ADVOCACY
ILLUSTRATION: TUUKKA RANTALA
ADVOCACY FOCUSED ON THE LEARNING CRISIS, THE INCLUSION OF WOMEN, AND RELATIONS WITH AFRICAN COUNTRIES
THE PURPOSE OF OUR ADVOCACY is to support the rights of the most vulnerable people to quality education, livelihood and peace. Our objective is to promote sustainable development and equality by achieving changes in policies, attitudes and laws. We want to enable the participation of women, young people, minorities, and religious and traditional actors in decision-making. In practice, advocacy includes dialogue with decision-makers, preparing background analysis, commenting on political documents, and issuing recommendations. Covid-19 posed a significant challenge for us on many levels. Due to Covid-19 restrictions, we had to conduct most of our advocacy campaigns online. Thanks to modern technology, we were able to work actively in our programme countries, in international forums, and in Finland. In some of Finn Church Aid’s programme countries, Covid-19 restrictions further shrank the space for civil society, which was very limited to begin with. International meetings were postponed until next year, and decision-making processes dragged on. Despite the challenges, we achieved significant results with advocacy: In Somalia, women took a stronger role in politics and decision-making, while in Uganda, payment of salaries to teachers working in refugee settlements was secured during Covid-19 related school closures. In Finland, our focus areas included funding levels for development cooperation, the report on development policy across parliamentary terms, and the content of Finland’s Africa strategy. Internationally, we worked with our education partners to increase financing to address the global learning crisis. STOP
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Finn Church Aid 2020
