Category: News

Women’s roles as village council (Panchayat) leaders are transforming the way people live in India. Although they often have much adversity to overcome – due to social conditioning and attitudes around gender – women are emerging as powerful leaders motivated by a desire to provide better lives for their families and communities.

When women are empowered with skills and knowledge, they act as change agents – creating opportunities to improve life and participate in the positive development of their community. The training they receive through our programs allows them to realise their full potential and instils the confidence required to approach local governments with authority. As such, they develop voices that are heard in public forums and generate the support of the people.

Through the Panchayat, they interact with people who can assist them in creating the changes they prioritise, such as –

• Ensuring all children (particularly girls) have access to an education
• Ensuring quality healthcare is available and accessible to all
• Installing clean water systems and sanitary facilities to meet basic human needs
• Addressing violence and inequality against women – so that all may live to their fullest potential

Elected women, like Geeta (pictured below), carry with them a deep sense of pride and responsibility to act in the best interests of all. By taking time to speak with people in their villages – including those previously left out of the development agenda – they find out what is truly wanted and needed and act on it.

 

“I draw determination from my heart, from within…I feel I’m not a regular woman – I’m a special woman! I am proud to be elected as the President of my local council area. I won by 1,500 votes because I took the time to speak to people in my community about what they wanted.” – Geeta Rao – An Elected Woman Representative trained by The Hunger Project in India.

The pathway to self-reliance is paved by unity, information and empowerment. When people living in hunger and poverty are inspired by a united vision of a healthier future, and when they are educated to understand how they can achieve this, the wheels of change begin to turn. When people are empowered to become the solution to their own problems they emerge as courageous, innovative, leaders who create sustainable and lasting changes in their communities.

Developing a united vision is imperative in order to achieve self-reliance. When people have grown up, only ever knowing hunger and poverty, the idea of a better life can seem impossible. By conducting workshops such as our Vision, Commitment and Action Workshops – where we reached almost 200,000 people, through 6,243 workshops, across 10 countries in 2016 – we empower our village partners to understand that a better life is possible for them.

Local volunteer leaders are trained to develop action plans aimed at driving their communities forward. They run workshops and visit people of their villages, sharing visions and educating them on issues they’re directly affected by, such as –

• Food shortage and farming – Families learn to grow food to provide for their families. Farmers learn agricultural techniques that increase their yields – including pest control and resilient crop storage through times of drought.
• Healthcare – people are encouraged to visit medical facilities for health check-ups, testing and treatment. They learn about the health conditions that affect them and how diseases can not only be treated but also prevented. As such, stigmas attached to certain health conditions begin to dissolve and healthier communities emerge.
• Clean water and sanitation – people are educated to understand the importance of accessing clean water and using sanitary facilities. Village animators are empowered to approach local governments to see that toilets, water pumps and filtration systems are installed within their villages.
• Women’s equality – women are empowered with an understanding of their legal, educational, marital, reproductive and property rights. They are encouraged to stand up for themselves (and each other) in the face of discrimination and inequality.
• Education – children (particularly girls) are encouraged to attend and stay in school longer. Families are taught to understand how taking girls out of school limits their future opportunities and independence. Functional adult literacy programs are offered for those who missed out on early education.
• Government Partnerships – village leaders are taught to form partnerships with local and international governments, traditional leaders and other relevant authorities, in order to act on behalf of the united vision of the people.

By taking a grassroots approach – where village leaders steer the changes within their communities – widespread support is garnered. As belief systems begin to change, new ideas and behaviours arise, and positive outcomes result. Self-reliance transpires as communities continue down this path of growth and improvement at all levels.

Unclean water supplies and poor sanitation are still among the biggest threats to many people’s health in developing regions.  With up to 950 million people worldwide still practising open defecation and up to 2.5 billion people living without adequate sanitation, vast improvements are yet to be made.

In India, 80% of diseases in rural areas can be traced back to contaminated water and poor sanitation.   The government has responded by promising to provide 60 million homes with sanitary toilets by 2019.  However, past attempts to improve sanitation in affected areas have taught us that simply providing people with sanitary facilities (such as toilets) is not effective in changing deeply ingrained practices (such as open defecation).

The best way to initiate sustainable change is to run community-led programs, where village leaders and volunteers are taught to; research what their community needs, understand the dangers of poor sanitation and integrate new systems within their villages from the ground level.  Village leaders learn how to approach local governments and work with them toward providing the infrastructure necessary to make the improvements.  They are simultaneously trained to lead educational programs within their communities, that change belief systems and practices to ensure the new facilities are assimilated successfully.

Through training with The Hunger Project, our village partners learn that clean water and sanitary practices are essential to their survival and they become proactive in implementing the necessary changes themselves.  They are empowered to ensure their human rights are being met and in response, they learn to;

• Install water tanks and pumps that provide clean water to families
• Develop new water sources and conservation practices
• Build and maintain bathrooms
• Educate their community about sanitation and associated health benefits

This month, five UN agencies released a new report warning that conflicts and protracted violence – exacerbated by climate change – have pushed the number of people living in hunger up from 795 million to 815 million between 2014 and 2016. The report notes that the majority of people living in hunger – 60 percent – live in countries affected by conflict.

At The Hunger Project, we feel it’s important to highlight that despite this sobering news, the world has made tremendous progress in ending hunger and malnutrition. In fact, the report notes that “most countries have achieved significant 25-year gains in reducing hunger,” and that the number of malnourished children, as evidenced by stunting (height for age), has decreased from 29.5 percent to 22.9 percent between 2005 and 2016. This shows that many of our efforts are working.

We can learn from the interventions that are working to find new ways to build inclusive, peaceful communities where women are empowered. Though The Hunger Project does not work in conflict-affected states, our women-focused and community-led approach is pertinent beyond the 16,000 communities where we work. In Bangladesh, we have seen through a partnership with the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES) that our community-led approach builds social cohesion, which can reduce violence in communities.

The findings of the new UN report, while alarming, should not undermine our efforts. We will continue to advocate for women-centered and community-led approaches with partner organisations and governments worldwide: this is how, together, we can achieve the commitments the world has made with the Sustainable Development Goals.

Header image: Community members hold a meeting at Ndereppe Epicenter, Senegal, 2015. Image Credit: Johannes Odé

The programs in our Epicentre communities change the lives of men, women and children in ways that are most valuable to their specific needs.  Our village partners are empowered with knowledge and skills that help them create sustainable communities where systems of education, healthcare and sanitation are prioritized to help end hunger and poverty.

By empowering people with an education, they are mobilised to take action towards creating communities that will one day be self-reliant.  Charged with the information required, they instigate change that leads to their desired vision of the future. As they make changes within their communities, the positive impact is felt by all and the community-held vision transforms to one of a future free from hunger.

Basanti (pictured above), from India, is one of 14,065 elected women who brought education, healthcare and sanitation systems to her village in 2016.  Because she is educated, she earned the support of her community and won the role of president of her Panchayat (village council).  She aims to create a ‘thriving community and thriving people‘.  As part of the untouchable (lowest) caste in India, Basanti understands the power of education on an individual’s life and is passionate about upholding the rights women and children have to an education.  Her training with The Hunger Project has enabled her to study for a degree, and she wants others in her community to have the same opportunities she has had.

Basanti and other village partners go out into their communities and educate people about proper healthcare, including the treatment and prevention of potentially fatal diseases, like HIV/AIDS, malaria and malnutrition.  By sharing information about the disease, people are encouraged to visit our healthcare centres where they can access; tests, immunisations, antiretroviral treatments, counselling and other healthcare services.  As more people come to understand the health issues that afflict their communities, and how they can be treated and prevented, attitudes, stigmas and behaviours that perpetuate problems surrounding them begin to change, and incidences of diseases decline.   Between 2001 and 2012 there was a 1.1 million decrease in the number of newly infected cases of HIV worldwide.  With the right information, people learn to protect themselves and their families, a healthier society begins to emerge and the new community-held vision becomes one of strength and vitality.

In 2016, 107,283 volunteers participated in our Women’s Empowerment program and have become village leaders equipped with the knowledge, skills and confidence to promote the rights of women and girls within their communities.

By placing women at the centre of our programs, we aim to end deeply embedded cycles of hunger and inequality which have resulted in women being; victims of sexual abuse and violence, denied opportunities of employment and education, married in childhood and malnourished since birth.

When we empower women with education, they understand the significant influence they have in transforming discriminatory systems that have failed them for generations.  Their creativity and leadership skills are unleashed and they can see how they are the solution to ending their own inequality and hunger.

Our programs empower village leaders, like Lucy from Kachindamoto, Malawi.  Lucy and her friends (pictured above) are now able to face their futures with optimism and hope and can educate other women in their community to; understand their rights, stand up for themselves in the face of adversity and protect themselves, and each other, from sexual discrimination.

By embracing their role as change agents, these women shift mindsets within their communities, so that others prioritise health and equality too.  The whole of society benefits from the changes they bring to their communities, as; food security, nutrition and family health improve, rates of malnutrition, hunger, poverty and child mortality decline.

Together with the invaluable support of our investors, we have been successful in mobilising 395,000 locally trained volunteers globally – all of whom are dedicated to ending poverty and hunger within their communities.

We know that the people living in communities afflicted by poverty and hunger are key to providing solutions to the issues they face. By partnering with these people, we can empower them to make changes so that they can end their own hunger.  Mobilising and inspiring local volunteer leaders within our community Epicentres allows us to gain insight into the mindsets of the people we aim to help, so we can then understand what they need as an individual community.  We don’t recruit ex-pats, instead, we train locals – allowing us to direct 75% of all funding to our program communities.

Our international programs are focused on; health, education, literacy, environmental sustainability, social justice and other support systems. We aim to equip our volunteers, village partners and the local population, with the confidence, knowledge and skills they need to create healthy, functioning, communities that will ultimately become self-reliant.

In direct response to their own experience of hunger, volunteers like Ayelech (pictured above), have been taught how to grow and prepare their own food.  Ayelech and the 53,000 other volunteers in Ethiopia who also learned these vital life skills are now able to provide healthy, nutritious food for themselves and for their families.  In doing so, they avoid suffering from malnutrition and other hunger-related ailments.  They are encouraged to pass their new-found knowledge and skills on to family, friends and neighbours to help break the cycle of hunger that has been their way of life for generations. With the dissemination of their skills; the health of the community begins to improve, widespread hunger and illness decline and the mindset within the community begins to shift away from one of resignation and despondency to one of determination and resilience.

Our dedicated volunteer leaders take a courageous stance against deeply ingrained belief systems, based on hunger and poverty, to learn new ways of living that inspire people within their community to do the same.  Their commitment to change and their instrumental efforts meant that 10 Epicentre communities reached their targets for self-reliance in 2016. In these communities, there was a 66% decrease in hunger, as well as an overall 41% decrease in extreme poverty.

Through our unique Epicentre and local volunteer initiatives, we have reached over 1.7 million people in Africa alone. This is the result of many years of dedicated work with our village partners and support from our loyal investors.  We will continue to expand upon the powerful relationships we’ve carved in order to maintain and amplify the positive impact we’re having within these communities so we can end hunger once and for all.

“It’s hard to find a family with bad quality grain these days. Families keep their maize, sorghum and millet in the food bank and are able to use it while it’s still good,” says Joyce Nakato, a Community Development Officer in Mbale, Uganda.

Joyce is referring to the storage facility that is part of The Hunger Project-Uganda’s Mbale Epicentre, which currently serves over 120 villages. The food bank supports local efforts to address food insecurity by providing farmers with a safe place to store their grain before selling it in the marketplace. In 2016, our community partners in Mbale added 3,040 Kg of grain to their community food bank. By increasing pest-free storage capabilities in the community, the food bank enables the storage of excess harvests, thus promoting the villagers’ food security during the off-season.

Initially set-up in 2007, over the last decade the food bank has become a favourite resource for farmers in the area, especially because the area is fumigated on a regular basis. Local farmers note how storing maize, sorghum and millet in the food banks helps preserve the quality and quantity of harvests. The food banks also provide an additional buffer against famine in the case of unexpected food shortages.

“I am grateful for the project,” Lorna Mubogi, a farmer in the region, told local newspaper New Vision. “Each harvest season, I keep there almost one and a half tons (1,500 kg) of maize from my garden.”

The food bank also engages the community in modern agricultural methods, provides improved seeds and trains farmers on climate-related information. These learning opportunities plus access to the food storage facilities empower farmers to work towards a more food secure future!

Post courtesy of The Hunger Project Global Office.