Africa

ICRW is a partner on AIDSTAR-One, which provides rapid technical assistance to the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and U.S. government country teams to build effective, well-managed, and sustainable HIV and AIDS programs and to promote new leadership in the global campaign against HIV. AIDSTAR-One leverages the expertise of its diverse partner organizations to provide targeted assistance in knowledge management, program implementation support, technical leadership, program sustainability and strategic planning.

Through this partnership, ICRW draws from its expertise on gender and women's vulnerability to HIV to develop gender-responsive HIV programming. ICRW also provides technical leadership in the area of preventing alcohol-related HIV risk.

Global stakeholders recognize that HIV/AIDS policies and programs must advance gender equality in order to effectively slow the spread of HIV. However, few concrete tools have been developed to guide policymakers and programmers in creating gender-responsive strategies at the national level. ICRW is collaborating with partners from civil society, government and donor organizations in Uganda and Cambodia to demonstrate how to develop national HIV/AIDS plans that address the unique needs and constraints of women and men.

In each country, ICRW is analyzing current national policies, strategies and programs to identify strengths and gaps in addressing gender-based vulnerabilities in the context of HIV and AIDS. The project team also is collaborating with a core group of government, donor and civil society representatives to form an advisory board. The board will use findings from the analysis to create recommendations and a plan for strengthening attention to gender in the national response to HIV and AIDS. The advisory board also will host a series of meetings to launch the action plan and garner support for its implementation.

Grassroots paralegals are community-based volunteers who provide legal education and legal aid. Grassroots paralegals can be an important ally in ensuring that women exercise their right to property and assets. ICRW and Uganda Land Alliance have been working together to develop, use, and disseminate training curricula and field tools for paralegals on gender and property rights and to deliver key messages about women’s property rights to both paralegals and their communities.

ICRW also worked to build the ability of Uganda Land Alliance and the grassroots paralegals to document their cases to assess over time patterns in cases and communities’ needs, understand who their clients are, and identify successful approaches to handling cases. Regular process evaluation exercises focus on knowledge gaps in communities, building paralegals’ knowledge of women’s property rights, paralegals’ working relationships with local leaders, and increasing local awareness of the paralegals as a resource. Lessons learned from these efforts will increase the effectiveness of training programs as ICRW and local partners promote grassroots paralegal efforts throughout Africa.