Year: 2015
Grantee Highlight: Wealth for Smallholder Women Peanut Farmers in Muwena
Grantee Highlight: Wealth for Smallholder Women Peanut Farmers in Muwena
Women smallholder farmers comprise an average of 43 percent of the agricultural labour force of developing countries. In Africa in particular, many communities depend on women to grow most of the food they eat, yet they continue struggle with lack of access to capital, land, agricultural inputs, tools and technology needed to move up to large scale farming.
In Muwena, a town of Livingstone Province in the South of Zambia, Women smallholder farmers have been cultivating peanut on a small scale using traditional outmoded means for consumption and sale. However these methods prevent the women from earning any meaningful income to meet their social needs and ensure household food security.
In 2014 Children with Future in Zambia (CWFiZ) a local NGO working to promote the economic and social welfare of vulnerable groups, particularly women and orphans, received a grant from the African Women’s Development (AWDF) for a capacity building project for women farmers in Muwena.
CWFiZ, worked with 225 women smallholder peanut farmers, training them in improved farming methods and the processing and marketing of peanut to increase the efficiency of their farm business.The project aimed to facilitate a transformation of peanut farming in the Muwena community to achieve a greater degree of food security among selected women smallholder farmers while increasing competitiveness in the domestic markets.
The program sought to build the skills of smallholder women farmers, training them in improved production and post-harvest handling practices that include improved plant seed varieties and access to quality agricultural inputs, tools and support services.
The project also provided women smallholder farmers with a peanut butter processing plant and a housing facility. The women have come out with test peanut butter products which were exhibited at fair in Lusaka in June 2015. The product has attracted a lot of attention from consumers, a positive sign for the women cultivators and processors.
The label of the peanut butter has the inscription ‘Nsabo Yetu’, meaning ‘our wealth,’ reflective of the benefit derived from the women’s hard work. The product has been certified awaiting large scale production and marketing.
Join us in supporting work like this by making a contribution to AWDF today!
Male, Person Living with HIV (PLHIV)
Male, Person Living with HIV (PLHIV)
…most people assume that someone with AIDS is immoral. They do not realize that there are other ways of transmission. They simply believe that if someone has AIDS, they must have acquired it through immoral behaviour. They associate you with criminals and hence discriminate against you”
Grantee Highlight: Tuli Wamu Nawe- Fighting Stigma and Discrimination to end the spread of HIV/AIDS
Grantee Highlight: Tuli Wamu Nawe- Fighting Stigma and Discrimination to end the spread of HIV/AIDS
Public Health Ambassadors Uganda (PHAU), a not-for-profit youth-led organisation, and a grantee of the African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF), is running an anti-HIV stigma and discrimination project focusing specifically on young women and girls living with HIV/AIDS in Uganda. Dubbed “Tuli Wamu Nawe,” meaning “We are together with You”, the project aims to use peer education and training to help share knowledge about the effects of stigma and discrimination on young women and girls’ HIV/AIDS prevention, care and treatment efforts in Uganda. Additionally, the experiences keeps women and girls from actively participating in the social, economic and political development of their local communities and the country at large.
Under the Tuli Wamu Nawe project, 25 women and girls with HIV/AIDS will be mentored and assisted with setting-up sustainable income generation activities (IGA). PHAU will work to forge partnerships with key community stakeholders and train peer educators and volunteers in HIV education activities to ensure that change is sustained long-term. The project will benefit 5 selected communities within Wakiso and Kampala districts.
Follow the project activities on the PHAU social media platforms: Facebook, Twitter, YouTube using the following hashtags #TuliWamuNawe #AcceptMe #EmbraceMe #WomenandGirlsagainstStigma. The project has also been featured on Women Deliver’s blog.
Some of PHAU’s other HIV/AIDS awareness education campaigns:
2015 International Women’s Day: Make it Happen campaign focusing on young women and girls
International Condom Day 2015 : ‘Condoms are Cool’ campaign
Join us in supporting work like this by making a contribution to AWDF today!
Rachel Dliwayo
Rachel Dliwayo
“I learnt that it’s never the victim’s fault to be raped”
Grantee Spotlight: Boxgirls Kenya wins International Award for Outstanding Work
Grantee Spotlight: Boxgirls Kenya wins International Award for Outstanding Work
Monday 16 November 2015
PRESS RELEASE: Kenyan girl-led charity wins international award for outstanding work
Local charity Boxgirls Kenya is one of just 20 organisations from around the world to receive an inaugural With and For Girls Award.
The With and For Girls Awards is a global initiative to identify and support strong local organisations working with and for girls.
The charity – based in Nairobi, Kenya – is recognised for its work to create positive change by using sports to challenge stereotypes related to gender and sport.
Boxgirls Kenya will receive the Award at a London ceremony on Monday 16 November 2015, where representatives from the winning organisations will attend along with people from a range of foundations, multilateral agencies, INGOs and prominent influencers within the sector.
Nairobi is a dangerous place to be a girl. During the post-election violence in 2008, many girls and women from Boxgirls Kenya’s community were raped and left traumatised.
An increase in sexual violence, combined with no platform for girls’ voices to be heard, has left young women from this community vulnerable.
Most girls drop out of school due to poverty and girls lack access to quality healthcare.
Boxgirls Kenya provides over 1,000 girls with healthcare services, leadership and entrepreneurship skills.
The organisation trains female boxing coaches and life skills facilitators who are then equipped to run weekly sports training sessions for girls across the community.
Boxgirls Kenya also campaigns for girls to remain in school until they complete their education and engages community members with its work, harnessing their involvement in demanding the rights of girls.
The organisation has championed Kenyan women in sports and one beneficiary, Elizabeth Andiego, was the first female boxer to represent Kenya at the London 2012 Olympic Games.
Muna Wehbe, CEO of Stars Foundation – “Despite the critical role that women and girls play in sustainable development, the World Bank estimates that less than two cents of every dollar spent on international aid is directed towards adolescent girls. The With and For Girls Award provides flexible funding to grassroots girl-focused NGOs, empowering them to invest their funds where they need them most. We want to shine a spotlight on these outstanding local organisations and encourage more funders to support girls in their role as vital agents of change within our sector.”
As part of the award package, Boxgirls Kenya will receive US$15,000 of flexible funding and capacity building support.
ENDS