P a g e | 11  The establishment of the Child Grants Program in 2008 aimed at enabling children to remain residing with their families where parents or guardians could not afford to continue caring for them. Conditional Cash Grants require parents to routinely immunise their babies in order to receive the payment, again reducing infanticide. Another of the conditions for payment is that the children in the household must have good school attendance records.  Shortly after the enactment of the CPW Act the MoSD was formed as a separate line Ministry which is mandated with the protection of children as well as adults and children with disabilities. This allowed the GoL to further encourage the positive cultural practices and regulate the negative ones. Discouragement of negative practices:  There are some traditional customs practiced by Basotho which are detrimental to the well-being of children. As already mentioned, the circumcision of boys in ritualistic ceremonies can cause severe disfigurement and even death where the boy bleeds out. There are some community concerns regarding the attitudes of boys towards women, following the boy’s involvement in the initiation ceremony.  Boys are also frequently deprived of their education when they are forced to herd livestock. This requires the child to stay in quite remote areas, with only his animals and little food or proper shelter. Lesotho’s heavy snowfall in mountain areas during winter months means boys herding have been known to die from hypothermia. Their lack of nutrient rich food also leads to stunting of their bodies and impedes their brain development.  Birthing in the home is still widely practiced in the rural areas in Lesotho, despite provision of alternative mid-wifery in most rural clinics. The causes of this are a combination of women being skeptical of the cost of using a hospital or clinic, as well as an inability to travel the long distances from their home to a clinic once in labour. Traditional women still return to their home District to birth their child – particularly their first born.  When a girl child is raped she is often forced by her family and community members to marry her rapist. This is to lessen the stigma attached to the rape victim and her family following the rape. By the girl marrying her perpetrator, some face is saved.  Young girls are also abducted and forced to marry their abductors. These are practices which are still culturally acceptable, primarily in rural areas. Girls can also be withdrawn from school in order to provide domestic help in the family home, depriving them of the ability to gain an education and potentially break the cycle of poverty.