Adapting to the Covid-19 pandemic.
No business as usual; the COVID-19 pandemic calls for the new normal living globally, where technology comes in handy to support the way of working and operating businesses. Therefore adapting to this new shift calls for a lot of resilience especially for women given their care giving role with limited access to assets/resource to support their families. At NAWAD, all efforts are geared towards “putting women at the fore front” with a vision of where women and girls enjoy social and economic justice. NAWAD responded to COVID-19 pandemic in the following ways:
Environmental Conservation through tree planting:
Climate change affects all and it takes joint efforts to live a carbon-free environment. According to the UN environmental report December 2020, promoting green recovery from COVID-19 can slow the impacts of climate change. NAWAD therefore supported this cause by distributing over 13,000 tree seedlings of various species (Gravellier, Taminalia, and Musizi) to 60 farmers in western Uganda. Fruit tree seedlings were also distributed
Enhanced Community Safety
Emergency response in Nwoya district in Northern Uganda
NAWAD supported community women in Nwoya with Protective Personal Equipment (PPEs) materials which included soap, masks, hand washing facilities and reusable pads geared towards promoting menstrual hygiene.
Photo showing community women in Nwoya district displaying some of the PPE materials received
Emergency response in Mbarara district in Western Uganda
Truck drivers along Masaka – Mbarara highway were the main medium of community transmissions of the COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore 540 women working in markets along Masaka – Mbarara highway in western Uganda were supported with Personal Protective Equipment (PPEs) to enhance safety. PPE items comprised of masks, soap, sanitizers and hand washing facilities
Increased Community Awareness on COVID-19 Pandemic
Information, communication and educational messages on the symptoms of COVID-19 and prevention were printed in local languages to reaching over 400 women in Western Uganda.
This was supplemented with a radio talk show where the district health expert; the representative from the COVID-19 taskforce shared their knowledge on COVID-19 response with the wider community.
A woman representative with disability also shared women experiences on the effects of COVID-19. The discussions pointed out that most families were unstable; there were increased cases of gender based violence due to loss of employment for husbands in homes. This increased the burden of provision on women who are working mainly in the informal sector with no insurance to absorb economic shocks.
