In the time of COVID-19, organisations like the Rural Women’s Assembly (RWA) are driving solutions to keep members and communities engaged and functioning in a very uncertain time. This does not mean that the RWA membership is not impacted by COVID-19, however, the women show resilience and strive to meet the demands of the pandemic while also meeting the needs of their fellow members with creativity and ingenuity. Doing a temperature test on the different countries in the region, there are a few clear similarities and key experiences worth highlighting.
We hope to also highlight that whilst things have been very challenging for our membership, we have also seen how our sisters have self-organised to support their communities by disseminating information, food parcels, hand washing stations, soap, hand-sanitisers and dignity packs across our region.
RWA ZAMBIA by Grace Tepula
RWA members in Zambia, distributed face masks, hand wash buckets and soap. They also explained the importance and benefits of indigenous red local maize seeds to the Mayor of Luanshya in Zambia who accompanied them on this drive.
We have distributed 600 face masks and 6 hand wash buckets with soap to two markets and a community in our area. One market is at the junction where trucks drive through to Congo from Dar es Salaam and where they park for a night. This area is where most of our COVID-19 cases have originated from.