Letter from Zambia 2023/24
Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights
By August 2024, BBYC will have complete the 2-year project, Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention in Remote Villages. The team has been working on developing a new project, as always, involving youth in the matter of Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights. Most projects addressing youth regard them as beneficiaries, not as partners. However, for a project to be sustainable, youth need to be engaged, mobilized, and indeed be treated as partners. Youth as well as other local stakeholders (e.g. parents, teachers, health care workers, etc.) need to be involved in all phases of project cycle development, starting from the situation analysis, and moving on to setting priorities, designing solutions, implementing, monitoring and evaluating. This is called “human-centered design,” and it is on the agenda at Bumi Bwesu.
Microcredit
Microcredit has fallen into disrepute. Many microfinance institutions are rightfully, blamed for exploiting the billion-person market of the worldwirde poor. However, any endeavor, be it non-profit or business oriented, can be conducted responsibly or greedily. Our microcredit program in Zambia is an example of ethically sound lending. Over the years I have revelaed details of the system, and these few sentences here can certainly not cover the topic. I can only attest to the fact that our project is not geared to profit, it is geared to sustainability. The initial capital was donated (not invested) so we do not owe anything to financiers. We do not use material collateral - we use what is known as "group collateral"; when a woman in a group of fifty cannot meet her payment, the others in the group pay for her. The group is motivated to help get that woman back on her feet, be her faltering due to illness or a business problem. That fosters solidarity, a word our over 400 memebers understand well. When I visit each year, I go from village to village and meet with hundreds of women. Solidarity is one of the things we talk about.
JS, April 2024
Letter from Zambia 2022
The terms “child marriage” and “forced, early marriage” have made the headlines. “In sub-Saharan Africa around 7 million girls live as child brides. Parents marry off their daughters due to poverty, tradition and gender inequality. (plan-international.org)” The Corona pandemic exacerbated these practices, partly as a result of economic desperation, reinforced by isolation. Child brides and adolescents forced into marriage become pregnant at an early age. Pregnant adolescents usually are forced to leave school, a life of poverty and ill-treatment awaits them.
As mentioned last year, our partner in Zambia, Bumi Bwesu Youth Center (BBYC), has taken on a new project, Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention in Remote Villages. The aim is not only to prevent child marriage, early forced marriage and adolescent pregnancy, but also to mitigate the consequences: keep those girls in school, give them access to contraception, let the community know, these girls have rights too.
In June this year I met with over 300 women in their villages and listened to what they had to say: times are hard, but with our microcredit program they can send a girl child to school, or pay for high school exam fees, or provide a second or third meal per day, not just one or two. And by contributing more to the family income, women have a higher status at home. As economic destitution is one of the drivers of child marriage and adolescent pregnancy, this program, which mitigates poverty, also contributes to preventing child marriage and adolescent pregnancy.
JS, November 2022
Letter from Zambia 2021
We were caught off guard as SARS-Corona-19 conquered humankind, in one wave, then a second, followed by a third, a fourth, and now Omicron. And so it goes on, the virus ever one step ahead.
Although our partners in rural Zambia seemed hardly to suffer in terms of becoming ill themselves or loosing loved ones, the pandemic affected their lives and the lives of the beneficiaries of our programs profoundly. Trade and travel were restricted. Women could only sell their wares at the market place 3 days a week instead of six days. The currency plummeted two-fold while prices soared four-fold. The salaries we paid our employees, the loans we gave to women in our Microcredit and Small Business Loan programs lost half their value, and through inflation buying power was diminished even further.
Urban Zambia suffered terribly: people died in the hospital corridors, there were not enough oxygen tanks, not enough ICU beds, not enough nurses and doctors to care for the sick. In rural Zambia, we do not know how many people died prematurely at home in their villages.
After missing out in 2020 due to the pandemic, I visited Zambia in May 2021 for five weeks. Our projects in Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (SRH&R) as well in Economic Empowerment of Women were still going strong. I went from village to village, met with over 300 women in larger and smaller groups, with their representatives, with stakeholders and with other local non-governmental organisations. The local team and I listened. Then we put our heads together.
What women say and what they want
Women in the district are thrilled with the microcredit and the small business loans projects. More women want to join up – so we are expanding our microcredit and small business loan programs to bring more women on board.
Women want more control over their own money – so we have upscaled our program where they can buy into their own funds. In 2-3 years all the women in our microcredit program will own half their funds.
Gender-based violence is not abating (who would think that it would?). Our counsellors want more training – so we have put further training courses into the budget.
Too many young teenagers are getting pregnant, especially in remote villages – so we are starting a program to reach them before adolescence, before it is too late. JS, November 2021
Letter from Zambia 2019
Prisca, a six year old girl
Victims of Gender Based Violence, “survivors” as we prefer to call them, continue to seek help at Bumi Bwesu Youth Centre. Caring for survivors is arduous; it requires perseverance and a good network in the community, and it requires making compromises in order to find the best solutions possible in an imperfect world, as shown in the story of Prisca.
Prisca was being sexually abused by her stepfather. After the mother reported the crime, which put her husband in jail, she had regrets. How to feed the family? They were bitter poor. She retracted her complaint and the step-father was set free to return home. They lived in a remote village and Prisca’s mother did not have a telephone. Our staff took a trip there but could not find the family. They were in hiding. That was in 2018.
In 2019 we took up the case again; A new staff member of our team heard that Prisca’s mother was related to a woman in one of our microcredit groups. This relative was able to convince Prisca’s mother to come to our centre on the promise of a small financial remuneration.
Prisca’s mother arrived at BBYC emaciated and weary, with a young baby at her breast. We gave her a warm meal, enough money to feed her family for a month, and conducted counselling. The mother was not willing to kick her husband out of the home, for how else could the family survive? However, she did agree to place Prisca with her grandmother, who lived in another remote village. Our staff accompanied Prisca there to see that she was safely placed.
We would have liked to have put Prisca in a safe environment a year earlier, we would have liked to have bolstered her mother with the will and the means to leave an evil man, we would have liked to have had the perpetrator brought to trial and see justice done. But we did what we could. JS, November 2019
Letter from Zambia 2017
Gender Based Violence
In 2015, sixty-one people sought help at Bumi Bwesu Centre. In 2016 it was 151. 2017 has thus far been booming, although the final figures are not in. That does not mean gender-based violence is on the rise, but rather, more people are seeking help – fulfilling one of our goals. The most frequent cause for help is “spouse-battery” (beating one’s wife, or rarely the case, one’s husband); the second most common complaint is “marital conflict”; there is a lot of “psychological abuse,” no less in Kashikishi than in Switzerland or the US; and then the very peculiarly Zambian problem called “property grabbing.” Property grabbing occurs when the head of the household, a man, dies, and his relatives claim the property instead of letting the wife and children inherit it. There are laws in Zambia which govern inheritance in the absence of a will, but most people do not know about their rights. Our counsellors inform them and guide them through the courts. Finally, there were seven cases of “defilement” (child sexual abuse), one of which was also a case of incest.
Microcredit
The new team at Lubuto Jumpstart Women’s Empowerment, the local partner organization which runs the microcredit program, has had a trial by fire learning how to manage the microcredit program. Restructuring and focusing on fewer centres has paid off. We reduced from 7 to 6 centres last year: three of the remaining six centres of fifty women each are performing well with only minimal portfolio at risk. We have therefore decided to increase their portfolios this year. Two other centres are following in their footsteps. We will supervise them another year, and if performance is up to standard, we will then increase their portfolios as well. One centre will drop out after the current cycle. We will then be serving a total of 250 women with proven good track records over the past three to five years. Next step will be to stick with these women and increase the individual loan amounts. JS, August 2017
Letter from Zambia 2016
In May, I visited Zambia to conduct the yearly “site visit” to monitor goings-on. On this trip, aside from studying the financials, log books and charts, aside from visiting villagers and working a bit in the hospital, I also listened to true stories, like the one below.
Gender Based Violence
Precious was sexually abused by her uncle, who by the way happened to be HIV positive, a fact which was not known at the time. However, it is prudent to assume the worst right from the start, rather than wait for confirmation. Her mother brought her to Bumi Bwesu Youth Centre two days after the assault. I mention the number two, because it is important. Indeed, numbers are vital. Your future depends on a number, on whether you get what you need before or after the number. After sexual assault, three is the number of days you have to get started on PEP (post-expositional prophylaxis) in order to prevent HIV; four is the number of days you have to get the day-after pill (post-coital prophylaxis) so you don’t get pregnant; eleven is the age of an almost immature girl, immature enough to be more vulnerable than older girls in terms of getting infected with HIV, mature enough to get pregnant. And if an eleven-year old gets pregnant, she is at risk of severe complications, like recto-vaginal or vesico-vaginal fistula, and death.
The 11-year old Precious was sexually abused on a Saturday. She came to the clinic on a Monday. Our counsellors gave her the day-after pill – that was day two. They took her directly to the hospital, where she was examined – still day two. There were delays. You need telephone calls and forms and signatures and a trip to the police. PEP could have been started on Monday, but it was not started until Tuesday morning – day three. Anyway, Precious made it just in time. She was on the right side of the numbers.
Our counsellors go to villages and schools to spread the message, not only that sexual violence is bad, and to inform, not only that it is against the law, but also to explain, that it matters to seek help on time: three days to prevent HIV, five days to prevent pregnancy. Unfortunately, most of the victims – the survivors – of sexual assault still seek help too late. But, peu à peu, we are changing that.
Microcredit
On this trip, I visited 7 villages and met with 350 women. In each village, I engaged in discussion. Here is what a few of the women had to say:
„Microcredit has improved my relationship with my husband. He is grateful that I also contribute to the family income. Now I receive more respect at home.” Mtono Village
“Because of microcredit, I can pay for school uniforms and send my daughter to school. Before, I could only afford to send my sons.“ Chandwe Village
Letter from Zambia 2015
Gender Based Violence
Our partners at Bumi Bwesu Youth Centre in Kashikishi have been busy at work: they lead discussions in villages, perform a theatre piece in schools, and hold a weekly radio call-in talk show. The aim is to “sensitize” adults and youth – both potential victims as well as perpetrators. On the one hand we hope to reduce the incidence of gender based violence, and on the other hand, encourage survivors to seek help in a timely manner when an event occurs. Our counsellors accompany survivors to the hospital, police, and in court. More and more people have sought our help: two years ago we saw two new cases a month; now it is up to 3-5 per week. Case management is time consuming and complex. Some cases are still pending two years later.
What do I do when I travel to Zambia? I go to villages and schools and observe our partners at work, review every single case and guide our counselors on how to manage them. I conduct workshops on selected themes such as complications of abortion, emergency medical treatment of rape victims, and family planning. I meet with not-always-so-cooperative doctors, nurses and hospital administrators; with corrupt police officials and smiling politicians; with village headmen and headwomen; and with school kids and their teachers, in order to encourage cooperation among the different parties at interest – “stakeholders” as they say in international parlance.
Microcredit
We have been nurturing this child for 4 years. During this visit, I met with 69 representative members of our program and visited half a dozen villages in order to hear the resonance at ground level. We can count a myriad of successes: the astonishingly high rate of return on our loans of 98%, the fact that women prefer our product over other new microcredit products that have emerged in the area, and that we have grown from 50 to 450 women in 4 year’s time. However, growth and success have their disadvantages. We have been unable to find competent and trustworthy management on the ground to carry on the good work. And the bigger we grow, the more these two qualities are essential. We have therefore decided to turn responsibility over to the women themselves, to let them manage the money themselves. This is a work in progress and the concrete details will be enumerated in the course of 2016.
JS, December 2015
Letter from Zambia 2014
I just returned a few days ago from a strenuous but exhilarating trip to Zambia. What do we do in Zambia? We monitor, encourage, facilitate, discuss strategy, give workshops, and this time around, because of a severe shortage of Zambian doctors, I also worked in the hospital on the paediatric ward. What was the biggest challenge I faced there aside from electricity outages, lack of personnel, and lack of essential medications? I would say, the worst problem was that children are brought in too late; parents do not have the means to get them to hospital in time. As we worked feverishly to save a comatose child with cerebral malaria, the nurse whispered to me, “This one, this one is B.I.D.” That is short for “brought in dead.” He may have been physiologically still alive, but his fate was sealed. We tried anyway. We got an intravenous line, gave glucose, a blood transfusion, quinine, phenobarbital and antibiotics, but he died an hour later. Had the grandmother - the child was an orphan - had the means to pay for a taxi instead of carrying the child 10 kilometres through the bush, would things have turned out differently? What killed this child, was it malaria or poverty?
Our microcredit program is a call to arms against poverty. How are we faring? We spoke with 14 women’s representatives, traipsed to 6 villages to meet with over 300 women loan recipients, and attended stakeholder sessions, board meetings and audits of the local non-profit partner organization, Lubuto Jumpstart Women’s Empowerment. The positive resonance was overwhelming: women are sending more children to school, putting a solid roof on the house, and last but not least, gaining respect at home. But we still intend to put these informal observations to rigorous test.
I am pleased to inform you that we received a grant from the Rudolph Geigy Foundation of the Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute to fund the microcredit study being conducted by master students from the Goethe Institute, Frankfurt Germany. They are in Zambia now for a three-month stint to collect both quantitative and qualitative data. I was able observe the students working hand in hand with local partners collecting quantitative data and to assist them in conducting the first pilot focus group discussion.
With our Coordinated Response Centre against Gender-Based Violence we have taken on the goliath of sexual exploitation. The local head-woman of a remote village confessed, “Wife beating, rape, incest, and child abuse have been around for generations. We just accepted it. Now we know to fight back.” In order to get the message across in the schools, we created a short tragicomic drama piece about a 15-year old girl who was being exploited by her teacher. There were two endings: in one she winds up HIV positive and pregnant, and leaves school. In the second ending she seeks help immediately, is able to prevent HIV and pregnancy, and stays in school. Sexual exploitation is rampant in the schools, but kids do not know where to turn for help. We are changing that. JS, June 2014
Letter from Zambia 2013
I just returned from Zambia last week and would like to update you on the state of our projects.
We had to adjust our time line to fit the human capacity of our Zambia partners; our modest, revised plan is to open one new microcredit centre of 50 women every two months. We now expect to become financially sustainable with a total loan capitol of $40,000 and approximately 300 women participants within a few years.
What does microcredit accomplish? We were keen to answer this question: we traipsed around from business to business, from market place to village to home – observing, photographing, palavering and above all listening. What do women say? Things like: “This year I was able to send not only my own children, but also the orphans I care for, to school.” “We eat better now.” Microcredit brings not just economic advantages, but social change as well. A few women found the means to leave an abusive marriage.
As for formally assessing and quantifying what microcredit achieves, two bachelor students from the Goethe Institute, Frankfurt, Germany set up the data-base and finished the pilot study in March – no small feet in the rainy season, with electricity outages over half of the time, and computers beset with viruses and worms. We were able to get funding from the Rudolph Geigy Foundation for the pilot study, and hope to get more funding for the definitive study in one to two years time.
GBV encompasses everything from wife beating to gang rape, from incest to child abuse, whether physical, sexual or emotional. How do you tackle this scourge? The first step is to find the right local person to train staff and mobilize the community. We found that person, a Zambian consultant, Nelson Mwape, who has opened over a dozen such centres throughout Zambia. He conducted seminars for our staff and for our future partners in the community: hospital staff, police, village chiefs, community headwomen, representatives of the judiciary, and members of the government. It was a captivating learning experience for us all.
What did we learn? We learned that GBV is everywhere. Every single participant had been, or still was, either a survivor, or a perpetrator, or a witness to some form of GBV. Seminar participants, both men and women, looked inward into their own souls. In so doing, they gained new perspectives not just of themselves but of the world around them. At the end of the week they were eager to work toward a better community.
JS, June 2013
