Project “Period 28 Day”

Executive Summary

The concept of “human dignity” is the basis of human rights. People live in dignity if their basic human rights are respected, protected and fulfilled. Governments that respect human rights are working to achieve dignity. Dignity expresses the idea that every human being has worth and should be treated with respect and without discrimination.

Ensuring human rights for everyone offers a way of adjusting the unequal power relations that separate people from the things that help sustain and improve their lives. These include skills and knowledge as well as facilities, goods and material resources. The more these power relations become balanced, the more people live in dignity and escape from poverty.

This Project seeks to emphasize that, Menstrual Hygiene Management (MHM) in Schools and on the field of play, for Girls is a Human right issue and must be treated with all seriousness.

Children growing up in rural Ghana live in an extended family Compound House with Cousins, Siblings, Uncles, and Antes etc. Boys and Girls sometimes sleep together, but Menstruation amongst Girls though it was happening every month; it becomes sacred topic from within.

Elementary School adolescence girls are punished for absenteeism from school, without analysing the real problem to make a girl find comfort in School.

The Project in Collaboration with Ministry of Health is to empower Girls through School education and in Sports. A Girl playing Football in their local areas where Football is mainly for boys prepares them psychologically that, they can do what boys do. Those, Girls can take charge in their communities as well as boys. They can equally be good Mathematicians and Scientists, areas they have hitherto reserved for boys in Schools.

Purpose, the need

ACRO Ghana is very active in sports as a tool to improve health. During the past 2 years ACRO Ghana has been parading the corridors of the WHO and other UN Women groups with the idea of Menstrual Hygiene. 2013 it became a huge topic for discussion during the World Women Day in March at the UN. This idea of ACRO Ghana has taken a centre stage at the WHO and it is being taken on board in the coming years in Ghana and by extension West Africa.

In ACRO Ghana, we encourage sport as a means of reducing anti-social vices and increasing confidence in adolescence girls. Girls are encouraged playing football, but they noticed that menstruating girls didn't want to play on the sports field without \"the right kind of dress.\" The lack of proper sanitary materials was impeding girls from reaching their potential, and from being empowered through sport. ACRO Ghana overseeing the activities of Girls is now concentrating on the Menstrual Hygiene Management of Women especially adolescent Girls.

The stakeholders in this project envision that the project is to pool together the abundantly available resources and skills among Ghanaian government employees especially in the area of Primary Health Care. They are to assist training girls from first and second cycle institutions including, Girl Advocacy groups to achieve high level of Menstrual Hygiene Management devoid of infections, infertility and bilateral tube blockage amongst girls. The long-term result of the intervention is expected to be well trained and healthy Girls who are capable of being employed, create their own enterprises and have brighter perspectives for growth to impact positively on the overall manpower development of Ghana. Other actors in the program are Ghanaian Nurses, Doctors, and Educators who are cooperating on the project to send their expert trainers.                

Relevance

Taboo,\" \"stigma,\" \"silence\": These words were heard in the opening speech by Chris Williams of WSSCC during a recent past Conference “Celebration Womanhood, Menstrual Hygiene Management at the UN.

They were swiftly repeated by Dr Jyoti Sanghera of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), who urged stakeholders to pull our dirty linen out of the closet. Sanghera said: » How can a normal, natural function be associated with shame, stigma, distaste, untouchability, taboo?\" Sanghera also outlined the Human Rights aspect of MHM, stating: “Stigma is an extreme and acute form of discrimination which normalizes exclusion, otherness, ostracism, and often confinement and incarceration.

The consequences of this are wide-ranging, taking in education, health and the workplace. Taboos can lead to real physical harm

As for the educational damage done by poor menstrual hygiene management, Catherine Dolan of Saїd Business School at Oxford University presented data from a small- scale study carried out in Ghana. 120 girls were given 12 pads per month. Absenteeism was cut by half, and 6.6 days per term were retrieved. Sanitary pads reduced the barriers to girls staying in school, which were multiple: fear of soiling, fear of odour, and even when there were WASH facilities at school, fear of leaving visible blood in the latrine or toilet.

 

Intervention Strategy

 “Obatanpa” (Sweet Mother) Net is where girls are engaged in sports to minimize social vices to empower them to grow well. One of the women Trainers says when “I was growing up as girl in rural Ghana, our community women and girls were fun of “Baha” a dried refined fibre from Banana or Plantain stem. This according to information available, absorb menstrual blood more effectively and it was also cheap to obtain. Later, came the use of cloth or Toilet rolls as it pertains to some “ACRO Ghana” Girls. Even here the clothes and toilets Rolls sometimes go out of reach of many of these girls forcing them to go for boy friends with its attended vices, teenage pregnancies, infectious diseases and what have you, making it difficult to break the poverty circles.

We will create girls’ social centres as meeting place for girls to train and receive counselling. ACRO Ghana will establish Girls Clubs in Ghana Secondary Schools for Menstrual Hygiene Management sensitisation.

“ACRO Ghana” focuses on Menstrual Hygiene Management, Girls’ football, Vegetable Gardening, Nutrition and Home Management and most importantly distribution of Soft Cups to communities and in second cycle schools to improve school attendance of Girls and in sports. Obatanpa Net make sure girls are taught about menstruation at early age, so that it does not take them by surprise as it is these days.

The urgent need of MHM in schools and in sports for the empowerment of adolescence girls cannot be overemphasized.

In collaboration with Evofem Inc, San Diego, California, U.S., reusable Soft Cups will be distributed to Girls after training.  This simple and effective method will reduce infections amongst Adolescence Girls who uses dangerous material during periods because they cannot afford to buy the required sanitary pads for schools and in sports.

The programme of distribution MHM sanitary Soft cups will be used to educate Girls about teenage pregnancies, HIV Aids and other Sexually transmitted diseases.

Making available sanitary pads to deprived communities is one thing. Another is the management of menstrual hygiene which should also include safe and sustainable disposal. This can be difficult because of cultural stigma: according to studies, even women who have WASH facilities at home throw their used cloths and pads out in the open, because they don't want \"dirty waste\" in the house. With the provision of the reusable Soft cups we, work with all stakeholders to make effective and efficient campaign to ensure attitudinal change takes place and the dignity of a girl / woman is restored and maintained

In short, the damage of taboo and stigma is widespread, leading to losses in many areas such as education (because girls don't go to school), interpersonal growth (girls stigmatized routinely for five days a month lose confidence), income generation (farm workers, often women, fail to report for work), health and fertility. These are the challenges that compel all of us to act now to empower 2,500 young school and sports girls to adulthood to produce strong healthy children and economy.

Beneficiaries

The beneficiaries from this project are young Ghanaian adolescence Girls and women in the area of Sports, Girl education, Menstrual Hygiene Management, vocational training in Nutrition, Food safety, Home management, Sexuality and other sectors as offered by partner institutions. These include Dress Making, Home Science, Textile, Catering and other challenging occupations dominated by Boys and Men. The young Adolescence Girls should be committed to the job and willing to engage themselves in such a hands-on skill building approach to training. Such approach will enable the beneficiary Trainers and Trainees to further develop themselves, get to higher school of learning, find jobs, create own enterprises and grow to Womanhood.

Geographical Outreach

In the first year of the project, we will be at Dormaa Ahenkro to establish Girls MHM Research Centre (Girls Centre) to support the above activities. By the end of the first year, it is estimated that, between 1,000 and 1,500 second cycle school and community girls will be brought to the stream to learn about themselves, particularly MHM.

In the second and running up to the 5th year, activities will be connected to Tamale, Abora Obohen, Nkoransa (epic centre for youth who want to move to Europe) and Kyeremasu through sports, schools and community processes amongst other things.

Goal

To improve Menstrual Hygiene Management amongst girls, women via effective structured development program for 2,500 Girls and Girl Advocacy groups.

Objectives

 

1. Increase the number of educating Girl groups in Schools in reducing the level of stigma that is both externally applied and internalized by many girls and women, particularly in low-income communities.

 

1. Increase the minimum essential levels of girls (also called minimum core obligations) right (school & sports), particularly for the disadvantaged, excluded or vulnerable groups.

 

1. The Provision of Menstrual Hygiene Management Research Centers, a space for women and girls to learn and discuss the topic of menstruation.

 

1. Increase the availability of sanitary pads to Girls in Schools and on the field of play for those who could not afford. That to involve stakeholders if simple sanitary pads would be made in school workshops including boys to sensitize them, that menstruation is normal natural phenomenon.

 

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We are applying the US Embassy Funds for Ghana for the first year. When successful, we shall seek funds for the subsequent years.

 

The First year Budget is around 60,000. – USD. The main funding areas include Land for vegetable Farm for the Girls. Resource/Research Center for the MHM program. Laptops, Solar system, Regular and reliable Water for wash.

 

Individuals, Institutions may partner or collaborate this project.

Thank you.