Campaign to raise awareness among Gambian leaders on Female Gnital Mutilation

04/02/2022

Once more, this year's International Day of Zero Tolerance for Female Genital Mutilation is celebrated with a fall in FGM cases in Gambia. According to the most recent data from the US Agency for International Development's Demographic Health Survey (DHS) and the Muliple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS) by UNICEF, this downward trend is most significant among the population aged 0 to 4, with a 13.1 % fall in cases in these past ten years. In 2010, 38.2% girls aged 4 or younger uderwent FGM; in 2020 this figure fell to 25.1%. The fall in cases is less evident among adolescents and women aged 15 to 49, in which only a 3.7% decrease was seen in that same period. Presently, 72.6% of Gambian women of these ages have undergone FGM. Nevertheless, the objective of abandoning this practice completely by 2030 is far from being achieved. Not only that, but UNICEF calculates that the strain of the COVID pandemic on initiatives and prevention programmes could have affected up to 2 million more cases which, in other circumstances, could have been avoided.

Raising awareness, key to encouraging zero tolerance of MGF

Although a reduction in cases may be due to the law passed in 2015 forbidding this practice, in neighbouring Guinea, once of the first countries to outlaw this practice in 1965, is completely the opposite, with 94.5% of girls undergoing this procedure, one of the highest figures in all of the world (2018, DHS). According to Adriana Kaplan, lecturer of the UAB Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology and director of the Wassu UAB Foundation, "it is in this sense that education and awareness-raising programmes are a key element to achieving sustainable changes".

Dr Kaplan has focused her professional career on applied research into the transfer of knowledge as a form of preventing this practice and tending to the consequences of it through the Wassu UAB Foundation in Spain and the NGO Wassu Gambia Kafo in Gambia. She highlights the need to work in a circular manner, i.e., both in the countries of origin as well as with sub-Saharan migrant communities abroad. The foundation acts by conducting applied research to the sociocultural reality of FGM and its consequences. With a scientific, respectful, sustainable and holistic approach, knowledge is transferred directly to key social agents, so that these men and women can take charge and bring about change.

For Kaplan “it is necessary to educate and inform about the harmful health consequences as a means to discourage FGM among the affected populations, as well as raise awareness among professionals from the health, social, legal and educational fields working with migrant communities, on the sociocultural reality related to this practice”.

The Wassu Methodology

The Wassu Methodology, in charge of a large part of the advances achieved in these 10 years, is based on scientific, holistic, respectful and sustainable evidence. The methodological proposal focuses on appropriation, institutional strengthening, sectorial concentration, alignment with local policies and strategic plans. The knowledge generated and acquired through this applied research is then transferred to key institutions and social agents who then, in turn, transfer the knowledge to their communities, promoting preventive actions and empowering people to become agents themselves and promote positive changes around them. At the core of this proposal there is a fundamentl certainty: each human being has the right to participate, in an informed manner, in all the decisions affecting their life and their health.

Crowdfunding campaign to work on changing the perception of FGM within communities

“Beyond the institutional aspect, the main task continues to be rooted in the land, the direct contact on the frontline with members of affected communities, with the aim of changing their perspective about this practice”, Kaplan assures. It is also here in which the figures show an even more important change in the mentality of Gambian women. According to data by the MICS and the DHS, in 2010 a total of 28.2% of women were against this practice, while in 2020 this figure rose 17.8% to reach a total of 46% (MICS, 2010 ) (DHS, 2020).

According to Wassu UAB Foundation and its counterpart Wassu Gambia Kafo, raising awareness among women is a key part to helping communities abandon this practice due to the role they play in its perpetuation, as custodians of tradition. With the intention of making them drivers of change, the foundation has launched a crowdfunding programme with the objective of raising funds for awareness-raising campaigns focused on preventing FGM and aimed at 120 female leaders in Gambia. The programme will implement actions in which women can reconsider their views on this practice with respect, and with the knowledge provided by scientific evidence and the exchange of personal experiences and dialogue.

Donations can be made at the following link:
https://micromecenatge.uab.cat/fimutilaciogenitalfemenina

5th International Forum on Gender Violences and Harmful Traditional Practices in Gambia and Western Africa

As part of the work in raising awareness and commemorating the International Day of Zero Tolerance for Female Genital Mutilation, the Wassu UAB Foundation has teamed up with its NGO counterpart Wassu Gambia Kafo to organise the 5th International Forum on Gender Violences and Harmful Traditional Practices in Gambia and Western Africa. In this fifth edition, the forum will be held at the international conference centre Sir Dawda Kairaba Jawara in Bijilo, Gambia, on 7 and 8 February.

The forum Sharing Knowledge, Weaving Networks will bring together over 270 participants from different countries and includes the support of the Catalan Agency for Development Cooperation (ACCD), the Catalan Fund for Development Cooperation (FCCD), UNICEF, UNFPA and the Secretary of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in Gambia. The objective is to open up a critical space in which to share the innovation and research conducted on harmful traditional practices as are FGM and child marriage. It also provides a space to share good practices and prevention strategies both in Africa and in Europe, thus fostering group dialogues and reflections among researchers, local leaders, civil society, professionals, public entities and other stakeholders involved.

For more information please visit:
Crowdfunding campaign
https://micromecenatge.uab.cat/fimutilaciogenitalfemenina
Wassu UAB Foundation
https://www.uab.cat/web/fundacio-wassu-uab-1345799785541.html

This information is related to the following SDG

• Good health and well-being
• Reduced inequalities
• Gender equality
• Partnerships for the goals