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UK/Nicaragua exchange visits for African trainers
Reprinted courtesy of AF-AIDS ([email protected])
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Ten African "Stepping Stones" trainers are visiting UK and Nicaragua during the month of May to participate in a series of Building Bridges workshops that will help them share understandings and approaches in the fields of Sexual and Reproductive Wellbeing and Domestic Violence.
These trainers from Gambia, South Africa, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe are scheduled to meet together with UK and Nicaraguan practitioners involved in gender and HIV work to look at lessons emerging from their varied experiences.
The first workshop was held in Charney Manor near Oxford from 5 - 7 May 2002, from where they proceeded to Managua, Nicaragua on 8 May for a 10-day exchange programme with the Nicaraguan Association of Men Against Violence (AHCV) and a feminist organisation, Puntos de Encuentro. These organisations' dynamic work on domestic violence, gender and diversity, draws on experiences from the Sandinista revolution.
Returning to the UK on 19 May, the group will be joined by three Nicaraguan practitioners for a further two days of workshops, analysing and building on the learning from the exchange. There will be a more public day of presenting the fruits of the visit to both countries on 22 May.
The aim of these exchange workshops is for the Africans and Nicaraguans to learn from one another and to build on the strengths of everyone's experiences in very different contexts, in order to improve everybody's ways of working. The aim is to develop gender-sensitive approaches to sexual and reproductive well-being which engage men more fully, and to build an independent international network of those working with participatory approaches in this area.
The exchange visits are being facilitated by Exchange Programme, a networking and learning programme on health communication for development, and have been developed by Dr Sheena Crawford of Edinburgh Resource Centre Ltd., Dr Rob Vincent of the Exchange Programme and Dr Alice Welbourn. Gill Gordon of the Reproductive Health Alliance is also facilitating the programme.
Stepping Stones is a life-skills training package on gender, sexual and reproductive well-being, communication and relationship skills. Created in response to the AIDS crisis in Africa, Stepping Stones is listed by UNAIDS in its "best practice series" for community mobilisation and is the winner of a BMA film award. It is now being widely adapted and used in over 40 countries in Africa, Asia and beyond.
Exchange Programme is a networking and learning programme on health communication for development. The programme is hosted by Healthlink Worldwide and funded by Department for International Development (DFID). Exchange Programme aims to share widely information and knowledge on effective health communication and to support strategic approaches to health communication. It also aims to increase the involvement of southern-based organisations in generating, analysing and applying good health communication.
For further information, please contact:
Frank Mubiru
Networking/Information Officer, Exchange
c/o Healthlink Worldwide, 40 Adler Street, London, E1 1EE, UK
Tel:+44 (0)20 7539 1570(general),+44 (0)20 7539 1574 (direct)
Fax: +44 (0)20 7539 1580
E-mail: [email protected] or [email protected] |
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