Posts Tagged ‘South Africa’
Katherine Zavala – IDEX’s Program Manager, Grassroots Alliances – recently journeyed to South Africa on a site visit to our partners. She reports from Johannesburg.
Women's Net provided technical training to teenage girls in order to provide a new outlet for advancing women's rights.
Driving into Johannesburg, on the other side of the hemisphere from San Francisco, it is easy to embrace the warm sunny weather. The Jacaranda trees are blooming this month, giving a purple flair to the lush, green environment.
Along the highway, I see the Nelson Mandela Bridge and central “Jozi” as some local people refer to the South African city.
I start my learning journey with Women’s Net, an IDEX Catalyst Grantee.
The goal of Women’s Net is to strengthen women and girls movements for social change through the use of information communication tools and advocacy that promotes access, the right to information and freedom of expression.
Katherine Zavala – IDEX’s Program Manager, Grassroots Alliances – is in South Africa on a site visit to our partners. She reports from Cape Town.
"We talk about our commonalities and differences. We get to know each other’s history, where we come from, and our struggles as women."- Mary Tal, WWWA's Founder and Director. Photo by Eric Miller.
Mary Tal, Founder and Director of Whole World Women Assocation
Today I’ve been invited to observe a training at the wonderful Community House in Salt River, Cape Town, a unique building where lots of NGOs share a communal space including IDEX Partner Whole World Women Association (WWWA).
The training is for peer educators. The goal is that these new peer educators, who come from different countries such as Democratic Republic of Congo, Malawi, Rwanda, and Cameroon, will educate and build awareness among other refugees on HIV/AIDS literacy.
WWWA has been working with migrant and refugee communities in the surrounding areas of Cape Town since 2002, particularly focusing on women.
Refugees from the most conflicted areas around the African continent have been attracted to South Africa because it offers the best economic opportunities on this continent.
Unfortunately, refugees are still not welcomed or integrated into South African society.
Katherine Zavala – IDEX’s Program Manager, Grassroots Alliances – is in South Africa on a site visit to our partners. She reports from the Eastern Cape province.
IDEX Program Director Katherine Zavala with AGF staff (in red) and Positive Health Champions
Today I went to visit IDEX Partner Angus Gillis Foundation (AGF) and accompany them on a community visit to Glenmore, a township in the Eastern Cape province.
Eastern Cape is known as the poorest province in South Africa, where two-thirds of the people are living in rural areas and lack access to available resources.
It is the final day of activities before the communities start their Christmas vacation. Many of them will travel far to visit extended family. Some will stay home.
But today is a day for reflecting on what was learned in 2011 and what their dreams are for 2012.
During COP 17, the UN’s latest round of climate talks, civil society organizations – including 4 IDEX Partners – are mobilizing from all over the world to put pressure from the outside on the government negotiators on the inside.
Katherine Zavala – IDEX’s Program Manager, Grassroots Alliances – is in South Africa on a site visit to our partners and to support their activities at COP 17. She reports from Durban.
IDEX partner SDCEA conducts a toxic tour in South Durban to highlight environmental degradation in the area under the watchful eye of a security guard.
Throughout the two weeks of COP17, IDEX Partner SDCEA has organized toxic tours, as part of their strategy to showcase the realities of low-income communities in South Durban living right next to several big polluters.
Toxic tours always start at a spot overlooking the Shell/BP oil refinery which is located right next to a huge paper mill and an airport strip.
This whole cluster is right next to the Umlazi channel that flows all the toxic waste directly to the beach, where fisher folks can no longer fish because of the extreme toxic waste that has accumulated on the shore.
As we arrived, we noticed several people including a security agent for the oil refinery, who is paid to stand around and call the cops if he sees anyone from SDCEA doing their toxic tours.
SDCEA is so accustomed to this routine that they have taken the approach of being transparent and telling the security agents what they’re doing and how many people are there for their tour.
Sure enough, after a few minutes a police helicopter came and surrounded our area for a good five minutes before flying away!
During COP 17, the UN’s latest round of climate talks, civil society organizations – including 4 IDEX Partners – are mobilizing from all over the world to put pressure from the outside on the government negotiators on the inside.
Katherine Zavala – IDEX’s Program Manager, Grassroots Alliances – is in South Africa on a site visit to our partners and to support their activities at COP 17. She reports from Durban.
Getting ready to walk in the Global Day of Action march in Durban, South Africa where the UN COP17 talks are taking place
It wasn’t easy to get the right route for the Global Day of Action march, but after multiple negotiations with the municipality a path was finally agreed on. It would start at Botha’s Garden, going towards Down West Street, turn into Aliwal Street [ Samora Machel ] and then in Braam Fisher Street [Ordinance Road] to meet the UN President of COP 17, Christina Figueres at the International Convention Center. The march ended at the Old Pavilion site, next to the beach.
Arriving at Botha’s Garden around 10am, I found a huge octopus marking the ending point of the march. The octopus represented USA and its demands for more carbon markets!
I joined the march with IDEX Partner Biowatch who had brought 15 farm workers (mostly women) from rural KwaZulu Natal to Durban to be part of the protests at the People’s Space and the International Convention Center (ICC) where the UNFCCC conversations were happening.
This was the first time the farm workers had been part of this process and in their debrief later many expressed how powerful it was for them to see African leaders in different networks and movements.
During COP 17, the UN’s latest round of climate talks, civil society organizations – including 4 IDEX Partners – are mobilizing from all over the world to put pressure from the outside on the government negotiators on the inside.
Katherine Zavala – IDEX’s Program Manager, Grassroots Alliances – is in South Africa on a site visit to our partners and to support their activities at COP 17. She reports from Durban.
Today was an important powerful day as it was symbolically the day of the launch of Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa (AFSA).
AFSA is a new continental alliance of African networks that have come together to form a united African voice on key issues affecting the continent’s peoples, in particular issues concerning farmers, food systems, forests and other ecosystems.
Promoting African Solutions for Food Sovereignty
AFSA aims to strengthen the already existing and growing food sovereignty movement in Africa.
Their objective is to create a strong voice that calls for effective policies in the interconnected areas of family farming and food systems; promotion of traditional and indigenous knowledge systems; and regeneration and protection of ecosystems, community rights, and ecological governance systems in Africa.
Nov
30“We are part of the solutions to the challenges we’re facing. We could be the biggest solution” – Dispatches from COP 17
2011
Posted by IDEX
During COP 17, the UN’s latest round of climate talks, civil society organizations – including 4 IDEX Partners – are mobilizing from all over the world to put pressure from the outside on the government negotiators on the inside.
Katherine Zavala – IDEX’s Program Manager, Grassroots Alliances – is in South Africa on a site visit to our partners and to support their activities at COP 17. She reports from Durban.
Workshop participants make signs for the Global Day of Action march at the Biowatch/ABN Agroecology and Climate workshop
During the week of COP17, IDEX Partner Biowatch facilitated a workshop on Agroecology and Climate with African Biodiversity Network (ABN) at the People’s Space.
The event drew over 55 participants consisting mostly of women farm workers, but also men and youth from rural KwaZulu Natal, Tanzania, Mozambique, Uganda and Kenya.
The workshop highlighted agroecology as a key solution to climate change.
Many Western-oriented thinkers define this as the alternative method of agriculture, but as quoted from Gathuru Mburu, ABN’s Director from Kenya, “This is not the alternative for me. This is the natural path that we should and ought to be following.”
Four experts on agroecology shared their practices and experience: Mercy Mutave from Institute for Culture and Ecology (Kenya); Helena Paul, Eco Nexus (UK); Lawrence Mkhalipi, Biowatch (South Africa); Sophiwe Florence Dlamini, Biowatch Community Facilitator in Pongola, KwaZulu Natal (South Africa).
A Visit with Positive Women’s Network in South Africa: “I wish to learn more so that I can then teach others.”
2011
Posted by IDEX
Katherine Zavala – IDEX’s Program Manager, Grassroots Alliances – is in South Africa on a site visit to our partners. She reports from Johannesburg.
Today I visited IDEX’s longest partner in South Africa, Positive Women’s Network (PWN), in their new office in Johannesburg.
I was pleasantly surprised to arrive at a room full of women, as Prudence Mabele, PWN’s Director, introduced me to her office team and women participating in support groups from different townships around Johannesburg.
- Katherine with Positive Women’s Network in Johannesburg.
The Power of Support Groups
PWN’s core ongoing program has been the support group model, where women living with or impacted HIV/AIDS come and engage in a safe space with other women to share their experiences and feelings on issues prevalent in their lives.
Today there are 5 outreach coordinators and 10 support group members.
They have come to start planning their activities for 16 Days of Activism. Activities will include HIV/AIDS treatment literacy, awareness around the link between HIV/AIDS and cervical cancer, and awareness on violence against women.
Quality Health Care Remain a Challenge
Each outreach coordinator (key community liaison and facilitator of the support group) shared with me the different challenges they’ve seen in their communities.
The common theme? A lack of support from the health clinics towards women.
IDEX Partner Biowatch's workshop brought together rural women farm workers to put together posters to march with on Dec 3rd's Global Day of Action
IDEX is joining social movements from across the globe in creating 1000′s of Durbans in conjunction with the social movement activities around the UN climate talks in Durban, South Africa.
Why? To demonstrate to governments around the world the people’s determination to prevent catastrophic climate change.
This year the Global Day of Action calling for a “1,000 Durbans” is being headed up by Desmond D’Sa, of IDEX partner South Durban Community Environmental Alliance, which will see a non-violent mass march in Durban calling for measures to halt climate change.
“World leaders are discussing the fate of our planet but they are far from reaching a solution to climate change. If they fail to make progress we will see drought and hunger blight our country and continent even further. We call on all South African’s to march with us this Saturday and remind our leaders they must come to a fair climate change deal that avoids runaway climate change.” - Desmond D’sa
Like many organizations around the US and the world, IDEX will be marking the Global Day of Action and supporting our South African partners through a series of activities to highlight grassroots communities concerns and making the local-global links around climate change work.
In Durban, staffer Katherine Zavala will be supporting partner activities and networking to promote climate justice solutions.
In the US, we will engage in activities that include:
- Occupy Oakland Event – Friday, December 2:
Join us at the Occupy Oakland General Assembly on at 6pm as we introduce a statement of solidarity with social movements in Durban. Email yeshica at idex.org for info.
- Oakland Urban Farm Event – Saturday, December 3:
We’ll be supporting a Bay Area ally organization as they demonstrate sustainable urban food-growing practices on their public land-based farm in an East Oakland community.
- Learning Call – Tuesday, December 6th:
At 9am (Pacific) and 7pm (South Africa), IDEX will be hosting Learning Call: Grassroots Leaders Live from South AfricaCivil Society’s Role in COP17 Climate Talks in Durban with our four partners organizing on climate justice issues at COP 17. This is a unique, firs- time effort to bring grassroots voices live and direct from one of these events. We are very excited about this first-time event! If you are interested, please call the office at 415-824-8284 for more information.
- COp17 Report Back – Later in January, date TBA:
We’ll be participating alongside Bay Area ally organizations about COP 17 and our partners’ grassroots solutions to climate change.
To read more about the 1000 Durbans Global Week of Action and to see other actions happening around the US, visit: www.grassrootsclimatesolutions.net.
In South Durban, host of COP 17, this year's UN climate talks, homes are located directly next to oil refineries and factories. The factories continue to offer no support to these families who are at risk because of their poor environmental practices.
- Written by Yeshica Weerasekera, Director, Program Partnerships
As the COP 17 UN Climate Talks kicked off this week, in Durban, South Africa, I’ve noticed a sudden and somewhat limited flurry of media interest.
With the world at great risk from the consequences of global warming, millions of people are rightly concerned about whose interests the UN negotiators will protect as they hash out a deal to address climate change.
Will they, as they have to date, focus on market interests, short-term costs and narrow, political expediency, or will they take the ethical higher ground and think of equitable solutions which protect vulnerable communities, the rights of nature and future generations?
I rarely hear the voices of the poor in the media, however, and the scale and impact of the environmental crises on their communities.
Africa Will be “Frying”
In each of the countries that IDEX works in, our partners remind us time and time again of the deepening impact of changing weather patterns and toxic pollution.
An agreement to limit global temperature to even the best-hoped for 2 degrees centigrade, for example, will mean a 4 degree change in Africa, the most vulnerable continent, and catastrophe for it’s people. Africa will be “frying” as African environmentalists lament.
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