Making the most of local expertise
“About 55.5% of the population (in SA) is living in poverty at the national upper poverty line (~ZAR 992) while a total of 13.8 million people (25%) are experiencing food poverty” (World Bank). This translates to at least 5,200 extremely (food) poor households in Ndlambe municipality. Out of every four children born in Ndlambe, one will experience hunger, cold, poor health, an unsafe environment and lack of access to most social, health and educational services and opportunities.
Development aid has come a long way to figure out the best ways to help people. Today we have proven models to address development challenges, including poverty. Take for instance the Graduation Approach which has helped more than 2 million families in Bangladesh. SHINE has learnt from programmes like the Graduation Approach and aims to bring a holistic, integrated and systematic family-based poverty eradication programme to Ndlambe.
The effectiveness of its programme is optimised by: Working with local, national and international organisations, offering custom solutions tailored to the needs of the families it serves. Some of the main aspects addressed by SHINE include food security, life coaching, urgent household needs, the well-being of children, access to health and education services, saving groups, financial literacy, skills development training, job preparedness and placement and enterprise development. SHINE empowers the members of a family, aiming to put them on a sustainable upward trajectory out of poverty.
For a full rundown please visit www.shine.ngo. Here you will notice how programme progress is dynamically integrated into the website. For instance, when a field worker adds an entry into the SHINE app during a home visit, the website automatically updates.
Currently, we are implementing the SHINE pilot program. This includes 16 Target families (90 members) and a control group of 8 families. We will have the first projections of the outcome by mid to end of 2023. If the pilot programme shows progressive positive outcomes, this programme can be scaled up indefinitely.
But there is much more going on in the development sector in Ndlambe. We were happily surprised to find so many existing local development organisations and interested individuals. By working with these organisations, community initiatives, volunteers, government departments and businesses, SHINE can offer participating families holistic solutions in an efficient way making use of local expertise. It further brings diversity, sustainability and local ownership to the programme. This also stimulates developmental collaboration. This striving for collaboration has led to the development of the Sunshine NGO Forum, a platform where existing development organisations and interested individuals can get together about the development of our community. The forum website, www.sunshine.ngo, hosts a database with all known development organisations in Ndlambe and loads of resources and tools for NGOs. If you are interested in developing our community, please join this forum. Merely visit www.sunshine.ngo and click on JOIN and complete the short form. Or contact me directly at hyman@aidit.net.
We will be hosting a stall on the 5th of November at Pick n Pay at Heritage Mall. Everybody is welcome to come and meet us, talk to us and support us.
How we believe the world should be, is how it will become. Imagine a world where ALL humans have access to opportunities whereby to strive towards their full potential. Why are we still so far from this??