Uganda — Ethnic Supplies

African Women’s reproductive health-she died for lack of £66

September 22, 2011 By idahorner 2 Comments

Doreen

A few days ago I came across a story in the Daily Monitor a Uganda daily that has left me shaken to the core.

The story goes that Cecilia a teacher died in labour because she , her family and friends not raise the hospital amounting to £66. According to the Daily Monitor Cecilia had been warned to expect a large baby and when the day came she made her way to hospital and was there by 6am but was denied treatment until she settled the hospital bill. Her husband went out in the village to sell whatever possessions he could but this was not enough to save his wife and baby as she eventually died at 8PM that day. You can read the rest of the story here

If you are regular here you will recall a post about my late cousin Doreen who died earlier this year having developed a complication following a miscarriage. In that post I wondered what hope if any there was for African women when it comes to maternal health. Doreen and Cecilia’s stories do not answer that question. Unlike Cecilia, Doreen had a good job and so did her husband and they could afford to pay for decent maternal health care but that did not save her life.

I therefore ask the question again

What hope is there for African women when it comes to reproductive health?

Goal Number 5 of the the Millennium Development Goals is all about Reproductive health/maternal health but how is this really helping women.

Are African leaders even taking notice of this? Stupid question I know given how things work in some African countries.

Here in the UK most politicians use the National Health Service so generally know how things are and my assumption here is that they are more likely to fight for service improvement.

On the other hand in most African countries politicians and those with money are unlikely to use a public hospital and chances are they will fly out to a country they believe offers good or better health care than their own. My assumption here is because they have no experience of those services they are unlikely to call for improvements. They do not know or have no experience of how things could be improved!

Where does that leave the Doreens and Cecilias of this world?

Should a woman and her baby die because she cannot pay a mere £66?

Over at The Guardian Poverty Blog there is an ongoing discussion on gender equality.

Can we realistically achieve Gender equality when we are yet to resolve issues of access to decent maternal health care?

Over to you folk, please do share your thoughts on this matter

Filed Under: HEALTH, Latest Tagged With: Africa, African women, Health care, MATERNAL HEALTH, MILLENNIUM DEVELOPMENT GOALS, National Health Service, Uganda, United Nations

Fashion fights poverty part 2

September 20, 2011 By idahorner Leave a Comment

Eugenie

In the part 1 of Fashion fights poverty I told you about a young woman I met on my way out and true to her word she sent her question to me by email and here is what she had to say

Dear Ida,

Firstly, it was a pleasure to hear you speak last week at the Africa Fashion Guide event, particularly on poverty alleviation and the women you work with through ethnic supplies. It was also great to meet you briefly at the end of the evening. You may remember, I came and asked you a long-winded question, I said I would email you with it so you could respond if you got a moment! So here it is again..

I understand how important it is for women in Africa to make clothes, be tailors etc, having worked with different NGOs and women’s groups, I have seen how empowering being a skilled tailor is in Togo – But if the fashion industry insentivises this, providing greater demand and income for women, is it not also at risk of reducing the emphasis on women’s education which really is what can change women’s positions in society, enabling them to reach positions of greater influence and increase their opportunities and choices?

I have thought on this some more since I posed the question to you, and wonder if there are ways of incorporating education in to ethical fashion projects which give women business at the same time. Maybe you know of some. Personally, I am still a believer in the state providing good education, but perhaps it is too late for that in lots of African countries.

Yes, that is a long question and I will do my best to unpack it here and hopefully you the readers can join in.

My initial thoughts are that this young lady has concerns that women maybe excluded from education and confined to being tailors and that whilst that provides an income women ought to access education so that they can take up their full roles in society.

I agree that that women should have access to education and I believe that the single most reason why African women are poor is the lack of education and that is why I am involved in an education initiative in SW Uganda. But I am also a realist- some women will not access education for whatever reason.

When that happens initiatives that provide skills that enable women to become financially independent are the next best thing and such initiative see women as tailors or designers of fashion accessories and handicrafts.

In my mind the worst situation for an African Woman is to find themselves without an independent source of income nor an education as this equates to social, political and financial exclusion which are key elements of an individual being able to participate fully or have any influence in society for that matter and is what I mean when I use the word empowerment.

I have met many such women and in fact I work with some of them and I can tell you the reality of their lives can be challenging

So over to you folk- what are thoughts?

Filed Under: Business support for women, Latest Tagged With: Africa, London Fashion Week, MILLENNIUM DEVELOPMENT GOALS, Togo, Uganda

Do NGOs have a role in food distribution?

July 16, 2011 By ethnicsupplies 4 Comments

This post is also part of the #30 day blogging challenge series and today we are looking at creating catchy headlines. In the last post I asked you what topics you would like me to cover on this blog and whilst I wait for your ideas I thought I would revisit this question as someone has already asked it

If you have been following the news you would have come across 2 news headlines

News of the World and the phone hacking scandal
Famine at the Horn of Africa

The second headline has almost faded from front line news but is the subject of today’s post. Folk in East Africa or more preciously the Horn of Africa are facing the worst famine in 60 years and Non Governmental Organisations (NGOs) and Charities are appealing to us to donate whatever we can to support their efforts to get food to these folk

So what is the role of NGO’s in food distribution?

The answer is it all it depends on their terms of reference as NGOs get established for all manner of reasons.

A different question- do NGOs have a role to play in food distribution?

The simple answer is YES and

A qualified answer is Yes but perhaps only in emergencies such as the one we are currently witnessing in East Africa.

Why?

In my mind it is because the role of ensuring that citizens are fed primarily rests with leaders of a given country. They ought to plan and manage food distribution- put simply this involves

getting food from where it is to where it is needed
planning for hard times- e.g when the rains fail
supply and managing the infrastructure that enables 1 and 2 to happen

Am I being naive here- well that much depends on your point of view. But there are some things that I would like you to bear in mind please

One of the countries that are listed amongst those facing severe famine is Uganda, but as you can see from my previous post- there is no shortage of food in Uganda and that being the case why is Uganda included on this list.
granted Somalia- does not have an effective government to speak of but even then, are those in charge in Somalia starving like the millions we have seen trekking across East Africa in search of food. What does this tell us?
these countries are in close proximity to each other- could leaders of these countries get together and plan this out, I am not suggesting here that they should plan for good rains- but we do know that rains in this part of Africa do fail but do the East African leaders have a strategy for dealing with this? Or is it easier to wait and cry for help from the NGOs? I also know that most homes have more food than they need- for instance my mother has more Avocados than she knows what to do with and if someone asked her to donate it to starving people she will part with it easily. The only catch would be that you would need to get it off the trees yourself
why was Kenya’s initial reaction to the catastrophe to deny those fleeing the famine in Somalia access into Kenya?
Uganda has sent her military to rid Somalia of a terrorist cell Alshabab could they send some food to the folk they are trying to protect- chances are these folk are more likely to die of hunger than Alshabab bullets at this rate. Do you agree?

Whilst some want to know what the role of NGo’s in this is some like my twitter buddy @mugumya want to know

Patrick Mugumya Why is it #Africa that is always starving? is it that God is against us, do we sin too much or have we refused to learn from our past?

I am not so sure about God being against us but I have covered some of the reasons why Africans are always starving in this post some of which include disease and severe weather, you can’t work the land if you body is ridden with parasites. have we refused to learn from our past. It would appear that way seeing us we are aware or at least leaders are aware of what is required but fail to implement or take the necessary steps to secure food for everyone

Another issue that has been bugging me- where is the African diaspora in all this? What aren’t we doing something collectively to aid folk at the horn of Africa?

Whilst we ponder and debate this folk are dying of hunger and they continue to trek to safety

Filed Under: Ethics, Latest, Poverty in Africa Tagged With: Africa, East africa, famine, Horn of Africa, Kenya, News of the Wrold, Non-governmental organization, Somalia, Uganda, World Food Programme