Digital Pulse - Ch 3 - Sec 3 - Fantsuam Education and Health Promotion Programme

Development Issues: Education, Youth, Women, Health, Technology

Programme Summary

Organized by the Fantsuam Foundation, the Education and Health Programme Initiative targets rural community health workers in Nigeria (most of whom are women) as well as adolescents. It utilizes Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) to foster the exchange of information about, and to improve the provision of, health care.

Established in 1996, Fantsuam Foundation is an NGO located in Nigeria, about 600 miles from Lagos in the north-central part of the country. Fantsuam works to alleviate poverty through participatory decision making that utilizes local beliefs as a primary mechanism for setting project priorities. Thus, its primary project partners are women's clan groups, which are non-religious and non-political. These groups are located in Kaduna, Benue, Gombe and Plateau States; between them they have membership of about 3,000. Each participating community and women's group provides volunteers who undertake various activities and training relevant to their project.

Summary of ICT Initiatives

This programme conducts the following activities:

• Distribution of copies of the newsletters "Straight Talk" and "Young Talk" to secondary school libraries in participating communities. These newsletters carry news items, photographs, and articles written by adolescents in Kampala Uganda on reproductive health issues.
• Periodic health screening sessions that are led by a health officer and that include group discussions, individual counselling, and treatments. The women at Kpunyai set up a first aid unit for their village, the financial implications of which are discussed during weekly meetings.
• A class to teach basic computer skills to girls and women at the Bayanloco Community Learning Centre. Health information, especially on reproductive health issues, is provided.
• The development of Asibitin Karkara, a demand-driven primary healthcare model aimed at building a sustainable health service through partnerships with rural communities. This initiative builds on the strength of the extended family system and the willingness of people to pay for their health service in cash or in kind.
• A Mobile Rural Library and ICT Service (MRLIS) objective that works with 40 rural communities to help provide textbooks for their schools and access to information from national, regional, and international sources. This service also provides facilities for rural-based teachers to enrol in distance learning programmes to improve skills and update their knowledge. Retention of pupils in schools is encouraged through the provision of a school lunch to each primary school child.
• The initiation of contacts with a Nigerian university department for collaborative research in one of the rural communities where the source of water is a health hazard. This research includes:
• Determining the links between public health and community-level relationships and networks
• Analysing the social capital of communities, that is, identifying aspects of rural community life that promote health and ameliorate suffering caused by onchocerciasis or River Blindness
• Developing a community assets map that describes distinct levels of community strengths: individuals; citizen associations such as churches, cultural and peer groups; and local institutions like schools, libraries, hospitals, universities, etc.
• Identifying strategic alliances for sustainable funding of community health projects.

Fantsuam Foundation is also active in other areas and works:
• to provide collateral-free microcredits for women
• to promote rural health and education
• to document local languages in an effort to improve women's access to literacy and education, indigenous knowledge, and traditional medicine, as well as to protect the intellectual property rights of rural communities, and
• to collaborate with government agencies, Nigerian university departments, and Nigerian professionals in the Diaspora.

Observations

In 2001, the Fantsuam Foundation's Bayanloco Community Learning Centre and its coordinator were awarded theHafkin Communications Prize from the Association for Progressive Communications (APC, an African NGO committed to improving the utilization of ICTs for development. APC's objective is to recognize African ICT efforts, and to extract some of the lessons learned in order to make them accessible to others doing related work. The award theme was "People-Centred ICT Policy in Africa" and was based on the following criteria in which the Bayanloco Centre excelled.

1. Utilization of ICTs, especially the Internet
2. Mobilizing Awareness and Participation, and Building Capacity
3. Africa-Driven and Developing Africa
4. Women-Led, Women-Informed, Women-Inspired

Partners: Urban Nigerians, Nigerian professionals, and members of a Nigerian university department; women's clan groups including Bechechet Bayinring, Fido, Mangu, Dogon Kurmi, Bayanloco, Zagun, Tula and Uwaba-Oju.

Source: The Fantsuam Foundation site and the APC site.

For More Information Contact:

Fantsuam Foundation (Nigeria)

No. 1 Fantsuam Close

P. O. Box 58

Bayan Loco, Kafanchan

Kaduna State

Nigeria

Tel: +2348065302297/ +2348025595924

Fantsuam Foundation (UK)

14 Chandos Avenue

Leeds LS8 1QU

United Kingdom

Tel: +44 113 2690978

info@fantsuam.org

Fantsuam Foundation website