Every month, a girl in Nigeria decides whether to go to school. Not because she doesn't want to. Because she has no way to manage her period safely once she's there, and the risk of leaking through her uniform in front of her classmates feels worse than falling behind. This is period poverty, and it's one of the largest hidden drivers of the gender gap in education.
What "period poverty" actually means
Period poverty isn't just about not being able to afford pads. It's the combination of three things working against a girl at once: the cost of menstrual products relative to household income, the absence of clean water and private toilets at school, and the stigma that keeps periods a taboo subject at home and in the classroom. Any one of these can push a girl out of class. Together, they push many girls out of school entirely.
The numbers in Nigeria
The scale of the problem is easy to underestimate until you see it laid out.
37M
Nigerian girls and women without reliable access to menstrual products
23%
Of adolescent girls in Nigeria have missed school due to menstruation (UNICEF, 2023)
24%
Average share of the school year lost to period-related absence (World Economic Forum)
1 in 10
Girls across Africa miss school specifically during their period
Sources: UNICEF (2023), World Economic Forum, UNESCO-cited regional estimates.
These absences compound. Teachers move on to new material every day, so a girl who misses three or four days a month falls behind in a way that's hard to recover from without extra support. Over a full school year, that gap shows up in test scores, in confidence, and eventually in whether a girl stays enrolled at all.
Why it keeps girls out of school specifically
Cost is only part of the story. A pack of pads can take up a meaningful share of a low-income household's weekly budget, so families under pressure often deprioritize it. But even where products are available, many schools lack private, clean toilets, which makes managing a period during the school day difficult or unsafe. Layer on stigma — periods still aren't openly discussed in many homes or classrooms — and a girl is left to solve a monthly logistics problem alone, with no supplies, no facilities, and no one to ask.
What Treasure Care is doing about it
Every subscription box sold through Treasure Care funds the Red Basket Project — baskets of menstrual supplies, delivered directly into schools, alongside basic menstrual health education. Alongside that, Halo & Flow runs workshops and community conversations designed to take the stigma out of the topic entirely, because supplies alone don't fix a problem that's partly cultural.
Help fill the next 1,000 baskets
Every $20 covers one complete basket for a student. Every subscription box does the same, automatically.
Frequently asked questions
What is period poverty?
Period poverty is the lack of reliable access to menstrual products, clean water, private sanitation, and menstrual education, driven by cost, stigma, and inadequate school facilities. It forces many girls to miss school, use unsafe substitutes, or manage their periods in unsafe or undignified conditions.
How many girls in Nigeria miss school because of their period?
A 2023 UNICEF report found that roughly 23% of adolescent girls in Nigeria had missed school due to menstruation, and separate estimates cited by the World Economic Forum put average lost school time at around 24% of the school year for affected girls.
How does Treasure Care help fight period poverty?
Treasure Care sells organic period products online, and directs a portion of every sale into the Red Basket Project, which delivers baskets of menstrual supplies and education directly into schools in underserved communities in Nigeria and Canada.