Monday, November 30, 2009

Climate Change Conference 2009


Un artiste met en place la femme obèse avec le symbole national danois «La Petite Sirène» durant le COP15, la conférence climatique.

La sculpture de bronze de trios mètres de haut ’Survival of the fattest’ est mise en place dans l´eau près de la sirène. Installée par l´artiste danois Jens Galschiot. L´érrection de la sculpture est une partie de l´événement d´art SevenMeters.net. En confrontant la gentille sirène irréaliste avec la figurine double-standard Justitia du monde réel, Galschiot veut mettre l´accent sur l´hypocrisie dans le débat sur le climat.

Jusqu´au lendemain de la conférence (COP15) la sculpture restera en place afin de confronter et d´instaurer un dialogue avec les nombreux touristes et participants de la conférence qui passeront par «La Petite Sirène» durant cette période. Cela leur apportera de qoui penser.
La sculpture ’Survival of the Fattest’ représente une figurine Justitia en surpoids, qui est assise sur le dos d´un home africain mince et usé, qui a de l´eau des hanches aux pieds.
C´est le symbole du double standard et du pharisaïsme du monde riche. Avec sa balance dans la main, elle est assise sur le dos de l´homme affamé (Tiers Monde), et en même temps elle fait semblant d´exercer la justice et de faire ce qui est le meilleur pour lui.
L´artiste fait dire à la dame obèse: “Je suis assise sur le dos d´un homme. Il croule sous le fardeau. Je ferais n´importe quoi pour l´aider. Sauf descendre de son dos”. Justitia (déesse occidentale de la justice)
Le Monde Occidental et les danois sont assis comme la Petite Sirène sur un rocher ou come la dame obèse, à une distance de sécurité de la montée des eaux. Nous sommes heureux et sûrs, d´avoir l´économie et les resources nécessaire pour nous prévenir des changements climatiques. Pendant ce temps les états des iles sont balayés par des inondations, tandis que des ouragans, des sécheresses et des famines frappent le reste du monde – notamment l´Afrique et l´Asie.
« Les changements climatiques sont causés par la grande consommation des ressources dans le Monde Occidental. Les changements climatiques peuvent seulement être stoppés si le Monde Occidental commence à investir massivement dans une production d´énergie sans CO2 et dans une production durable. En dépit de ce fait nous ne changerons pas notre manière de vivre et nous ne ferons pas vraiment de différence. Au contraire, tout les gouvernements du Monde Occidental appellant leurs citoyens à commencer une nouvelle orgie de consommation afin de sortir de la crise financière.
Les Nations Unies envisagent 200 millions de réfugiés climatiques dans les 40 prochaines années. Cela va entraîner de grands changements démographiques dans le monde entier, de sorte que de nombreuses sociétés risquent de s´effondrer, incluant des guerres civiles et des instabilités, ce qui causera encore plus de réfugiés et de ce fait encore plus de problèmes sociétaux.Ce cercle vicieux peut seulement être évité en stoppant le réchauffement climatique et en s´organisant massivement pour aider les pays déjà touchés par la crise climatique,” conclut Galschiot.
Evénement d´art SevenMeters (peut être vue du 13 novembre au 19 décembre)
Survival of the Fattest est une partie de SevenMeters.net. Installations d´art par Jens Galschiot qui mettent en lumière la question du climat sous different angles, en coopération avec différents acteurs parmi peoplesclimateaction.dk et Illumenarts.dk. L´accent est mis en particulier sur les conséquences pour les peuples de la Terre et sur le sens des changements démographiques pour nos sociétés.
- Le pouls de la Terre (à la station de métro du Bella Centre, à l´entrée du COP15). La sculpture « le Messager » de 4½ mètres de haut, compte les nouveaux réfugiés climatiques sur un écran, tandis que les fossés sous le métro remplis de sculpture représentant des « enfants affamés » de taille humaine. L´installation entière et l´actuel métro sont éclairés de rouge, par la pulsation de lumières DEL, qui suit le “pouls” géologique de la Terre et qui est longue de plus de 300 mètres.
- ’Freedom to Pollute’ (La Liberté de Polluer) (La grande colline à Amager Fælled). Une copie de la Statue de la Liberté de 6 mètres de haut, qui envoie de la fumée par la torche.
- Les Réfugiés Errant (par le Bella centre) sont 3 sculptures aux visages en cuivre, de 10 mètres de haut, qui représentent des femmes africaines portant de longues robes de couleurs criardes. Elles sont mises en place dans une zone ressemblant à la savane, rappelant les réfugiées soudanaises.
- ‘Survival of the Fattest’ ( La Survie du plus Gros ) (dans l´eau près de la Petite Sirène). La sculpture confronte ‘La Petite Sirène‘ et l´auto-perception danoise avec la déesse de la justice du monde réel.
- ‘Balancing Act’ (au parc du palace Christiansborg et autres lieux) sont 10 statues, chacune en équilibre sur des poteaux de 7 à 15 mètres de haut. Elles ont été faites à l´occasion de la Décennie des Nations Unies pour l'éducation au service du développement durable (DEDD, 2005-2014) en collaboration avec Eco-net.dk.
- La ligne 7 meters à Copenhague (seulement du 6 au 18 décembre) est une visualisation de l´augmentation du niveau des mers de 7 mètres, si toute la glace du Groenland fond. Sur une distance de 24 kilomètres à Copenhague des milliers de lumières clignotantes rouges marquent le nouveau niveau potentiel de l´eau d´une hauteur de 7 mètres.
Le sculpteur Jens Galschiot (DK) est l´initiateur de SevenMeters.net. Galschiot est réputé pour plusieurs manifestations d´art internationales provoquant une réflexion, axées sur des questions mondiales.
Contactez. www.aidoh.dk , tél +45 6618 4058 / +45 4044 7058, aidoh@aidoh.dk
Contacts pour www.SevenMeters.net: Tél +45 6618 4058 / +45 6170 3083, Fax +45 6618 4158, e-mail: mail@SevenMeters.net,
Photos (gratuites) de le dame obèse ( www.SevenMeters.net). www.SevenMeters.net/bigerection, http://SevenMeters.net/links/6/
Videos (gratuites) de la ré-érection. www.aidoh.dk/Up-again, www.osrtv.dk
Contact pour Jens Galschiot, tél. +45 6618 4058, mobile +45 4044 7058
Mail: aidoh@aidoh.dk, info: www.aidoh.dk
Plus d´informations: infos: SevenMeters.net
Photos: http://SevenMeters.net/links/6/ tél. +45 6170 3083 / +45 6618 4058
Documents des photos professionnelles de la mise en place de la Sirène:
Niels Madsen, mobile: 40 215 415, nillermadsen@mail.tele.dk, www.osrtv.dk

Saturday, October 31, 2009

CAMLINK Farmers Club


Partner of producers and consumers of the agricultural sector
By James Achanyi-Fontem
WHO IS CAMLINK?
CAMLINK is a not-for-profit and non governmental organization for empowering the farmers and consumers to bring about a mutually benefiting relationship and to protect their interests and rights. The head office of CAMLINK is in Grand Hangar – Bonaberi, Douala City neighbourhood, Littoral Region of Cameroon.

OBJECTIVE
CAMLINK strives to achieve Millennium Development Goals No. 1, 3, 7 and 8 by researching on the problems faced by farmers and consumers in Cameroon, and seeking durable solutions to overcome the regularly occurring difficulties.

METHOLODY
It uses Joint Community Effort, Information and Communication Technologies (World Wide Web and SMS) to mitigate and eradicate difficulties faced by farmers.

WHAT ARE THE PROBLEMS?

“The Farmers' Plight” is a problem. This is wangled with exploitation from middlemen, illiteracy, hostile climatic conditions, inaccessible farm to market roads, high cost of transportation, pest attacks, lack of transformation machinery, poor farming techniques, ill health, inadequate finance, lack of preservation facilities, insecure and unstable market trends, large price fluctuations and having to deal directly with fewer consumers amongst others.
Women constitute a majority of the farmers in rural areas, where the problems of gender inequalities are very visible in the distribution of gains. CAMLINK Farmer Club believes that the missing piece in the puzzle can be found in information made available to farmers and consumers through the use of Joint Community Effort and the ICT (World Wide Web and SMS).

MISSION
The mission is to connect, coordinate, and inform stakeholders in the agriculture sector (farmers, consumers, civil society, government authorities, etc.) with the use of ICT (World Wide Web and SMS) to seek solutions to food shortages, poverty and gender inequalities.

OUR VISION
CAMLINK Challenges the ideas that underadvantaged people should continually depend on aid packages. It buys the idea of the Chinese proverb, "Give a man fish, and you feed him for a day, but teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime". It also buys Farm Radio International policy of sharing ideas and finding solutions. CAMLINK seeks to replicate this idea within farming communities. The organization strives to achieve by giving rural peasant farmers simple tools that inform and empower stakeholders in agriculture.
It recognizes that the government has done a lot already and is still willing to do more to help combat “The Farmers' Plight”, and this project aims at giving the government a phase lift by making:
Cameroon a major exporter of farm produce,
Farm produce are regarded with such high esteem as their counterparts in the fashion industry,
Create supermarkets for farm produce,
Eliminate waste in the agricultural sector, etc.
Promote Gender Equality through information, education and communication

PROJECT OUTCOME:

The project outcomes are enormous and exhaustive:
Promote and achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) n° 1, 3, 7 and 8
Expand Cameroon's Agricultural Markets
Reduce Scamming in Cameroon and Secure the Markets
Foster price stability in the Markets
Reduce Waste in the agricultural sector
Enforce food safety
Enhance Food Preservation
Educate Farmers
Inform stakeholders
Provide financial Assistance
Producers and Consumers time savings
Foster Just-In-Time Harvesting
Reduce Transportation costs
Foster Exchange of ideas amongst farmers
Enforce Coordination in the Agricultural sector
Encourage local consumption
Provide new employment opportunities
Encourage agricultural Livelihood
Promote efficient use of existing infrastructure
Reduce Rural-Urban migration
Develop a global partnership for development
AGRICULTURAL MARKET INFORMATION SERVICES PROJECT
CAMLINK is a not-for-profit and non governmental organisation working with farmers and consumers for the protection of their rights. The organisation’s objective falls in line with Millennium Development Goals No. 1, 3, 7, 8. CAMLINK researches on the problems faced by farmers and consumers in the rural communities of Cameroon and seek durable solutions together for overcoming regular occurring difficulties. In some parts, seasonal roads make it impossible for agricultural field workers to make frequent trips to monitor farmers' activities, while in other parts it is the hostile climatic and environmental conditions that hinder good yields. The use of ICT is relevant for circulation of frequent alerts on the positive and adverse situations throughout the country at all moments, to up date farmers before, during and after the planting season.
This project is hinged on the premise that the lack of access to immediate information is the reason why farmers and consumers alike fall short of satisfying their quests. African farmers on the one hand strive to increase the continent’s food production and make economic gains for themselves through farming in the expectation that consumers would just “stumble” upon their products “with pockets full of money”. Unfortunately this has not been the case, as farmers work hard and end up either destroying their ecosystem through uninformed farming practices thereby unwittingly destroying their dreams to prosperity on the one hand, and on the other hand depriving consumers “with pockets full of money” the opportunity to avail themselves of these products, stay clear of famine and contribute towards fulfilling the farmers’ quest to economic posterity.
Project Overview
This project is about delivering educative and informative SMS messages to farmers and consumers that would enable them connect directly and do business. It is intended to seek funds and expertise that will enable the team fulfill the wishes of the rural populations within some enclave isolated English speaking communities in Cameroon.
The rural communities in question are dominantly peasant farmers and consumers within localities close to South West and North West region. Information and education on the use of pesticides has been found to be lacking and this is vital for the health of their crops and up grading the soil. These farmers also need information about available markets and consumers demanding their products.
This approach aims at improving their economic situation, reducing the poverty level and promoting responsible farming practices in areas not readily accessible by agricultural field workers.
The strategies and approach applied in CAMLINK has been used in the banking and transport sectors in Cameroon with great success,  and there is no doubt that it will be productive to replicate it. Associating the strategy with existing infrastructures of mobile communication, the simple tools of Information and Communication Technologies would positively affect farmers and consumers as well.
The advent of the internet, websites and satellite technologies though very effective as tools of modern communications  fall out of the range of these actors for two reasons: either farmers and consumers do not know how to exploit them, or that they cannot afford the cost of getting connected and finding the information they need. The proliferation of websites that document information about farm products and consumers therefore does little or nothing to remedy this situation. Therefore, this proposal reposes entirely on SMS messaging to all actors involved because it is more instantaneous than other applications in use.
Outreach Field Research
CAMLINK has already undertaken an intensive field research on in puts. The results point to the need for a Market Information Service for Cameroon’s rural populations with low income earning power. Exchange working sessions have been organized with authorities of the agriculture public sector and leaders of other partner NGOs involved in the collection of useful data to be provided to farmers and consumers.
CAMLINK interviewed the petit traders interested and willing to collaborate once the service becomes operational. These middle men are mostly those who look for market outlets that farmers scout on permanent basis..
Before take off of this service link with farmers, workshops have to be organised to capacitate staff and stakeholders of the project. To lay the foundation, CAMLINK already discussed with experts in mushroom and snail farming. These experts have accepted to share their knowledge with us and farmers during planned workshops. These partners are only waiting the announcement of take off dates for the training.
The data collected so far shows the extent at which CAMLIK Farmers Club project would serve as a potential employer of many school leavers to serve as relay and community education agents at different levels. The out come will be the reduction of rural exodus and the current massive rural-urban migration. 
GENESIS OF CAMLINK Farmers Club Project
It all started with a keen observation of what is happening around us.
Scenario 1 
If you go to the urban towns and cities, where a majority of inhabitants are employed by some industry or state-run corporation, you are likely to see a handful of individuals who practice farming as a hobby. Every week-end, they go behind their houses, and tend after their small gardens of assorted vegetables, etc. In case some pests or fungi attack their farm, they walk down the street to a cybercafé and Google out information about this unusual occurrence that threatens their gardens. Sometimes they receive information that enables them solve the problem .Yet they do not depend on those small gardens behind the house for subsistence. It is just a hobby. So when they receive their salaries, they go to nearby markets to buy food from farmers whose agricultural activities provide food for them all year round. 
Scenario 2
A majority of inhabitants in the rural areas practice agriculture as their only profession to earn a living. Cut off from daily information by bad roads, and the absence of modern tools of communication, they blindly work their way through dense forests, turning them into farmlands, and rely on the whims of nature for a good harvest. A majority of these farmers are ignorant of existing opportunities, lack the knowledge of good planning and do not receive information that enables them contain pest outbreaks. They are not even familiar with sustainable farming methods. Training workshops to boost food production hardly take place in the villages. These peasants invest their energy and money on vast acres of farmland with the expectation that a bountiful harvest will enable them sell their produce to city dwellers, enrich themselves, send their children to school, or pay for a visit to the doctor when they fall sick. When disaster that could have been averted through information strikes their farms, everyone in the family and community is affected directly or indirectly. Children drop out of school; the city dwellers do not receive their regular supplies and suffer through price hikes brought about by food shortages and scarcity. Life becomes difficult for everybody and the stage is set for new idle farmers' families and hungry city dwellers to engage in whatever activity it takes to make provisions for them. 
A Hungry Man is an Angry Man 
 Today it is fishermen turned pirates off the coast of the Indian Ocean. They wreck havoc, take hostages and demand huge ransoms. These criminal acts undermine the authority of their state and destabilize the socio-political institutions. They disrupt the peace and harmony not only of Somali People, as the impact of their lawless pursuits is attracting and having global impact. This is not right. Tomorrow, it might be the farmer anywhere in rural Africa, Asia or Eastern Europe resorting to lawless acts because their once cherished profession no longer yields them the benefits expected. To have hundreds of thousands of disenchanted farmers and consumers taking the easy way to riches through lootings and other criminal acts paints a very grim picture of our world. Yet these hard working men and women would not engage in deviant behaviour if they were not hungry. Yes, angry consumers will not become lawless in these times of economic recession if they received information about sources of abundant food supply that would make them spend less and live better. Farmers or consumers become angry when they can no longer satisfy their basic needs. Something needs to be done about the current situation for us to live in peace.  
VISION OF CAMLINK
CAMLINK Challenges the ideas that under advantaged people should continually depend on aid packages. It buys the idea of the Chinese proverb, "Give a man fish, and you feed him for a day, but teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime". CAMLINK seeks to replicate this idea within farming communities. This, the organisation strives to achieve by giving rural peasant farmers simple tools that inform and empower them. CAMLINK is conscious of the fact that access to internet offers a broad range of opportunities though it is not ignorant about the huge costs involved in procuring these computer jewels that facilitate Information and Communication exchange. It is for this reason that CAMLINK proposes direct instant SMS messaging to the mobile phones of farmers because these are the very tools the farmers themselves possess.
OBJECTIVE
Develop a global partnership for development - Develop an open trading and financial system that is rule-based, predictable and non-discriminatory, including a commitment to good governance, development and poverty reduction-nationally and internationally.
Description
The project team is going to be dealing with people who are advanced in age in most cases and are parents. We need all the subtlety the situation demands as we strive to meet the needs of the different farming communities.
We shall also need to learn public relation techniques that enable people to meet the different stake holders within Government and Civil society in Cameroon.
Sustainability Model
The farmers will subscribe for a token to receive SMS and this shall be used for a start to buy SMS credits to sustain the project. As other farmers and stakeholders get the impact of the initiative, there is no doubt many will respond to the invitation to subscribe to the service and benefit from SMS information and education system. If the project receives small financial support, the information to the farmers will be free of any charge.
Potential obstacles
Obtaining funding for community based projects has been a major obstacle to the expansion of the work of Cameroon Link. Getting the institutions that represent agriculture, trade and industry to cooperate with CAMLINK has also been a challenge. We believe that the recognition and endorsement of our idea as reflective of efforts to eradicate poverty and reduce dependence shall enable the Cameroon government and international funding institutions to give us the needed support.
Project Milestones
There was a field study in Melong, a typical farming community to discuss this project.
CAMLINK acquired SMS credits online to send messages to farmers, and this warmed the hearts of the project team to continue research for sustainability. Now as a team the ambition is to expand the SMS coverage to reach at least 5000 farmers weekly. For this to happen, we need funds to purchase SMS credit and also to create a feedback data base through internet networking. Funds are needed to remain connected by internet permanently. CFA 25.000 is needed every month to remain connected 24/24.
Project Assessment Staff
Agricultural Technicians
These are people with knowledge of farming and agriculture. They will provide the farmers with necessary modern farming techniques and teach them best farming practices. There are quite a number of trained agricultural technicians and CAMLINK only needs to allocate a small allowance to compensate them for service rendered.

Food Processing Engineers and Experts

These are people with knowledge in food processing. They will provide information on effective food handling, processing and conservation methods. They will also carry out quality control of the food put on sale in the markets or for exportation. Quite a good number of trained food and nutrition experts exist in Cameroon and CAMLINK needs only to compensate them for service rendered with the allocation of an allowance.

Software Developers

People in this category will take care of ICT channels and facilities. They will be required to develop Soft wares, websites, etc. to be used by the various operational task force of the CAMLINK Farmers Club Project. Soft ware Developers exist already and CAMLINK needs only an technical allowance to compensate them for service rendered.
Internet Connection
From day one of execution of the CAMLINK project, permanent internet connection at various sites and offices of the project is needed. The internet links will serve to connect sites, villages, towns and cities within Cameroon first and also connect the CAMLINK project to markets in countries abroad. Internet connection will enable web access to the CAMLINK Project website to serve as the main advertising task force of the Project. The importance of a web site presence cannot be over emphasized. To start, funds have to be scouted to get connections operational linking a few key offices of the CAMLINK Project.

Communication Credit

The CAMLINK project will be unable to guarantee that every participant will have net access and computer. But most participants already possess mobile telephone sets. The project therefore takes advantage of this to provide instant messaging service to participants-farmers especially - informing them on possible disaster outbreaks, possible market outlets, buyers/sellers at home and abroad with updates on project activities. CAMLINK is scouting for funds to purchase more appropriate ICT computer servers and communication credit for the computer room in its Douala office.

Digital Cameras
To effectively market the project idea and its produce (farm produce), the project will need digital cameras for uploading samples, adverts, shows, documentary, etc. CAMLINK needs the best cameras and cost effective tools for this service.

Community Offices in Villages, Towns and Cities

For permanent presence and impact, the project needs to set up offices at various sites around the country. To get the peasant farmers more involved, CAMLINK is depending on community farmers’ cooperatives and local radio stations as the focal points in the villages. To enhance this partnership, CAMLINK will assist population during election of their farmers cooperative peer leaders and motivate them with small allowances during training for their installation. This will mean organizing peer education training on the functioning of the system.

Farm Produce Distribution Points in Villages, Towns and Cities

The project will set up distribution points around the country to ease exchange and distribution of produce from the farms in the farmers’ cooperatives. This will facilitate safety and handling. Here is the McDonald idea! If this is the case, we depend on the community, rents, subsidies, and grants to make this possible.

Financial Houses

The project will not need to set up financial houses, but use the farmers’ cooperatives as the Peasant Farmers’ Financial House. This will ease money transfer processes and prepare the farmers for project activities ownership. This will mean selecting members of the community for training on project management and accounting. This system will promote gender and equal opportunities with sharing of tasks between the men and the women. It will encourage peace and unity and consolidate marriages within communities.
The farmers’ cooperative unions or organizations will hold meetings regularly to evaluate progress and farmers can start reducing small loans to expand their activities.

Cybercafés

Consumers have four (4) different ways of placing their orders: Use of internet website, phone calls, Mobile phone SMS and visit at the distribution point. Individuals not using private web access will have to turn to the cybercafés. Cybercafés will be installed in villages with large populations and farm out puts.

Transport Services/Facilities

The project is in need of the services of transporters and transport vehicles to move farmers’ produce from their farms to the cooperatives for those who require this service when the roads are accessible. The produce will later be moved from warehouses to distribution points, from distribution points to consumer homes, from warehouse to warehouse, distribution point to distribution point, warehouse to exportation points. We can make use of the existing cooperative transport system but to avoid regular vehicle break downs and maintenance and delivery problems the project needs vehicles and transport services dedicated for its use alone.

Computers and Accessories
The project will require computers for each office or distribution point to collect data. For the beginning not all points will be computerized. Small holder schemes will be treated manually and processing at the offices and sales points would be centralized. However, computers will greatly facilitate communication and processing of order, requests for supply, registration and book keeping.

Furniture and Equipments
The offices, sales and distribution points will be equipped with furniture. These will include tables, chairs, cupboards, fans, etc. Weighing equipment, balances, loading cranes, trolleys, etc. will be placed in warehouses.

Warehouses around areas of mass production

Warehouses will be located in areas of mass production. These will serve as areas for early preservation and temporal food storage location. Farmers will deposit food items for sale in the ware houses to reduce their transportation problems. The community will provide space for the ware house in each locality as their moral contribution to the project. But the project will construct specialized warehouses where there will be need.

Storage Facilities
Like warehouses and distribution points, the project will construct or rent good storage facilities to handle delicate and perishable food items, without which handling becomes a serious problem.

Initial Funds
For an effective take off of the project activities, funds are needed for community awareness and installation of the initial facilities. For sustainability we require community support, grants, and subsidies including profit derived from the services provided by the project, charity and personal sacrifices.

Legal Advisor
There is a need for a legal advisor to backup the project activities to make sure each phase is guaranteed and covered by law. A lawyer will be hired for rendering legal advice and legal procedures services. The project will make payments for service is rendered by legal advisor.

Administration & Good Governance

The project will employ a good governance administrator to check cheating, stealing, etc. at all levels of the project. The good governance administrator will work in partnership with the required government services for processing transit documents.

Management and Staff

The project will recruit staff based on merit and equal opportunities will be accorded both sexes. Project descriptions will be made public and advertized before selection through tests and interviews.

Sunday, September 27, 2009

Maternal and Child Mortality Reduction

Bringing Men on Board to Reduce Maternal and Child Mortality
By Mantoe Phakathi
Swazi men have very little involvement in caring for newborns and mothers, yet they are critical partners in ensuring their well being. "Getting men involved in maternal and child health care is a serious challenge because of cultural dynamics and practices," said Rejoice Nkambule, the health department’s deputy director of public health services. For example, custom prohibits a Swazi man from physical contact with his newborn baby and its mother for a minimum of six months.

A major grant from the Japan Social Development Fund (JDSF) is now trying to change this. In July,2009 the Japanese government awarded Swaziland $2.57 million over three years to improve maternal and child healthcare programmes in the country. The programme, which is expected to start later in 2009, will be chiefly rolled out in the poverty-stricken Lubombo region in the eastern part of the country.
A key part of the grant will be spent on community mobilisation initiatives aimed at getting men involved in caring for the health of their wives and children. Research has shown that lack of male involvement in maternal and child healthcare slows down the mother’s healing process after giving birth and hinders the development of the baby.
According to Zanele Dlamini, director of the Swaziland Infant Nutrition Action Network (SINAN), a non-governmental organisation that promotes maternal and infant health through breastfeeding, mothers need their partners’ assistance after giving birth because they are usually too weak to handle the baby on their own, and many mothers experience mood swings, hormonal imbalances, insecurity and emotional depression after giving birth.
"When the man shows his partner affection, her stress level goes down and, most importantly, the womb heals faster, reducing chances of developing cervical cancer," said Dlamini. She further explained that fathers also benefit from a close relationship with mother and baby. "For instance, when the father massages her when she is breastfeeding, love circulates among the three people, and the baby will have a strong bond with both parents," said Dlamini. She points out that because Swazi men generally do not participate in antenatal or postnatal care, women become vulnerable to pressure from in-laws to follow traditional practices that are often against health workers’ medical advice.
"What we’ve discovered is that, while we promote exclusive breastfeeding for six months, in-laws force mothers to give their babies traditional medicines and food against the doctor’s advice," said Dlamini. "Men fail to give the women support because they are ignorant about maternal and child health issues."
According to Nkambule, lack of male involvement in maternal and child healthcare contributes to the fact that Swaziland has one of the highest maternal and child mortality rates in the world.
The other main reason for the high mortality rate is HIV/AIDS, as 26 percent of the reproductive age group of 15 to 49 years is HIV-positive, she explains.
A 2009 State of the Swaziland Population report estimates maternal mortality at 589 deaths per 100,000 live births, far beyond the World Health Organisation’s target of 146 deaths per 100,000 live births. The report further puts infant mortality at 85 deaths per 1,000 live births. This is a dramatic increase from 1991 maternal mortality rates, which stood at 229 deaths per 100,000 live births, and 1997 child mortality rates of 78 deaths per 1,000 live births.
What further perpetuates the high numbers of maternal and child mortality – in addition to gender roles and HIV - is the lack of well-trained staff and modern equipment at public health institutions.
"Health issues are very dynamic, which is why we need a vigorous training of health personnel and also update our equipment," said Nkambule.
Health experts criticise the Swazi government for failing to fulfil the Abuja Declaration, signed by African leaders in 2001 in Nigeria, which demands countries to allocate 15 percent of their national budgets to health. Swaziland has currently only allocated 11.5 percent. Family Life Association of Swaziland (FLAS) director, Dudu Simelane, noted that many women, especially in rural areas, die during childbirth because of the absence of emergency obstetric care. "Training of nurses and midwives should include the management of (emergencies)," she said.
Simelane hopes the Japanese grant money, which will also be used to increase the capacity and effectiveness of community health workers with regard to maternal and child healthcare, will help to change the situation. A number of mobile clinics will provide family planning, HIV counselling and testing, sexually transmitted infections care and treatment in rural area

Getting Men On Board

Maternal and Child Mortality
By Mantoe Phakathi, Swaziland
Swazi men have very little involvement in caring for newborns and mothers, yet they are critical partners in ensuring their well being. "Getting men involved in maternal and child health care is a serious challenge because of cultural dynamics and practices," said Rejoice Nkambule, the health department’s deputy director of public health services. For example, custom prohibits a Swazi man from physical contact with his newborn baby and its mother for a minimum of six months.
A major grant from the Japan Social Development Fund (JDSF) is now trying to change this. In July,2009 the Japanese government awarded Swaziland $2.57 million over three years to improve maternal and child healthcare programmes in the country. The programme, which is expected to start later in 2009, will be chiefly rolled out in the poverty-stricken Lubombo region in the eastern part of the country.
A key part of the grant will be spent on community mobilisation initiatives aimed at getting men involved in caring for the health of their wives and children. Research has shown that lack of male involvement in maternal and child healthcare slows down the mother’s healing process after giving birth and hinders the development of the baby.
According to Zanele Dlamini, director of the Swaziland Infant Nutrition Action Network (SINAN), a non-governmental organisation that promotes maternal and infant health through breastfeeding, mothers need their partners’ assistance after giving birth because they are usually too weak to handle the baby on their own, and many mothers experience mood swings, hormonal imbalances, insecurity and emotional depression after giving birth.
"When the man shows his partner affection, her stress level goes down and, most importantly, the womb heals faster, reducing chances of developing cervical cancer," said Dlamini. She further explained that fathers also benefit from a close relationship with mother and baby. "For instance, when the father massages her when she is breastfeeding, love circulates among the three people, and the baby will have a strong bond with both parents," said Dlamini. She points out that because Swazi men generally do not participate in antenatal or postnatal care, women become vulnerable to pressure from in-laws to follow traditional practices that are often against health workers’ medical advice.
"What we’ve discovered is that, while we promote exclusive breastfeeding for six months, in-laws force mothers to give their babies traditional medicines and food against the doctor’s advice," said Dlamini. "Men fail to give the women support because they are ignorant about maternal and child health issues."
According to Nkambule, lack of male involvement in maternal and child healthcare contributes to the fact that Swaziland has one of the highest maternal and child mortality rates in the world.
The other main reason for the high mortality rate is HIV/AIDS, as 26 percent of the reproductive age group of 15 to 49 years is HIV-positive, she explains.
A 2009 State of the Swaziland Population report estimates maternal mortality at 589 deaths per 100,000 live births, far beyond the World Health Organisation’s target of 146 deaths per 100,000 live births. The report further puts infant mortality at 85 deaths per 1,000 live births. This is a dramatic increase from 1991 maternal mortality rates, which stood at 229 deaths per 100,000 live births, and 1997 child mortality rates of 78 deaths per 1,000 live births.
What further perpetuates the high numbers of maternal and child mortality – in addition to gender roles and HIV - is the lack of well-trained staff and modern equipment at public health institutions.
"Health issues are very dynamic, which is why we need a vigorous training of health personnel and also update our equipment," said Nkambule.
Health experts criticise the Swazi government for failing to fulfil the Abuja Declaration, signed by African leaders in 2001 in Nigeria, which demands countries to allocate 15 percent of their national budgets to health. Swaziland has currently only allocated 11.5 percent. Family Life Association of Swaziland (FLAS) director, Dudu Simelane, noted that many women, especially in rural areas, die during childbirth because of the absence of emergency obstetric care. "Training of nurses and midwives should include the management of (emergencies)," she said.
Simelane hopes the Japanese grant money, which will also be used to increase the capacity and effectiveness of community health workers with regard to maternal and child healthcare, will help to change the situation. A number of mobile clinics will provide family planning, HIV counselling and testing, sexually transmitted infections care and treatment in rural area

Sunday, September 13, 2009

Breastfeeding with Men’s Involvement



Rationale of Gender & Breastfeeding
By James Achanyi-Fontem, Cameroon Link
Introducing the issue of gender during the training in Delhi, India last July 2009, Renu khanna, talked about the rationale observing that it is increasingly being recognised that a gender perspective on social issues helps refine action strategies to bring about desired results for social change and equity.
The platform for action resulting from the 4th World Conference on Women in Beijing(1995) and the programme of action of the International Conference for Population and Development (Cairo 1994) legitimised the concerns of women’s movements world over that a woman’s perspective as well as gender perspective is essential in social sector policies and programmes.
Renu Khanna said, a gender approach takes full account of gender differences and responds appropriately to them in the development, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of services in any sector. As such, the training was designed to help breastfeeding advocates to build strategies on gender and breastfeeding in their respective constituencies.
To better understand issues, it was revealed that gender is not sex and vice versa. Sex refers to the biological differences between men and women, while gender refers to roles (behavioural norms) that men and women play and the relations that arise out of these roles. These roles, it should be noted, are socially constructed, not physically determined.
Gender characteristics are relational, change over time, are institutional, vary with ethnicity, class, culture and so on. Gender sensitisation calls for male responsibilities and participation. It aims at promoting gender equality in all spheres of life, including family and community life, and to encourage and enable men to take responsibility for their sexual and reproductive behaviour and their social and family roles.
The importance of male involvement was further reaffirmed in the platform for action adopted at the UN World Conference on Women in Beijing 1995, because gender issues are not the concern of women alone. Helping men understand hoe gender equality benefits them can help them become key allies in creating a more gender-equitable world.
This means that the achievement of gender equality will not be possible without the active involvement and support of men. Gender sensitisation for men is necessary so that interventions for women and girls are not derailed by male resistance.
It is important to make it clear in this contribution that promoting gender equality is not about granting privileges to women while disempowering men. It is all about creating integrated approaches that benefit all. It is about creating a gender equitable and just world.
The gender gap in many countries are so wide that a vast majority of women are poor, illiterate and suffer ill health and poor nutrition, with inadequate education and poor job opportunities. Their low social and economic status hampers their political participation and decision-making.
Very often, the current patterns of domination and inequality are so deeply embedded in cultures and institutions that we do not recognise them and thereby even accept them as the norm. Good examples are violence against women, giving boys more food than girls in a family, unequal pay for women, child care and housework being women’s responsibilities. Women will be empowered only when they enjoy equal treatment and have access to education, economic resources and enjoy good health.
The enhance men’s awareness, Paul Sinnapen emphasised that men have to be sensitised about the existing gender gaps and help them understand gender roles and their impact on social and economic disparity among women. Change in patriarchal mind set and attitudes of men are crucial in bringing about gender justice.
Addressing participants in Delhi, India as breastfeeding advocates, Sarah Amin, Co-Director of WABA, outlined that for a long time breastfeeding promotion has focused on the child, often to the absence of the mother, the woman. She added that breastfeeding is a symbiotic relationship between the mother and the child, and thus any analysis and response or interventions should take into account both persons involved in the act.
According to Sarah Amin, gender inequalities, including the inequalities in health status and access to and use of health services, not only make women’s lives more difficult, they also often make breastfeeding and other tasks, such as child care and nurturing very challenging. Breastfeeding advocates can better support women to breastfed when they understand the causes of gender inequality and know how to analyse and address such unequal conditions.

Thursday, July 30, 2009

SCANDINAVIAN GENDER ROLES


By Yvonne Bekeny in Finland
Gender equality in the Scandinavian countries is a given and manifest reality in almost all aspects of socio-political and economic life in that part of Europe. Family policies are gender sensitive oriented and parenthood policies are instituted such that gender relations are significant at least on the symbolic level. The extent to which this happens in actual sharing of tasks between mothers and fathers is still a question to be researched? Child rights including the rights to provision and care by both parents have been instituted. Scandinavian policies have undergone changes over the years to ensure fathers opportunities to take care of their families (Eydal, B. 2008). Although the mother is ‘the primary parent…the father can be a visiting care assistant’ (Lammi-Taskula in Ellingsater & Leira, 2006). Transferring part of parental leave is negotiated by the parents with no explicit suggestion to change the status-quo of gender relations. The mother’s primacy in childcare remains unchanged. Norway, Sweden and Iceland, have a more clear-cut orientation in promoting father care and roles sharing between women and men in infant care. Lammi-Taskula states tht ‘Finland and Denmark on the other hand have vague positions in striving for gender equality in promoting father care’ (Lammi-Taskula in Ellingsater & Leira, 2006). Fathers take only a small portion of the whole parental leave period in all Scandinavian countries. Nonetheless, these gender balanced duties seem to be conditioned by socio-economic factors in the countries rather than by policy claims. There is a variation within the countries themselves and within the nature of employees; white-collar, blue-collar, minority, well-educated parents all have different views about sharing of duties equally over childcare. Lammi-Taskula maintains that “for large numbers of Nordic parents, unverified assumptions…about economic consequences of equal sharing of parental leave as well as cultural conceptions of gender and parenthood, especially motherhood, hamper negotiations both in the family and in the work place. Unreflected, unequal gender relations are naturalised and remain unchallenged” (Lammi-Taskalu in Ellingsater 2006).
These observations raise questions of the nature and limits to gender equality that the Scandinavian countries can declare. This idea is even more illustrated in the Norwegian context where parental leave arrangements are usually classified as policies enhancing gender equality. However, parental leave can be ambiguous with regard to gender equality objective, both regarding policy rationale and policy impact (Ellingsater in Ellingsater & Leira 2006). National variations of parental leave arrangements actually reflect different purposes, and generally are geared towards encouraging women to stay at home and promoting gender equality by supporting mother’s employment rather than shared responsibility in childcare. This idea is further substantiated by Boje (2006) who posits that even if mothers in all Scandinavian countries have taken up employment in large numbers, the traditionally gendered pattern of responsibility for child care remains in the large majority of families. In his article, he observes that although Denmark and Sweden seem to have the most equal division of caring responsibilities, even ‘the strong political commitment to equality has not fundamentally changed the gendered division of childcare. ‘Progressive and women friendly policies concerning work and family might modify the prevailing gender order but more profound changes can only be accomplished through comprehensive changes in norms and values concerning gender roles ( Boje in Ellingsater & Leira, 2006). Hence, looking at the above analysis it can be said that the question of gender roles in childcare in the Scandinavia is almost still a myth and in as much as the state would want to achieve gender equality in almost all spheres of life, the issue of gender equality in childcare is still a challenge to these states. Eydal (2008) remarks that if this myth could become a reality pretty soon, the new generation of children born in the family where both parents take care of children, will be the ones to break the vicious cycle of gender inequality.

Thursday, June 18, 2009

Gender Training Workshop 2009

By James Achanyi-Fontem
Coordinator-WABA Men’s Initiative
Email: camlink99@gmail.com
The 5th annual WABA-FIAN joint gender training workshop takes place in New Delhi, India from the 6th to 9th July 2009. The training will be delivered by two experts in gender promotion strategies from India and Malaysia, Renu Khanna and Paul Sinnappan.
The joint training workshop aims at enabling some 25 advocates from the breastfeeding and food rights networks to raise awareness and sensitivity on gender issues. Resource persons for lectures and conducting exchange sessions will focus on the gender challenges to breastfeeding and food rights issues. WABA and IBFAN have supported the participation of 12 persons involved in the breastfeeding protection, promotion and support movement.
The World Alliance for Breastfeeding Action, WABA and the Food First Information and Action Network, FIAN, expect the participants to be well sensitized on the concept of gender and gender mainstreaming, after equipping them with tools and skills of gender analysis by the end of the course. The course participants should be able to enable others in their respective regions and countries to develop gender analysis of breastfeeding and rights to adequate food after the training.
This will be realized through the application of gender concepts and tools, and the development of gender sensitive strategies and work plans. Within the context of the training, participants are expected to be able to differentiate between sex and gender, recall dimensions of gender as a system, enumerate and list gender aspects of breastfeeding and rights to adequate food. The men and women should be able to list men’s role and responsibilities in appropriate infant feeding and promotion of rights to adequate food by the end of the training.
Themes to be treated within the week-long workshop include gender and sex, gender as a system, gender aspects of breastfeeding and rights to adequate food, gender analysis frameworks, economic and political contexts of women, men’s involvement, role and responsibilities, gender mainstreaming and gender indicators.
The participatory training methodologies include exercises, games, group discussions and presentations, role plays, experience sharing by participants and others. While Renu Khanna has a Master’s degree in Business Administration from the faculty of management studies from Delhi University, India with over 25 years of experience in health care management and organization development in health organizations, Paul Sinnappan has for the past 10 years been involved in conducting gender training for men in the credit unions, cooperatives, micro credit programmes and non-governmental organizations, NGOs, in Malaysia and South East Asia.
The joint WABA-FIAN gender training workshop initiative began with the introduction of gender concerns by the donor agency, the Canadian Cooperative Association, CCA. Since then, the International Cooperative Association, ICA; the Asian Confederation of Credit Unions, ACCU, and the Asian Women in Cooperative Development Forum, AWCF have become partners in the process of integrating gender in cooperatives in Asia and Pacific region.
The joint WABA-FIAN gender workshop initiative started in 2004. Other resource persons for the training are Flavio Valente of FIAN International from Heldelberg, Germany and Laskshmi Menon from the Association for consumers’ Action on Safety and Health Centre, ACASH, in Mumbai, India. Lakshmi is a consultant to WABA and was also the former co-coordinator of WABA’s Gender Working Group.
WABA’s gender programme goals include:
1. The promotion of gender awareness among breastfeeding advocates and mainstreaming of the gender perspective in breastfeeding advocacy and programmes.
2. The promotion of collaboration between the breastfeeding movement and the women’s movement, in order to strengthen the common advocacy goals of both movements; and to undertake joint advocacy, education and training on women’s rights, health and breastfeeding.
3. To increase participation of men in domestic work, child care and provide breastfeeding support, to raise men’s awareness on women’s rights and reproductive health issues. For more information, click on www.waba.org.my

Monday, June 15, 2009

Gender Equality Promotion

Strategies for Promoting Gender Equity in Developing Countries:
Lessons, Challenges and Opportunities

By James Achanyi-Fontem, Director of Publication, Cameroon Link,
Email: camlink99@gmail.com

Gender Equality Situation Analysis

Women are key to the development challenge. Throughout the developing world, women are at a disadvantage at household, community and societal levels. Within the household, women have less access to and control over resources and limited influence over household decisions. Beyond the household, women have limited access to communal resources, are under-represented in public decision-making bodies; have limited bargaining power in markets and often lack opportunities to improve their socioeconomic position. Therefore, efforts to reduce gender inequality are required on multiple fronts.
Gender mainstreaming has been associated with more failures than successes. While there have been some positive gains to gender equity in the thirteen years since the adoption of the Beijing platform of action, a number of factors - including the challenging policy environment within which gender mainstreaming processes operate, inadequate resources allocated to this work, institutional features that have blocked change, and the way in which gender mainstreaming processes have been implemented contributed to the overall failure of gender mainstreaming,
While advocates of gender mainstreaming envisioned both institutional and social transformation, in practice, bureaucracies have not proven to be effective agents of social transformation, Gender equity should be pursued in creative ways through the elimination ongoing feminization of poverty in the global economy as women workers constitute the driving labour behind export production and rural-urban migration.
The next step will be the scaling up of transformative programming to create a larger global movement, involving non-governmental, multi-lateral bodies, and donors, in order to create a forum for sharing knowledge of male-oriented programming and gender equality. Several remaining challenges include extreme poverty, lack of interest in fighting for gender equality, and bureaucratic hurdles to participating in the political process.
A larger conceptual frame work is needed, which links empowerment, rights and mainstreaming in all social spaces in order to advance the discourse on gender relations and achieve greater gender equality. Considering the realities of women’s , men’s and children’s daily lives in a developing country context, where gender relations are influenced by poverty, insecurity, impunity and patriarchy is also important.

Setting the context

The evolution of the main approaches to confront gender inequality is similar when women in development (WID) with gender and development (GAD) are compared, especially as each approach arose in a different historical context. How development strategies in general and strategies to promote gender equality in particular have evolved depend very much on the limitations and opportunities available at different points in time.
At one time, there was a desire among development practitioners to find a different model for promoting gender equity that encompass a broader, more multicultural approach and one that took men into account. At the same time from 1975 to 1985, women’s organizational capacity around the globe had increased dramatically, bringing a new set of voices from the developing world into the debate. Women’s groups developed their own projects, and were backed by various international donor agencies, including many private foundations. This explains how GAD came about as women’s activism was becoming an international force in response to a very different set of challenges and opportunities.
The projects and programs initiated under the GAD label were not all that different from earlier WID efforts. Women-specific projects usually seen as WID inspired, remained following the shift to GAD, in part because many cultures separate women’s and men’s activities. Gender mainstreaming was promoted as likely to be much more effective than the women-specific projects and WID offices associated with the WID approach.
Some advocates felt that mainstreaming could marginalize women’s programs and that disbanding gender units within donor agencies risked losing the ability to keep a focus on gender within aid bureaucracies. Moving beyond the WID-GAD enabled advocates to devise creative ways to promote gender equity, instead of simply responding to current trends.
Whether private firms can be influenced by gender equity considerations depends on local contexts and the particular role of civil society organizations and increasingly gender-sensitive legal systems. Unfortunately, civil society organizations are no longer perceived as representing grassroots energies.
In the major trend, it is believed that the new emphasis on climate change may create opportunities for environmental feminism to advance, while third trend has been the shift from the redistribution politics to identity politics, which has caused academic feminists, pays less attention to equality.
Grounded in feminist theoretical frameworks and intended to make mainstream institutions agents of social change, gender mainstreaming, refers to a wide set of strategies and processes. The Economic and Social Council of the United Nations (ECOSOC) defines gender mainstreaming as the process of accessing the implications for women and men of any planned action, including legislation, policies or programs in any areas and at all levels. The strategies of making women’s as well as men’s concerns and experiences an integral dimension of the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of the policies and programs in all political, economical and societal spheres, so that men and women benefit equally, but that the goal of gender mainstreaming is gender equality.
Gender mainstreaming is neither a clear agenda for institutional transformation nor a clear agenda for gender transformation and social change. In practice, gender mainstreaming has often involved adopting a gender policy, creating a gender unit to work on organizational programs, mandatory gender training and increasing the number of women staff and managers. In the worst case, gender mainstreaming has been used to stop funding for women’s empowerment work, and to dismantle many of the institutional mechanisms such as women’s units and advisors created to promote women in development in the name of integration.
In some regions like Africa, women have made striking gains in elections to local and national government bodies, as well as in entering public institutions. Girls’ access to primary education has improved and women are increasingly entering the labour force. Access to contraception has also become much more widespread and violence against women has been recognized as a human rights issue and has been made a crime in many countries.
Decreased government spending on social sectors, tightened macroeconomic and fiscal policies, privatization of state owned enterprises and basic services, and liberalized trade are some aspects of the policy environment that have had harmful effects on women. Government reform efforts have focused on administrative and fiscal reforms while neglecting to consider ways in which institutions can better support poor women and address accountability failures. With regard to resources, investment in women has been the lowest priority.
In terms of implementation, gender mainstreaming efforts such as gender training, organizational development efforts and planning for gender equality often have no clear connection to change that is meant to occur on the ground. Until now, strategies to promote gender have accommodated to institutional cultures and agendas, which are uneasy with notions of social transformation.
Some instrumentalized strategies are gender equality objectives broken down into advocacy for girls’ education due to the link with fertility reduction and micro-credit schemes targeted towards women due to the high development payoff. During the execution these programs, the fundamental feminist vision of social transformation is not very clear. It is necessary that gender advocates should frame mainstreaming objectives in practical terms in consideration of the strengths and weaknesses of particular kinds of bureaucracies. Another challenge is measuring progress. Tracking relative contributions to different goals within the same project is difficult, and it requires social impact analysis during the design phase of the project and sophisticated tracking mechanisms and gender disaggregated data to examine program impact. The way forward is to get a range of diverse strategies all termed gender mainstreaming including policy reform, advocacy, capacity building, analytical frameworks, and program development and monitoring systems to be disaggregated and analyzed in terms of their particular gains and failures. This would facilitate strategic thinking about what particular institutions are well positioned to accomplish and what they can be held accountable for. Civil society including women’s organizations and networks should be motivated to work for change, if commitments have to be achieved.

New Avenues for Change

The global economy has produced not only the feminization of poverty, but the “feminization of working poverty“. Though more women participate in today’s workforce, the great majority occupies low-status jobs and is unable to lift themselves out of poverty. More women take jobs in the informal economy that lacks job security, benefits or protection. Around the globe, women are working in export processing sites, as domestic workers, as street vendors or as suppliers at the bottom of a multinational supply chain.
With this situation, grassroots strategies are needed to address problems related to the fact that women are used as a source of cheap labour as part of an economic development strategy, while labour standards around the world are declining. International migration is another economic development strategy that has implications for women. Offering cheap labour as an anti-poverty strategy is insufficient to generate economic growth.
Women often leave their families to become domestic workers abroad, leading to the breakdown of the family and other social problems. International migration can also be detrimental for the women who migrate. This can be addressed by encouraging them to become part of the labour movement, because this allows women workers to monitor the conditions of their own workplaces and make sure people are being treated fairly.
Global networks give women more power to negotiate contracts with their employers. It is important to include men when addressing concerns of women in the global labour markets. In particular, men can play an important role in addressing the sexual exploitation of women. Truck drivers in Cameroon are taught about HIV/AIDS in conjunction with groups like the Women’s Gender Empowerment Councils in Bonaberi-Douala. These truck drivers drive across the Chad and Central Africa Republic borders, have different sexual partners or engage in other risky behaviour.
An alternative solution is the engagement of men around issues of reproductive health and gender equality. Men as Partners (MAP) works as increase men’s awareness of reproductive health issues and increase men’s support for their partner’s reproductive health decision. This can also stimulate men to take active stand for gender equality and against gender=based violence.
This is because there is a clear mandate around the need to work with men and boys to achieve gender equality that has been recognized by numerous international conferences and declarations and supported by women’s organisations and the women’s movement. One of the main driving factors of this mandate is the recognition of how gender inequalities fuel the HIV/AIDS epidemic.
Men are conceived of in some positive ways as financially independent, providers, husbands and fathers, but there are also negative and harmful messages about what it means to be a man. These include withholding emotions, exerting power, using violence, not asking for help, having multiple sexual partners, risking taking, substance abuse, violence, misogyny and homophobia.
Increased political, economic and religious fundamentalism has lead to the development of rigid norms of expected male and female behaviour. The concept of working with men and boys is to question some of the more detrimental constructs of masculinity and explore alternative attitudes and actions.
Men with more traditional concepts of masculinity are shown to be more likely to report physical violence towards female partners, to be involved in delinquency, to have a higher number of sexual partners, to experience sexually transmitted infections and to use and abuse alcohol and drug.
However, these traditional and harmful constructs of masculinity can be challenged and replaced with alternative models, which promote equality and lead to improvements in health for both men and women.
Another angle is the gender-neutral programming, which is common in large-scale HIV prevention programs. These programs promote HIV prevention, but unfortunately make no room for a discussion of how abstinence, monogamy and safe sex are experienced differently by men and women and the realities of men and women’s lives in a cultural context.
On the other hand, gender-sensitive programming, takes into account that men and women have different realities and that different strategies are often required reaching men and women. Gender-sensitive programming often includes design features that make services more male-friendly.
Transformative programming takes on negative societal messages about what it means to be male and female, and challenges those in an attempt to create a more equitable society, which supports healthier behaviours in the future. Challenging the direct cause of gender inequality, harmful gender socialization, makes it possible to address the spectrum of health issues, including gender-based violence, HIV, reproductive health, family planning, men’s role in maternal health, issues of fatherhood and care-giving, and issues of violence.
MAP’s programs consistently ask men to talk about equitable relationships and men’s role in promoting gender equality and challenge men to create a new masculinity that involves taking a stand against gender based violence in the community. Most programs have focused on reaching out to men individually or in small, intensive group settings, forcing them to consider what it means to be male and how notions of masculinity may have a negative impact on their societies. These strategies have been successful in changing individual attitudes, knowledge and behaviours and the next step would be to expand to the societal level, where there can be a greater, more sustainable impact on gender socialization.
Transformative programs on gender equality should move beyond the workshop approach to support men when they return to a patriarchal society where there is often not sufficient support for new concepts and constructions of masculinity. Community action teams led by men who have been through the workshops should be put in place to go out and communicate and engage in community activism around gender issues.
A clear challenge of taking this work to scale is building the capacity of organizations and social institutions in order tom attain sustainability. Individuals must confront their own issues concerning gender and identity before they can challenge the broader social situation. This requires significant time, effort and support.
Gender programming at the health level is focused on improving the quality of services and making them more accessible to men. This requires large scale media campaigns and new or reformed policies and legislation. The public sector should be engaged with increased funding to promote gender equality.
It is through the involvement of the public sector that more work will be done to address the broad socioeconomic conditions that can influence men and their behaviours. If men are unable to provide for their families, they may feel disempowered in their role as men and resort to some of the more harmful constructs of masculinity, which include dominance over women, use of violence and risk-taking behaviours.
Many men who have gone through critical reflections of gender have come out on the other side espousing more gender progressive attitudes, and engaging in more protective behaviours. Networks that bring together various organizations, such as non governmental, multi-lateral bodies, and donors create a forum for sharing knowledge of male-oriented programming and gender equality.
Action plans should be conceived which incorporate elements like women’s empowerment, strengthening productive capacity of women and supporting women’s psychological, social and reproductive health. These efforts get women feel more encouraged to speak and voice their opinions.
Previously, women were engaged in domestic activities, which were unremunerated. Women’s productive activities have generated new sources of income, which have increased women’s economic autonomy. Cameroon Link has trained women to speak out against domestic violence and assisted women who suffered from abuse.
Before this training, women were less interested in the politics of the community than in having their basic needs met. Only after women’s basic needs are addressed does the organization introduce other themes such as community participation. Productive activities of women are done with respect to the cultural identity of Cameroon, which is Africa in miniature, drawing on indigenous knowledge.

The Way Forward Gender Equality Promotion

The way forward is to work out a larger conceptual frame that includes empowerment, rights and mainstreaming in all social spaces, putting into consideration the realities of women’s, men’s and children’s daily lives. It should be noted that, in the developing country context like Cameroon, gender relations are influenced by poverty, insecurity, impunity and patriarchy. As such, achieving gender equity requires a stronger and diverse but unified voice for change; greater accountability and increased, targeted resources.
Currently, the accountability framework consists of several agreements at the global level, such as the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa, the Beijing Platform for Action, the Millennium Development Goals and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Other the other hand, gender equality is not just related to human rights, but also women’s empowerment and specific measures are needed to respond to existing inequality and to champion the empowerment of women in order to increase women’s opportunities and capabilities. Women’s empowerment also requires mainstreaming the gender equality agenda in institutions and processes in a way that transforms social values that have sustained gender inequality.

Challenges
Development Approaches

This tends to separate development issues from concerns over investment, foreign policy and security. Current development approaches are increasingly top-down, focusing on policies, institutions, and processes, without an adequate focus on community empowerment and social movements and as such do not have a large impact on people’s everyday lives. The centralization of power and resources has negative implications with respect to gender equality, because in the parliament, government cabinet, chief courts or among elders of the clan, where power is defined and decisions are made, there is a dearth of women’s participation.

Limited access to resources

Gender equality requires equal access to services and infrastructure such as roads, electricity, water, and communication tools. Without access to such resources, women with tremendous knowledge and skills, expertise and passion are not given an outlet to use their knowledge and skills, keeping them at a disadvantage. Technological tools enable women to use their time, energy and expertise more efficiently.

Poverty, Violence, Disease & Patriarchy

Gender equality cannot be achieved as long as women live in insecure environments, whether due to an abusive partner, militia or a threatening neighbour. It is important that development practitioners should shift focus from poverty reduction to wealth creation. By focusing on poverty reduction, women are viewed as subjects of poverty rather than as producers and generators of wealth. Women’s arts and crafts should be adequately valued as a reflection of their knowledge and skill.
The governments should offer support to women for their role as caregivers and nurturer, rather than treating them as subsidy providers for basic social services such as health. All women, whether rich, poor, working or housewives should participate in decision making spaces, academic and research institutions, advocacy and public awareness initiatives, political debates, the private sector and within households as a collective voice for change.
The voice of leadership at international and national level is also needed to call for greater investment in gender equality and women’s empowerment. Advocates of gender equality must seek greater accountability through legislative and policy strengthening; reform and harmonization, resources and an end to impunity; political governance and greater private sector investment and responsibility.
More public resources are needed to make strategies to promote gender equality successful. Mobilizing greater resources for gender equality requires a system of taxation that does not overburden the poor and gender-responsive budgeting. From all that has been said, it is understood that the fight for greater gender equality is strong and women simply need proper mechanisms for financing their initiatives for equality and rights.

Sunday, June 7, 2009

Gender Sensitivity Guidelines

The World Alliance for Breastfeeding Action, WABA has designed guidelines for Gender sensitive materials, that can be used for advocacy and communications. Make use of them and give us your feedback.
1. Statements/recommendations should be broad to cover all women, whenever relevant. Use the term "woman" rather "mother", unless the context is specific to a mother. Eg. All women are entitled to good nutrition. Unless you want to make a specific point that pregnant and breastfeeding mothers in particular need additional nutrition and support.

2. Use gender neutral terms like "humankind" or "humanity" rather than "mankind." Avoid references to bis. Use s/he, for example. This point is even more relevant in Latin based languages as most nouns are gendered, masculine and feminine. Use the plural form when it is ungendered.

3. The content should always respect women's basic rights to food, health, security, development, personal integrity, informed decisions and other rights spelt out in the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and other international instruments. There can be cultural sensitivities to issues around women's right to sexuality and reproductive rights, although W ABA ' s Gender WG stand is that aIl women' s rights in CEDAW, the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) and Beijing Platform of Action should be protected and supported.

4. Consider the woman's situation (context, background) when "making demands on her" –eg. avoid using words like "should", "must", "ought to". General remarks like "Women should breastfeed" can be seen as insensitive if their situation, which prevents them from breastfeeding, is not considered. Rather talk about supporting women to breastfeed.

5. Avoid stereotypical portrayal of men and women in terms of social beliefs, norms of expected behaviour, sexual division of labour, access and control to resources decision making and power differentials. Note this especially in illustrations (images, photographs, etc).

6. Are the messages in the materials directed only to women or also to men? Where relevant, ensure that the messages also address men as a means to ensure their involvement and to recognize their rights and responsibilities. Being gender sensitive means that you recognize the entitlements, roIes and responsibilities ofboth men and women.

7. Ensure that we don't only talk about the father when we refer to men's role in chld care and domestic work. With changing family structures, the men involved can be a partner, friend, brother, etc. and not just the husband or father of the child.

The World Alliance for Breastfeeding Action (WABA) is a global network of individuals and organisations concerned with the protection, promotion and support of breastfeeding worldwide based on the Innocenti Declaration, the Ten Links for Nurturing the Future and the WHO/UNICEF Global Strategy for Infant and Young Child Feeding. Its core partners are IBFAN, LLLI, ILCA, Wellstart International and ABM. WABA is in consultative status with UNICEF and an NGO in Special Consultative Status with the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations (ECOSOC).

Monday, May 4, 2009

Maternal Health Protection


Maternal Care In Emergencies
By James Achanyi-Fontem
Pregnancy-related problems that women face are many, and, in most cases, unpredictable. Some of them lead to death or permanent injury. Social, political or economic factors should not be allowed to deny a woman her fundamental right for a healthy pregnancy and childbirth. Reducing maternal deaths is therefore a matter of rights and an urgent priority. That is why every family needs to be encouraged to make savings in advance preparation for emergencies. Fortunately, modern medicine has the capacity to handle most of the problems in health facilities.
Both mother and baby stand to benefit from treatment at a health facility. Some treatments at the prenatal stage have the benefit of preventing children from being born with complications and defects. In the home delivery story presented here, the placenta retention could have resulted in death.
Zinkeng got married and soon became pregnant, but did not go for pre-natal consultations in a health facility as one would expect and at the ninth month labour started at home. She was delivered by a traditional birth attendant successfully to a baby boy but the placenta did not come out thereby causing bleeding profusely. The Traditional Birth Attendant (TBA), accuses Zinkeng of infidelity, believing that this is the reason the clan gods and ancestors are bringing punishment on her by causing the placenta to be retained. This belief is common in most Cameroon rural traditional communities. Fears of infidelity are usually confirmed by divination. When the placenta is retained, there is no other verdict but guilt.
During a routine visit, a community health nurse comes across Zinkeng and her intervention saves her life. Subsequently, the nurse advises the traditional birth attendant and Zinkeng’s mother on the importance of antenatal and postnatal care, insisting that even though they risked denying Zinkeng the essential prenatal care, she must receive postnatal care.
During labour, Zinkeng cried out her sufferings and asked that she should be taken to the hospital, but the mother-in-law told her that it was no hospital matter. She asked her to confess her unfaithfulness to her son, and the placenta will come out. In her words, “You certainly know that our gods hate infidelity on the part of a woman.”
Sounding angry, feeble, and sobbing, Zinkeng replied that “I have not been unfaithful to your son. Which man in this community have you ever seen me with? I’m not a rotten woman. Please, stop ruining my good name and take me to hospital before I bleed to death.” By the tradition of some of these less educated parents, there is not justification but the fact that retaining the placenta clearly confirms her unfaithfulness.
The nurse had asked the expectant mother, Zinkeng, be taken to the hospital immediately there are any signs of labour, but the mother-in-law, who is a TBA would not heed to the advice, because according to her, she is a qualified TBA. But the nurse asked her to say, what was needed now that the baby is born, but the placenta was retained.
The TBA did not know what to say. And the nurse added that this is where there is a difference. The problem has nothing to do with infidelity. The nurse decides to help Zinkeng suckle her baby but the TBA refused, protesting vehemently, “No, no, no! We can’t suckle the baby boy on the first milk (colostrums). It’s bitter milk and the colour is not good.”
The TBA added that it had to be expressed and thrown away to allow fresh, clean milk to form, which is the good for sucking milk. Apart from that, both mother and baby should be bathe first, she went on.
The nurse realising how ignorant the TBA was, started explaining that the first milk that mothers in the village term bitter milk is the best for the baby. It is God’s own immunization against diseases. She invited the TBA and other relative present to just watch her!
As the TBA continued her vehement protest, the nurse told her of the Chinese proverb, that “One who says that a thing cannot be done should not interrupt the one doing it. You see how vigorously the baby is sucking? Now, hold the placenta and pull it gently and let’s see what happens.”
As the placenta came out, the TBA was surprised and a reluctantly said, Hmmm … With a sigh of relief, Zinkeng said, “Thanks, nurse!” Where diviners were ruining my life, reputation and marriage, you came to mend my soul and preserve my chastity.
The nurse on her part said, “Let all thanks go to God.” Zinkeng reported later that she was feeling dizzy and the nurse told her that with so much loss of blood, it was natural to feel dizzy. She was told to drink a lot of fluids and that a meat-based broth would be good, because she also needed iron.
Zinkeng was immediately taken to a health facility and was told not to get out bed until she felt better. Those who went visiting move away to talk about other matters and to give the new mother time to rest, as they arranged for transportation to the health facility.
What really happened?
When the nipple is stimulated through the sucking, it produces a substance in the body, a hormone called oxytocin. This hormone causes the muscles of the woman's uterus – the bag where the baby was growing – to tighten and contract. When the uterus tightens like this, it helps the placenta to separate from the uterus so that it can come out as it should.
The mother of the Zinkeng did not take the daughter to the hospital as advised because the labour took them by surprise. If she had been attending a health facility regularly, healthcare providers would have been able to figure out her due date, an estimate of the day her baby would be born. Most babies are born within two weeks before or after their due date. The labour wouldn’t have taken them by surprise.
The partner needed to put aside some fund for pre-natal, post-natal and emergencies. He did not secure any funds for the above. The role of TBAs is very important within the communities, but some of the complications of pregnancy and childbirth cannot be handled by Traditional Birth Attendants! Only health facilities have the necessary tools to handle most complicated situations.
Postnatal Care
Here’s what happens with prenatal visits. At a woman’s first prenatal care visit, healthcare providers counsel her on the importance of proper nutrition, diet, and exercise. They ask the woman about her health and her partner’s health; they identify any medical problems; they weigh her and check her blood pressure, and they check a urine sample for infection. The Traditional Birth Attendant cannot take these precautions.
Postnatal care is equally important in ensuring good health for mother and child. In the first few days after delivery, when her breasts begin to produce milk, she can have engorged or swollen breasts if care is not taken. She’ll also need to know how to prevent cracked nipples. There is a lot to know about. Simply let the mother access the nearest health facility.
Later Prenatal Visits
In later prenatal visits, the health providers measure the woman’s belly to see how the baby is growing; they check her hands, feet and face for swelling; they listen to the baby’s heartbeat; later on, they feel her abdomen to assess the baby’s position. They also ask the woman if she has any other personal concerns bothering her.
For more information, write to camlink99@gmail.com or click on the following link- http://cameroonlink.blogspot.com

Friday, April 3, 2009

Antenatal & Postnatal Bank


Antenatal & Postnatal Bank
The need to save money for antenatal and postnatal care
By James Achanyi-Fontem, Cameroon Link
The people of Bangwa in the south west region of Cameroon observe specific gender roles. Roles such as pounding in a mortar, grinding on a stone, fetching water and gathering firewood are considered feminine roles, if it is not milling palm oil or tapping palm wine. A man seen performing any of the above roles is mocked as being tied to the apron strings of his wife. It is in light of this that Pa Ndi, coming across her son pounding fufu, feels disgusted. She raises the alarm, attracting neighbours down the hills to the scene. The Assemblyman of the area steps in to calm the situation, and takes the opportunity to advise Atemnkeng and his wife Abangawoh to save money in preparation for the woman’s maternity needs.
What has not been found out is why some traditional customs frown on a male pounding, especially as food is food\and when it is consumed; it turns into the persons who eat it. Kinsmen and women, neighbours of Bangwa Community who were invited to come and witness the scene described it as an abomination of the century. Atemnkeng and his newly married wife, Abangawoh were echoed as having exchanged sexes, he now the he-woman pounding fufu, and she the she-man being the director of kitchen business.
On the other hand, these young educated persons take the scandal by their parent as an embarrassment. Abangawoh tries to learn from her mother, what they have done to warrant the community’s embarrassment? She knows that their village regards pounding, grinding, and carrying of firewood as feminine roles, and the biological mother, sniffed her out doing the unexpected. Though educated, Abangawoh see the embarrassment as a betrayal.
Many were driven to the scene by curiosity, though they knew that it was risky following a mob. Everyone wanted to see things for themselves. Atemnkeng’s mother caught him pants down, pounding fufu for his new bride, Abangawoh. She was mad that her daughter-in-law is subjecting her son to what she sees as a feminine role.
Apart from the young couple that did not see anything wrong in sharing roles, every other persons in the village believed the old lady was totally right. Some described the scene as a bad precedent well and that soon their wives will begin to order them about. They will not only have to pound fufu, but grind millet while humming a song – the men will have to go to the bush for firewood.
As the taboo spread, a community health worker arrived to address the crowd: “My dear fathers, mothers, brothers, and sisters, it is good community spirit to respond spontaneously to alarms. But this particular call is not a call of distress. It’s a slight domestic affair, requiring exclusive family settlement.” It was with these simple terms that the community counsellor invited the crowd to retire to their activities and leave the rest to him. Pa Ndi, Atemnkeng and Abangawoh were left alone.
The community counsellor told the three that because of the generation gap, the youth and older neighbours sometimes misunderstand one another, but that such misunderstanding could still seek a remedy.
He added that dialogue solves misunderstandings better than tears. No one should have told the couple that sobbing is uncharacteristic of Bangwa men. Abangawoh rather proved to be more hardened because she did not wail.
The counsellor added that, if spouses are not willing to show flexibility to each other, their marriage won’t hold. He advised that in any relationship as intimate as marriage, there must be sharing of responsibilities.
In most cases, it is difficult to settle a conflict without an intruder in African context. As the dialogue continued, an enlightened female counsellor came in and did not allow the story to be reported. She got part of it while going to the market and decided to visit the family of Pa Ndi. She told them that the days are gone when women had no voices. The dominating attitude of men must change, and bring women too into decision-making processes.
This is when Abangawoh came in with her explanation: “Your counselling said it all. Guided by it, we shared responsibility for pounding fufu, each according to his ability, for the entire family. My husband has the energy to pound, and I the skill to shape the result in the mortar. Which of the two roles is more risky? What if the pestle crushed my fingers? I would have only one hand left for the rest of my life. How would I live in a community like …
African village communities are very fussy about gender roles, but it is difficult to find any roles that women can play that men can’t, except women’s biological role of carrying a baby in the womb, which is God-given. It is important for couples to learn that people do not have to interfere too much in others’ marital affairs.
Though Abangawoh lauded the advice of the counsellor who did a good thing advising her husband to do what most men do not do in their community, which is sharing responsibilities with the spouse, she used the opportunity to ask for more rights. There was one entrenched attitude left that the counsellor needed to advise Atemnkeng to change for the better.
Atemnkeng doesn’t want to sit with her partner to discuss anything about their mutual welfare. He takes decisions affecting both of them alone. Abangawoh saw the need for them to save money so that she could visit the antenatal clinic regularly. The need was coming faster than …
This got the counsellor to pick some of the points puts forward to extend the dialogue into creating the antenatal and postnatal bank. He admitted that Abangawoh raised important points, especially as it isn’t easy going through pregnancy for nine months. Pregnancy has specific health needs. So does delivery. You must have money on hand for any eventuality. Though maternal health services are now free of charge in Cameroon, couples should set aside funds in case certain drugs or supplies are out of stock at the health facility. Also, there can be complications and the expectant mother may need to be taken by emergency transport to another hospital.
Though the couple are poor, they have the means to save a little from time to time to meet the needs of pregnancy and childbirth. They will need to make advance arrangement for transport, and will also have to buy supplies for delivery. Pregnancy and childbirth are family affairs. The expectant mother herself should be a central player in decisions relating to her own care.
Working occasionally for a wage and saving it is one way. You have poultry, goats and sheep. If you raise more animals, you can sell some to add to your savings. Your farm crops can also give you some money during the selling season. With a little seed money, there are many income-generating activities that you can engage in.