, the Network presented statistical facts about the conditions of the Nicaraguan woman in the year 2005:
77 women were assassinated by their husbands, companions or ex-husbands in 2005.
3% of the accusations of sexual violence managed to come before a judge and 75% of the accusations of violence were filed by the district attorney which presented an obstacle for access to justice.
25 % of women are able to achieve formal employment, while 75% are employed in the informal sector. The majority work as domestics or in Duty Free Zones and receive pay below the cost of living requirement.
38% of women obtain credit and this is reduced to 21% in the urban area.
Only 12% have title to their land.
The extreme condition of poverty, prevailing in the rural zone, obliges 85% of the women to migrate from the rural area to the city. Meanwhile 15% emigrate to other countries in the area.
of Central America under unsafe conditions and disrespect of their rights.
The responsibility of the homes has fallen principally on the backs of women. This responsibility extends to the grandmothers where 31% continue to be the supporters of their families.
Children and Adolescents
The reality of Nicaraguan children and youth has been exposed on innumerable occasions by the Coordinator of the Nicaraguan Federation of the NGOs who work with children and Adolescents (CODENI), to which Cantera belongs, and publically demanded that there be a considerable increase in the National Budget of the Republic in favor of this group, the most defenseless and vulnerable of the population.
The 53% of the Nicaraguan population is under 18 years of age, of which 43% are 50% are little girls and adolescent girls.
More than one million of this population are outside of the educational system.
Only 32% of little boys and girls of preschool age are enrolled in this program.
27% of urban children and adolescents suffer from chronic malnutrition and on the Caribbean
Coast and in the rural area, it is more than 32%.
32% of the population of children and adolescents have never been to school and this is particularly true in the rural area and on the Caribbean Coast.
One of every 10 children has suffered situations of violence in their families according to the report of SIETE.
316,000 children and adolescents are working in order to survive and are exposed to situations of sexual abuse, physical harm, pornography, and economic exploitation.
10% or 1,800,000 of the economically active population are children and adolescents.
Youth
Nicaragua is a country with an estimated population of 5,205,018 inhabitants, of which 72% are persons under 30 years of age. The country is primarily composed of youth. Of this percentage, 23.5% (1,222,099) are between 18 and 30 years of age and of this number 613,584, more than half, are women. 59.7% of the total population of adolescents and youth of the country live in zones considered urban and the rest live in the rural areas.
The majority of the adolescents who work in the urban zone do so in the streets or in markets and work in the informal sector such as selling from street to street without a fixed shop, guarding buildings, washing cars, collecting castoffs from garbage cans in markets, at bus stops and stop lights, etc.
The adolescents who work in rural zones do so in all the agricultural fields and chicken farms which is to say in the production of coffee, bananas, tobacco, sugar cane, etc.
The situation of adolescents and you in reference to health is determined by the deficient conditions of bathrooms within homes and in the community in which they live. This goes along with the low coverage and quality of health services and the wide levels of poverty.
There exist considerable rates of death and dying. There are few specialists to attend to the illnesses of
young people, availability medicines is minimal and free health services are not fulfilled as they were established by the Constitution and finally the infrastructure of health care has deteriorated.
The research of “The Empty Desk” carried out by the Special Ministry of Justice for Children and Adolescents of the PDDH cites information from UNICEF and other organisms showing that the general rate of illiteracy is at least 32%. The net rates are 17.2% on the preschool level, 75.2% on the primary level and 27.3% on the secondary level
On other educational levels only 3.9% of youth have access to a technical education and 6.4% to a university education.
Producers and Products of the Farming Region
Vulnerability cuts across the entire country in regard to conditions of: productivity, environment, economics and politics. On the rural level, the poverty increases because of the declining environment and the poverty of the society, through the loss of biodiversity and water sources, the massive and accelerated depreciation, poor usage of the soul, deforestation of mountain slopes and the indiscriminate use of natural resources as a strategy of survival.
The progressive government’s abandonment of the farm sector in the last 15 years has motivated within Cantera it intervention directed toward diminishing the flight from the farmland to the city, with the conviction that alternative possibilities of production exist in order to improve the levels of nutrition and the quality of life on the farm. As a consequence of this abandonment, thousands of families have sought as the only alternative for survival, work in the free zones or migration.
Women 
Children and Adolescents 
Youth 
Producers and Products of the Farming Region