The Global Women’s Water Initiative (GWWI), a joint venture of international organizations (A Single Drop, Crabgrass, and Women’s Earth Alliance) in partnership with WaterAid Ghana has launched the 2010 West Africa Program which “equips two-person teams of local African women leaders with technology training, introductory business skills, networking support, and seed funding to launch water service projects in their communities that have the potential to become income-generating.”
The 2010 program will be held in February 2010 in Accra, Ghana where participants will undergo a week-long training. In addition to the training, there are other phases of work to be carried out by the participants. It will begin with a Preparation Phase where selected participants have to “Gather information and map their communities’ needs related to water and sanitation” and “Take part in facilitated conference calls and web-based community forums, and accomplish pre-training assignments.” The Training Phase is where the participants will “learn proven and appropriate water technologies and introductory business skills to address the water challenges in their communities” and gain skills. At the end of the training, participants have to “create and commit to specific action plans for the year” and they will receive seed funding of US $1500 “to launch a water project addressing water access and quality.” The final phase is for follow-up and implementation where participants will receive technical support including project visits and trainings.
The program will support two women from West Africa and out of them one has to be from an established NGO and the other has to be a leader of the community with whom the NGO works. The program will opportunities for them to work closely and develop action plan for implementing an “an appropriate water technology project for their community.” The last date to submit nominations for the program is 30 October 2009. The nomination form is available online at the Women’s Earth Alliance website. For more information, visit this link.