Let’s prioritise support networks

sometimes community volunteers – are the cornerstone of the region’s care and support network.
While the global economic situation will likely force organisations to make tough support decisions in the next years, a situation worsened by the most recent Global Fund crisis shock, tapping into this important social workforce must remain a priority, especially when it comes to children. Care work tends to be the socially understood domain of women, whether it be in the home, on a voluntary basis, or as paid employment.
However, high HIV/Aids prevalence in the region, along with a host of other health issues that contribute to high mortality rates, means the numbers of children needing support outweigh the demand.
Care workers fill a crucial gap on a continent where most social services ministries and departments across are critically underfunded. For instance, in Tanzania, the Social Services annual budget is just 1 percent of the overall Ministry of Health and Social Welfare budget. Care workers are the people who make care count in communities.
However, they are usually equipped with limited skills or training in the complex field of emotional care and support (psychosocial support) of children facing different life challenges.
Within the Southern African Development Community (Sadc) region, governments have adopted regional frameworks meant to strengthen and harmonise service delivery for vulnerable children and youth.
These frameworks are the Sadc Minimum Package of Services and the Psychosocial Support Framework for Orphans, Vulnerable Children and Youths (OVC and Y). A key objective of the regional documents is to ensure that countries have national care and support frameworks for OVC and Y that will translate into families and communities providing holistic care and support to children.
A strategic priority in the implementation of these regional frameworks is the development of a social workforce with the capacity to ensure efficient service delivery in health, education, nutrition and psychosocial support at community level.
To strengthen capacities of such community based workers to provide better care for children, the Regional Psychosocial Support Initiative (REPSSI), in partnership with the Centre for African Studies, Unicef and the University of KwaZulu Natal, developed an innovative capacity building certificate that is delivered as a situated supported long distance program.
This unique Certificate Course allows community workers to gain the skills they need to provide missing social services. The REPSSI/Unicef Certificate Course in Community Based Work with Children & Youth is being delivered in 10 countries in east and southern Africa. The certificate programme is transforming community care work traditionally viewed as voluntary into professional work. This is a significant contribution to the implementation of the Sadc regional care and support policies and frameworks that seek to improve child and youth well-being. While women in the region have traditionally done care work, men’s participation in the certificate programme is breaking known gender barriers.
“Community workers usually take the volunteer form, with mostly women championing reproductive work. The Certificate, however, is transforming community child-care work into productive work, thereby attracting men to volunteer work,” says Noreen M Huni, director of REPSSI.
The Certificate programme is also helping to broaden the scope of who is considered to be providing care, involving men, women, traditional leaders and the police – all of who provide care and support children in communities. – Genderlinks.

lTapfuma Murove is the Head of Advocacy at REPSSI.