International HIV/AIDS Alliance collaborates with Zambian government to support children
29 July 2008
The International HIV/AIDS Alliance in Zambia has signed an agreement with Zambia’s Ministry of Community Development and Social Welfare to strengthen community support for orphaned and vulnerable children.
Under the agreement, the Alliance will provide technical support to the Department of Social Welfare in Ndola and Msaiti districts to effectively coordinate and monitor activities aimed at supporting children and the households caring for them.
The Alliance is also partnering with two community-based organisations, who will receive funding to carry out support programmes.
The aim is that, by the end of the project, community support systems will be better able to respond to the needs of orphaned and vulnerable children, and there will be improved policy dialogue with government and other decision makers.
In July 2008, at a ceremony attended by government officials, the Alliance handed over project equipment to its partners including a vehicle, a motorbike, 30 bicycles, two computers and a printer.
At the ceremony, Alliance Zambia’s acting country director Chabu Kangale expressed his confidence that the Ministry of Community Development and Social Welfare would provide leadership to civil society, the private sector and other government ministries to provide coordinated support to children.
“In most cases, each of these partners has acted in isolation and this has led to duplication of activities. It also means that we haven’t been making the most of resources to benefit children,” he said.
The Ministry’s Director of Social Welfare, Rose Mutupo, also highlighted the importance of working in partnership to support children.
“I would like to encourage other non-governmental organisations to take a leaf from the example set by the International HIV/AIDS Alliance to enhance and work through existing structures, particularly in collaborating with the Ministry,” she said.
The existing structures that Rose Mutupo referred to are Community Welfare Assistance Committees, set up by the ministry to identify and provide support to vulnerable individuals. The Alliance has conducted skills-building workshops for 40 committee members on policy research and advocacy and on decentralising the government-initiated Public Welfare Assistance scheme.
The Alliance is also going to be working with the committees to establish a database that will review planning, policy and coordination activities – to prevent resources concentrating in certain areas at the expense of others.
Irish Aid is providing financial support for the programme.
