Regional

African Women’s Development Fund

Started by three African women activists, the African Women’s Development Fund (AWDF) is a unique grant-making foundation based in Accra, Ghana. AWDF’s goal is to support African women’s nonprofit organizations working toward a world that embodies social justice, equality and respect for women’s human rights. .

Promoting women’s leadership and empowerment, AWDF encompasses six distinct funding areas, including an HIV/AIDS Fund which is supported by the Stephen Lewis Foundation. Launched in 2005, the Fund works to promote: a culture of awareness around HIV/AIDS, economic empowerment through skill-building, leadership development and capacity building for organizations working on HIV/AIDS issues.

Prioritizing the needs of small and medium-sized organizations, AWDF provides grants  to organizations working on such projects as: legal and policy reform, access to treatment for victims of sexual violence, protecting women’s rights to own and inherit property, adoption counselling and treatment literacy programmes for women living with HIV/AIDS.

Grassroots Organizations Operating Together in Sisterhood (GROOTS) International

The idea a regional bottom-up federation that could advocate, with one voice, for the home-based caregivers they represent was born during the 2003 International Conference on AIDS and STIs (Sexually-Transmitted Infections) in Africa. GROOTS International aims  to raise awareness and show how home-based care organizations are mounting a significant response to the HIV pandemic in their respective communities. Piloted by GROOTS Kenya, GROOTS International is now expanding that project to Zimbabwe, South Africa and beyond, with the goal of building the capacity of grassroots home-based caregivers in those regions to respond to HIV and AIDS.

SLF funding for the expansion of GROOTS International’s Home-Based Care Alliance is going towards meeting three primary objectives:

1. To serve as a platform for self-organization and self-coordination among home-based caregivers within and across communities and regions;
2. To build linkages and partnerships between home-based caregivers and other stakeholders responding to HIV and AIDS in communities;
3. To ameliorate the financial drain of caregiving and to strengthen social safety nets for AIDS-affected communities through collective livelihoods, income-generation and savings and credit strategies.

International Council of Nurses

The International Council of Nurses (ICN) is a federation of more than 130 national nurses’ associations, representing more than 13 million nurses worldwide. Founded in 1899, ICN is the world’s first and widest reaching international organization for health professionals. ICN has extensive experience in implementing and sustaining international projects in partnership with various foundations and development agencies.

With that background, ICN’s Girl Child Education Fund (GCEF) supports the primary and secondary schooling of nurses’ orphaned daughters in Kenya, Swaziland, Uganda and Zambia. The Fund, with support from the Stephen Lewis Foundation pays for fees, uniforms and books for all enrolled girls  through their graduation from secondary school. GCEF also facilitate peer-support group activities for the orphaned girls. To provide one-on-one mentorship and advocacy, GCEF relies on a network of nurse-volunteers in each of the four countries where they work. The Stephen Lewis Foundation supports the GCEF by paying the costs for about a hundred GCEF scholars in Uganda, as well as covering costs of  GCEF’s administration, coordination and financial accountability in Kenya, Swaziland, Uganda and Zambia. With SLF support, the nurse-volunteers within GCEF are trained, guided and invited to a formal recognition dinner each year in their honour.

Just Associates

Just Associates (JASS) is a network of justice activists, scholars and popular educators in 13 countries worldwide who are committed to increasing women's voice, visibility and collective organizational power to advance a more just, equitable and sustainable world.

In Malawi and Zambia, SLF helps JASS expand their grassroots mobilisation, peer-support, empowerment training and advocacy with women living with and affected by HIV. In Zimbabwe, the women’s groups started by JASS also focus on the trauma and physical effects of violence by combining self-care with strategic mobilisation and political awareness. Additionally, all of JASS’ activities confront gender violence and discrimination against women, and they challenge the stigma and taboos about sex and sexuality that lie at the heart of the HIV pandemic. JASS uses leadership education, capacity-building training for community-based organizations and advocacy training. Group work is combined with one-on-one follow-up mentoring with both adult women and youth. The SLF also provides administrative and staff support so that JASS can continue its important programmes.

• Project descriptions last updated April 2011