Chintan organizing poor muslim women wastepickers in New Delhi, India
Community Engagement workshops in Uttarakhand, India
Girls Got Goals Soccer Project in Monze, Zambia
This year, Lisle has stepped into the centre of urban poverty, with its partnership with Chintan. This partnership will help Muslim wastepicker women in Delhi to organize themselves to assert their rights and to procure cleaner, safer livelihoods. A new report which describes the wastepicker's situation and Chintan's response is available.
These days, India is discussed more for its prosperity than its poverty. Yet, almost 700 million people live under 2 dollars a day, a sum that means starvation in urban India. A majority of these people are in the informal workforce, which means they have no access to social security and are not organized. In other words, their work can be treated as illegal. Amongst the worst off are the thousands of informal sector waste-recyclers: waste pickers, waste buyers and waste reprocessors. They bear the brunt of a city's consumption and offer it critical recycling services. However, such persons are also harassed and humiliated by several others: the police, local municipal actors, even residents, who nurse a severe bias against them.
The nuts and bolts of Chintan's work is organizing wastepickers and small scrap dealers at the grassroots for their rights and to work as a cohesive group, help them to access safer livelihoods, ensure children phase out of this work and go to school and train themselves to understand the laws and advocating for better policies. Lisle's partnership with Chintan addresses the most vulnerable of these people, creating a model of replicable optimism despite widespread poverty.Delhi is the first time in most of these women's lives where they step out of home and encounter complete strangers, without the support of their husband or brothers. They become sitting ducks for government agencies, who ask for bribes to let them carry home scrap, or sit near a trash dump or even to avoid being booked for vagrancy. They often pay, in order to survive. Not only is this a loss of income, but also, a loss of empowerment.
The initiative is based on building up the women to reduce their vulnerability. Two central strategies have been identified, both based on the central theme of getting organized as a distinct group. One is learn to negotiate with the government and other agencies for their rights. The other is to build capacity to secure more formal work which not only pays more, but is also safer and cleaner. Clearly, neither of these can be done unless the women work as a group and jointly safeguard their interests in the long term.Chintan will begin with forming them into a group that learns hands on as the processes unfold. A trainer will teach them to work as a collective, while others will help them to identify avenues of work. This is likely to include service micro-franchises, which will enable the women to pick up waste from the generators' doorstep, while securing a service fees from each household. Not only does this reduce the informal nature of their work, but it will also help them increase income and improve their health. Other spin offs will be domestic: reduced vulnerability and collective action outside is expected to reflect at home, with greater decision making internally. The initiative is less than a year, but the processes will constantly develop, improve and branch out with this foundation. Lisle and Chintan will ensure that the tools to do this are in place.
Lisle's 2007 grant to the Mountain Children's Forum (MCF) will allow the MCF to expand its work with young people in rural mountain communities in a new and exciting way. This proposal was facilitated by Sharada Nayak and the Educational Resources Centre (ERC).
Through a series of nine workshops in different parts of the North Indian state of Uttarakhand, the MCF will expose young people in those communities to the concepts of collective action and local engagement. Each workshop will engage about 30 children, aged 12-18.
The MCF focuses on a broad range of issues, including education, health, agriculture, environment, and disaster preparedness. But its primary focus has always been on developing leadership, communication skills, and self confidence in children, breaking down traditional barriers of gender, caste, religion, etc., and helping young people find ways to improve their lives and their villages through direct action.Although community engagement has always been a central focus of the MCF's work and workshops have always been one of our most effective tools, we have never before had the opportunity to focus our resources in this way. These workshops will use the medium of games and group activities to tap the energy and excitement of young people and help focus it on improving their communities.
In rural mountain villages, where the needs are so great and the resources so few, the young people have shown themselves to be a dynamic force for change. Driven by the inherent revolutionary tendencies of youth, children are not as bound by tradition and so are willing to reconsider prevailing beliefs-such as the idea that boys are better than girls-and shake off the debilitating apathy that makes people think they are helpless to improve their circumstances.Yet this resource usually remains untapped because, before the children can become engaged in improving their communities, they must first learn to believe in themselves and understand the importance of respecting and working with others. That is the purpose of these workshops.
We have also discovered that one of the most powerful motivators for the children is having people listen to their ideas and show an interest in what they are trying to do. That is what makes this grant all the more unique. The first workshop will coincide with a visit by some Lisle board members [Note - do we want to include their names?], who will participate actively in the workshop. It will undoubtedly be a fun and unique experience for the Lislers. But for the children, its impact can be momentous: these young lives are often defined by the borders of their small, rural villages. Through this interaction they will have an opportunity to see a world far vaster than they have imagined and, even more importantly, they will have the amazing, empowering knowledge that someone from so far away actually cares about them and what they are doing.Another powerful feature of this project is the planned follow-up. Until now the MCF has measured its work by the number of partners and children it reaches. However, through these nine workshops and the support for following up with each individual community, Lisle is providing the MCF with a rare opportunity to actually measure how the ideas and concepts discussed in the workshops are turned by the children into action and results in their villages.
Girls in a rural community in Zambia, Africa are making strides by scoring goals. Soccer Without Borders is working with a youth sports organization in the small town of Monze to help develop a girls soccer program. Monze is a poor town where many people struggle to live on less than a $1 a day, one out of four people are HIV positive, and the life expectancy for adults is only 38 years of age. Girls in particular face many obstacles and challenges. Having the money to pay for high school entrance fees is a privilege and without many goals for a future, girls often end up pregnant at the age of 14-15. When girls are given the opportunity to play soccer and be a part of a team, they are putting their energy towards a healthy lifestyle and a more promising future.
Soccer without Borders is a non-profit based out of San Francisco, which works to develop sustainable soccer and life-skills programs in developing countries. The funding from Lisle will help support The Girls Got Goals Global project to provide a full time salary for a Zambian woman to coordinate a girls soccer program as well as purchase much needed sports equipment. Throughout the year she will continue to train and support the volunteer coaches who work with four girls' soccer teams. In addition, she and other peer leaders will facilitate a life-skills curriculum with each team. These sessions will address issues such as self-esteem, being assertive, HIV/AIDS and Malaria prevention and goal setting. The girls will play in a soccer league for the first time and show off their talents in a culminating tournament.One of the most important components of the program is the creation of an income generating business to help support the teams in a sustainable manner. Due to playing on rough dirt fields, the lifespan of a ball is only a couple months Donated uniforms brought from abroad are shared with about 10 other boys' teams and will need to be replaced over time. Christine, the Girls Sports Coordinator, plans to develop a business with her coaches and teams to buy and sell chickens. The little money they generate will keep the program afloat over time by providing funds for equipment. The development of a source of self sustaining funding is a vital concept for the youth and coaches to learn and an important type of self empowerment. Hence, the program name, 'Girls Got Goals Global.'
We want to thank the community at Lisle for believing in our project. We are lucky to have Bill Kinney supporting us as our mentor. Zambian people are incredibly hospitable and welcoming, and would be grateful for any sort of support that could be provided. People can help by either bringing or sending soccer equipment such as uniforms, balls, cleats (did we mention the kids all play in their bare feet?!) or folks can come and help coach soccer, lead life-skills sessions, or assist in fundraising.Project proposal applications should be submitted to the Lisle office by September 1st, 2007. Key required elements contained in the application include:
Lisle Board members will provide consultation in the developing of proposals to fulfill this funding opportunity. Please feel free to call, write, or email for further details or help.
