The District Womens Development Association (DWDA) of Chipata, Zambia is a community group set up by women to help them with improving livelihoods. The association provides support to women in learning new skills, improving their capacity to earn more income and live healthier lives.
The association engages in several capacity building activities for the members with support from many local and international partners. The Chipata DWDA is part of a network of DWDAs in Eastern Province. It is found in almost every district in the province and is made up of 12 area associations located in remote areas.
OneWorld Africa (OWA) is working with Chipata DWDA on a Chipata Womens Mobile Communication Project, which aims to improve the communication of developmental information from the district to the area associations and to further connect the district office to several information sources. The project is a partnership between OWA, Celtel (largest mobile phone service with more than 250,000 subscribers and network coverage in all the nine provinces of Zambia) and the women themselves. The goal is to improve the lives and the livelihoods of the members of the Chipata District Womens Association through access to information on health and agriculture initially, later taking on other issues.
The main objective of the project is to setup an information communication network within Chipata district and to disseminate the information to 12 communities in Chipata.
It also aims to improve the livelihoods of peasant women farmers of that area and provide a medium or a channel for advocating the concerns of the grassroots women.
OWA staff visited the Chipata DWDA and some of their area associations in October 2004 to assess information needs of the area associations. It was learnt during the visit that although some of area associations have no permanent electricity supply, each association, however, has some mobile telephone coverage provided by the mobile cellular company, Celtel.
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