combating HIVAIDS: Bara

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Combating HIV/AIDSA Literacy and Economic
Approach Program District Bara Target
Audience 2530 women by Samjhauta Nepal
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About Us

• Status NGO
• Vision Education and Empowerment
• Achievements till to date
• Empowered 500,000 women of 70 districts through
  Adult Literacy
• Incorporated the lessons learnt and Empowered
  120,000 women of 21 districts through action
  oriented literacy package leading to Empowerment
  Literacy, Economic Empowerment and Legal Literacy
  
• Integrated STD and HIV/AIDS education to the
  economic groups of women
• Future programs
• Empowering AYs through life skills and SRH
  education.
• Strengthening the role of civil society in
  democracy and governance through education.
• Dream Development of the low cost replication
  model

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Our Approach

• Empowerment through Self instructional action
  oriented curriculum development for illiterate
  and neo-literates.
• Appreciative Planning and Action approach based
  on building program on successes
• Different components of empowerment integrated
  together as empowerment literacy, economic
  empowerment, legal literacy, health education and
  democracy and governance
• Implementation through district and VDC based
  NGO partners
• Sustainability through group and NGO networking
  at the district and VDC level with other line
  agencies
• Knowledge dissemination mechanism through family
  gathering to the rest of the community

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Program objectives
Integrating HIV/AIDS education to non-formal
education and economic empowerment Development
of the self instructional curriculum with focus
on general information on STI and HIV/AIDS STI
and HIV/AIDS transmission STI and HIV/AIDS
prevention reproductive health of women and its
relation to STI and HIV/AIDS negotiation for
safe sex communication with children and
community networking for care and support to
PLWAs roles and responsibilities of the
community and the PLWAs Overcoming stigma
through group reading and discussion
process Negotiation for safe sex Creating
community linkages and support network through
savings group Creating awareness campaigns
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Implementation Structurein Partnership
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Findings Table 1 Change in STI/HIV/AIDS
Knowledge among the target women
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Table 2 Confidence of women for safer sex and
combating HIV/AIDS
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Table 3 Knowledge on STI/HIV/AIDS among
secondary target groups of the project

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Self Initiated Group Activities

• Community workshops
• Events 63 Groups involved- 74 Participants
  3,144 (Women 2,946 / Men 188)
• Awareness Rallies
• Events 19 groups involved 78 Participants
  9,433 women and men
• Family Gatherings
• Events 70 Groups involved 70 Participants
  1,163 (Women 691 / Men 472)
• Putting up Handwritten Posters
• Events 19 Groups involved 26 Participants 566
  Women
• Sharing with School Students
• Events 3 Groups involved 6 Participants 129
  (Girls 72 / Boys 57)
• Teej Song contest consistence of STDs and
  HIV/AIDS related messages
• Events 7 Groups involved 19 Participants 377
  Women
• Quiz contest to mark World AIDS Day
• Events 1 Groups involved 17 Participants 68
  Women
• Door to door support services program
• Events 11 Groups involved 11 Participants 198
  Women
• Formation of VB District Co-ordination Committee
• Events 1 Groups involved 43

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Lessons Learned

• Active involvement of the target audience
  fostered right from the start during the
  development of the curriculum and bringing their
  success stories into it is one among the keys to
  the success of the project and was experienced
  essential for sustainability.
• Even the illiterate women could gain knowledge on
  HIV/AIDS prevention and control listening to
  someone reading in the group.
• Interpersonal communication and group discussion
  were more important than electronic and print
  media to educate neo-literate and illiterate
  women.
• It is better to start with a small project and
  then replicate to the larger audience

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Major challenges

• Educated and empowered women could not find
  enough SRH services at the local health
  facilities.
• No VCT in the district. Rural poor men and women
  cant come all the way to Kathmandu, even if they
  realized the need of testing through education.
• Lack of proper coordination at local levels on
  SRH issues.
• We could not reach all WEP women due to limited
  funding.