Peru is a country of enormous potential - and enormous inequality. Monetary poverty affected 29% of the population in 2023, with children bearing a disproportionate share: 38.5% of minors in Peru live below the poverty line. In rural and indigenous communities, the gap is even wider.
Save the Children has worked in Peru for more than 40 years. We focus on the children most at risk: those growing up in remote mountain communities, those whose schools lack safe water and sanitation, and those facing violence at home or in their communities. Alongside local partners and community organisations, we're working to change that - for good.
Updated June 2026
Rosita* is a 16-year-old teenager living in a rural community in Peru. She faces daily challenges related to hygiene, health and access to water, in an environment where diseases such as dengue fever are common and there is a lack of adequate services.
Children and climate: a growing crisis
Climate change is not a future threat for children in Peru. It is happening now. Cyclones, floods and the intensifying El Niño phenomenon are damaging schools and health centres, destroying crops and spreading disease.
In 2023, Peru recorded its worst dengue epidemic in over a decade. At least 50 children died and another 80,300 children were infected with the virus - a crisis driven in large part by the El Niño phenomenon, which brought torrential rains, floods and rising temperatures across the country's northern regions. The dengue-carrying mosquito thrives in exactly the warm, waterlogged conditions that climate change is making more frequent.
Children in Peru are not waiting to be saved - they are speaking up. In 2025, a group of young campaigners supported by Save the Children met with Peru's Vice Minister of Environment ahead of COP30. Their ideas, including an Emergency Fund for climate-related emergencies, helped shape the Peru Local Conference of Youth Declaration, which fed into the Global Youth Statement delivered at COP30. Kamila, 16, put it simply: "We want a clean Peru with sustainable opportunities for all children. We shouldn't pass on a problem, we should pass on a better future."
Child protection under threat
In Peru, one in five mothers resorts to physical violence as a form of discipline, with rates nearly double in rural areas compared to urban settings. Throughout 2024, the Women's Emergency Centres in Peru handled 58,341 cases of violence against children and women.
Save the Children works through local partner Paz y Esperanza to provide emergency child protection to children assessed as being at high or medium risk of serious harm, as well as to women and girls who have experienced gender-based violence. In 2025, this work was put at direct risk by global aid cuts - with 24 children and 16 women and girls facing the potential loss of the protection services keeping them safe.
We are calling urgently for funding to continue this life-saving work. Find out how global aid cuts are affecting children.
Rosita*, 16, reads a booklet about dignified menstruation with her father Felipe*
Clean water, safe schools and menstrual dignity
In rural communities across Peru, something as basic as access to clean water can determine whether a child stays in school. Rosita*, a 16-year-old from a community in northern Peru, knows this first-hand. Before Save the Children's "Water for All" project reached her school, there were no working toilets, no running water, and no privacy - making it especially difficult for girls and young women to attend during their periods.
"There were days when I didn't go to the bathroom all day because there was no water and the bathrooms were dirty," Rosita told us.
Save the Children installed proper sanitation facilities, chlorine dosing pumps for clean drinking water, and ran educational sessions on menstrual dignity - breaking down myths that had long kept girls at home. "Seeing that they talked normally about menstruation made me feel safe," Rosita said. "My doubts were cleared up."
This is what lasting change looks like: not just infrastructure, but dignity, confidence and the chance to stay in school.
Education for every child
Education is at the heart of everything we do in Peru. We work to ensure that indigenous children can learn in the Quechua language, that children with disabilities are welcomed and supported in classrooms, and that girls in remote areas have the same access to quality learning as anyone else.
Our reading programmes have improved literacy for thousands of children. We work with teachers, parents and local authorities to build educational communities that are inclusive, safe, and resilient to climate shocks - from improved school buildings to psychosocial support that helps children learn even when the world around them feels uncertain.
Between 2022 and 2024, Save the Children Peru positively impacted more than 305,980 people - either by addressing their humanitarian needs or involving them in development processes.
Frequently asked questions
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What is Save the Children doing in Peru right now?
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Save the Children works across Peru on child protection, clean water and sanitation, education, and climate resilience. In partnership with local organisations, we provide emergency child protection services for children at high risk of harm, run WASH programmes to improve access to safe water and sanitation in schools, and support young people to advocate for their rights - including at international events like COP30. Our work is under pressure due to global aid cuts, and we are actively seeking funding to continue life-saving programmes.
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Why is Peru a priority for Save the Children?
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Despite progress in recent decades, 38.5% of children in Peru still live in poverty. The country faces compounding crises: climate-driven floods and dengue outbreaks, high rates of violence against children, and significant inequality between rural and urban communities and between indigenous and non-indigenous populations. Save the Children has worked in Peru for over 40 years and is focused on reaching the children most left behind by these systems.
Names marked with * have been changed to protect identities.
