Column: Women and girls became central in our pandemic work

Women and girls became central in our pandemic work

INTENSIFYING GENDER-BASED VIOLENCE (GBV), more domestic work, dropouts from school, and increasing numbers of child marriage. The Covid-19 pandemic hit us all hard, but the consequences of school closures and national lockdowns were especially serious for Nepalese girls and women.

Right after the declaration of Covid-19 restrictions and lockdowns, we understood that child marriage would become a pertinent issue in our working areas. That’s why we wanted to focus on child safeguarding and make it one of our first priorities. We started implementing our activities which included child clubs in school, community dialogues and even educational street drama performances.

We also erected billboards with a message on child marriage and its negative effects on children’s physical, mental, social well-being and legal provisions against child marriage. It was encouraging to see that the billboards were well recognized by the community and local government officials.

In addition to child safeguarding, the pandemic forced us to respond to the crisis in many ways. Our food distributions addressed the immediate needs of the most marginalized groups, especially pregnant and lactating women, and households who had a person with a disability.

As in many other countries, there were more reported cases of gender-based violence in Nepal during the lockdown. We did our best to tackle the problem with our family dialogues, media awareness campaigns and sessions on gender inequality with mixed groups engaging men, boys, women and girls of communities. Some of the cooperatives (supported by FCA) formulated advocacy plans of action including activities to reduce child marriage and addressing GBV, amongst others. These were submitted to the respective local governments.

In consideration of the increasing violence and abuse against women and girls in the quarantine centres, FCA partners advocated for women-friendly spaces with local governments. Our efforts bore fruit: due to this collective voice of Civil Society Organisations, local governments initiated women-friendly spaces in the targeted quarantine centres.

I’m hopeful because our constitution is very progressive and the policies and acts addressing child marriage and violence against women and girls are promising. The presence of the local units of the government at the community level aims to create an enabling environment for women and girls to thrive. STOP

Deepika Naidu Program Development Coordinator PHOTO: TATU BLOMQVIST

RIGHT TO LIVELIHOOD

EVERYONE HAS A RIGHT to a livelihood that enables them to support themselves and their families, to increase their wellbeing and to participate in developing their communities as equal citizens.

The Covid-19 pandemic has tested people’s ability to earn a living in many ways, and lockdowns have increased unemployment and food insecurity. Those most severely affected populations have been women and girls whose unpaid work at home increased significantly during lockdowns.

Community cooperatives and savings groups, which provide business loans and other assistance, are at the core of our livelihoods work. During the 2020 pandemic, we waived interest rate payments for a period of time, offered debt restructuring, and otherwise adjusted our operations to better meet the new needs. We also started distributing food to the most vulnerable as emergency assistance.

In developing countries, the majority of jobs that pay a living wage are created by small and medium-sized enterprises, which is why Finn Church Aid supports the private sector in all its programme countries. We train women, young people and refugees to help them find employment or establish a business.

The full impact of Covid-19 may only become apparent over a long period of time. But while the pandemic has overshadowed other global trends which affect livelihoods, such as the advancing climate change, In developing countries, small migration and urbanisation, our pri- and medium-sized enterprises ority now is to ensure that the results create the majority of jobs. Allen Bamukunde collects eggs we achieved before the Covid-19 crisis for sale by Chiggi Egg Producin reducing poverty and inequality tion Ltd, a company supported by Women’s Bank in Uganda. are not wasted. STOP PHOTO: HUGH RUTHERFORD