What happens at Work...
on Colm in Kenya (Kenya), 28/Jun/2010 13:24, 34 days ago
Strengthening Community Partnership and Empowerment (SCOPE– my placement organisation inKilifi) manage and distribute the World Food Programme‘Food by prescription’ programme to People Living with HIV/AIDS who have a low Body Mass Index (BMI) of under 18.5.AIDS is well known for causing severe weight loss known as wasting. In Africa, the illness was at first called“slim” because sufferers became like skeletons. Whilst, less dramatic changes often occur in earlier stages of HIV infection.SCOPE’s intervention tackles ‘slim’ by giving clients highnutrientfood for 6 months to improve theirnutritionallevel. The programme is an effective way to keepPLWHAhealthy; Clients progress, gain weight and graduate from the programme.The problem is sustainability.Once clients leave the programme, poverty often see’s them quicklydeteriorate, lose weight and become vulnerable to infection and thus, are reliant on food support.One of my objectives as aVSOvolunteer was to help create a sustainable exit strategy for clients through facilitating the creation of Income Generating Activities– to do this, SCOPE had funds available under theUSAIDAPHIAII Coast prevention programme.And as with allVSOwork, this was to be done through enhancing the capacity of the organisation to allow them to deliver the solutions over the longer term.Developing internal capacityWe first started to enhance the Business Development training ability of SCOPE and specifically my colleague– RuthMugiirah.Ruth, a 25 year old Kenyan, comes from a Community Health/Peer Educator background and has excellent facilitation and community support skills.However, Ruth had limited knowledge on business. So overtime, I worked closely with Ruth to develop a basic business skills training programme for groups in the local community.We helped severalwomen'sgroups using this programme, primarily organising them to access finance and to manage their businesses better.Additionally, Ruth and I worked to enhance her documentation and organisation skills.Working with the key stakeholdersWe worked with SCOPE’s Food Distribution (FD) team,MalingiandKatunguuto develop a plan.The FD team were familiar with the key stakeholders in the programme, the main challenges and issues facing clients.They introduced us to the stakeholders includingKiKaso– TheKilifiandKaloleniHIV/AIDS support group network of 30 groups, and the District Aids Service Coordinator, MrMeshack. Together we decided to survey all groups ofKikasoto create a baseline level and to implement what we believed to the most suitable approach.Working withKikaso–KilifiandKaloleniHIV/AIDS Support Groups Network (30 Groups, 23 Active)In March of this year, we met with the Secretary and Chairperson ofKikaso, William (Willy) and ChiefNdagorespectively. During the meeting we agreed a programme to Survey members and develop the training.From this point to the training date, which included several hiccups and delays, we worked closely withKikaso,particularlyWilly and keptDASCO, who was extremely helpful, informed at every step of the process.We completed the survey by May which gave us a baseline level of the skills and resources available to each support group, and thus, allow us to measure our effectiveness when programme at the end.The survey showed us that importantly, no group said they had received training in Business or Agriculture in the past, presenting us with an excellent opportunity fill a need gap.Training 23 HIV/AIDS groups and 7 Peer EducatorsFrom Wednesday 23rd June to Friday 25th2010, inKilifiDistrict Hospital, SCOPE trained arepresentativefrom 23 support groups and 7 peer educators from each of the 7 districts inKilifiandKalolenion Basic Business Management.The training was designed so that eachrepresentativeand PE could return back to their support groups or peer educator groups and pass on the information to their members.Over the three days trainees were trained on Basic Business Management, Savings, Finance and Records, Running Successful Groups, Accessing Credit andAgronomics.The trainers came mainly from within SCOPE whose extensive peer educator training experience made the ideal trainers. We also used an external trainer of Micro-Finance and forming Co-operatives, whilstDASCOalso had a session onSocio-economic dynamics of HIV/AIDS in business.The feedback from the session was excellent and all participants found the training extremely useful.Each has now developed a work plan to implement thelearning'sand Ruth and I have arranged follow-ups with each group.It was a fantastically well run event, organised almost exclusively by Ruth with help from several other members of SCOPE and with invaluable help fromDASCOandKikaso.Now we are working withUSAIDsAPHIAII Coast project to seek further funding for additional follow-up trainings. This should provide SCOPE andKikasowith an excellent platform and momentum to really effect change withPLWHAsin our community.Whether it’s the sustainable exit strategy for the food programme remains to be seen.But it gives us more than a slim chance of succeeding.