Water, Health & Women's Empowerment- Guinea Bissau

This new year, many villages that are being supported by GlobalGiving donors are now engaged in improving their lives through new and revised market garden activities. Women are being very proactive in clearing the gardens and planting new vegetables. The vision is to bring more health and economic opportunities t the villages. The micro-saving scheme is expanding with great new opportunities for women to purchase seeds, tools and also improve their income from starting up new small scale businesses such as opening up a shop, animal husbendary or sewing. The community are coming more closely together to address their needs without expecting support from the outside. Their level of confidence is growing very positively. This is done equally involving all member of communities, from elderly to young children. 

There are chellenges such as spiralling cost of living and lack of transport for women to make the best of opportunities. WellFound aims to address this by seeking new funding and partnerships across the board. The support provided by the GlobalGiving community m very positive changes. 

Sanitation and hygiene promotion
Good behaviours, facilities, and services together make up a hygienic environment, which children need in order to fight diseases and grow up healthy. Lack of sanitation can be a barrier to individual prosperity and sustainable development. When children, particularly girls, cannot access private and decent sanitation facilities in their schools or learning environments, their right to education is threatened.

For these reasons, at WellFound our priority has been to engage schools about the importance of better sanitation facilities. We have proudly delivered 10 hygiene promotion and CLTS workshops, focusing on topics such as personal hygiene, hand washing, and safe storage of water. As a result, a total of about 1,280 people have reported increased knowledge on safe defecation. We continue our mission to educate children as well as communities about the risk of contamination, spread of diseases and female health and safety.

Already we can see a huge improvement in regular hygiene habits and a growth in sanitation services across communities. We aim to continue promoting hygiene and sanitation in all communities we engage with.

Success in Vaama
Recently, WellFound finished constructing a borehole in the village of Vaama, Sierra Leone. Now, 250 inhabitants have access to clean and safe water.

Prior to our intervention, water-born diseases were rampant in Vaama, among both children and adults. However, now the inhabitants have safe drinking water and no longer need to suffer as a result of dirty water.

One of the village inhabitants, Christiana, said that WellFound's work at Vaama “was a dream we thought would never come true; absolutely there was no hope that I would one day drink clean water in this community, as this was impossible for us to do on our own - unless a miracle happened.”

WellFound will continue to improve the lives of communities in remote villages across Guinea-Bissau and Sierra Leone.

Market gardens, microsavings and loans
Village Savings and Loans (VSLA) schemes have been established across 5 communities in Sierra Leone, including Mosanti, Mofantaneh, Moyibo, Lipalai and Mogbencha. Since then, 154 people have become economically active as a result of WellFound intervention. Furthermore, VSLA has allowed individuals to come together and have access to loans with minimal percentages and enabled them to expand their farms and grow their profits.