Short Term Vision:

To empower women in Maseno Division, Kisumu District of Kenya's Nyanza Province in the fight against abject poverty, lack of education, gender discrimination, HIV AIDS, and environmental degradation, which have become a stumbling in the development of the society...
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Short Term Vision:

To empower women in Maseno Division, Kisumu District of Kenya's Nyanza Province in the fight against abject poverty, lack of education, gender discrimination, HIV AIDS, and environmental degradation, which have become a stumbling in the development of the society more or so in the rural developing world.

Long Term Vision:

To empower the African and Third World woman in the fight against abject poverty, lack of education, gender discrimination, HIV AIDS, and environmental degradation, which have become a stumbling in the development of the society more or so in the rural developing world.

Green Hill Women Group(GHWG) envisions a world free of gender discrimination, HIV AIDS, abject poverty, environmental degradation, and with education for all being one of the paramount banners on the global policy agenda. GHWG members and partners yearn for a world where you will be treated as a human being, and not as a woman or a man. A world where humanity comes first before anything else. A world where you do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
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STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

Maseno Division is part of the wider Kisumu District in Nyanza Province, Kenya. The district is one of the areas most affected by the HIV AIDS pandemic in Kenya coming first in the HIV AIDS prevalence rates in the whole country in the year 2001 and followed...
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STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

Maseno Division is part of the wider Kisumu District in Nyanza Province, Kenya. The district is one of the areas most affected by the HIV AIDS pandemic in Kenya coming first in the HIV AIDS prevalence rates in the whole country in the year 2001 and followed by Thika District in Central Province. The hardest hit in the region's population are the women and the youth.

Many are the women and children who have been left widows and orphans in the area, in the wake of a scourge, which the World Health Organization and UNAIDS estimate is taking its toll more on the Sub Saharan African population at an alarming rate. A report produced by the World Health Organzation, UNAIDS and Dr. Richard Hunt of South Carolina University School of Medicine shows that the HIV AIDS prevalence rates in Kisumu are highest among women especially those around 19 years old.

Since the majority of family bread winners in this society happen to be men, their death leaves the mostly HIV AIDS infected women with no proper income other than the ever unproductive peasantry to look upto for survival. The HIV AIDS orphans are left with no one to pay for their education, feeding and clothing. Many are the days they go hungry without proper meals if any. This has turned many of them into criminal and dehumanising activities such as stealing and prostitution in order to fend for themselves and their families.

With the high poverty levels in the region, many of the women upon the death of their husbands are left with no inheritance other than small patches of land on which no viable economic activity can be done other than subsistance production churning out less than a month's supply of maize meal (a staple), and vegetables (usually kale and indigenous African vegetables). For the major part of the year, the women are left to scrounge in search of non existent food where upon some do resort to petty crime and prostitution for the ever elusive survival.

For those who are completely defeated, there is certain death since starvation and HIV AIDS infection does definately kill. In a region where the extended family is highly invaluable, the HIV AIDS pandemic is tearing the local families apart as some parents die leaving their parentless children with grandmothers, grandfathers, uncles, aunts and the like, many of who generally are peasants with their own families and therefore meagre resources to be able to support extra mouths. The result is a combination of abject poverty, hunger, lack of education and hopelessness leading to perpetual helplessness. The region's environment is also under threat due to frequent logging of trees for sale and poor farming/agricultural practices.

In the light of these developments, some women touched by the deteroriating state of their fellow women, the region's children, men and youth came together to form Green Hill Women Group (GHWG). The organization was registered with Kenya's Ministry of Culture and Social Services as a Community Based Organization and a Self-Help Group. And thus began the fight for the dignity of humanity.

GREEN HILL WOMEN GROUP(GHWG) PROJECTS

~Empowerment of the region's women.

~Campaign against HIV AIDS among the region's women.

~HIV AIDS awareness campaigns among the region's population.

~Education of the HIV AIDS orphans.

~Reproductive Health Education and Awareness.

~Poverty reduction initiatives.

~Anti-drug abuse campaigns among the youth in the area.

~Conservation of the region's environmental biodiversity.

GREEN HILL WOMEN GROUP(GHWG) PROGRESS REPORT

~HIV AIDS awareness among the members and the region's population is on going stressing on the preventive, curative and management aspects of the potentially debilitating disease. The group has managed to demistify HIV AIDS in a region where many still want to see it a curse by someone ("chira" in the local Luo dialect). Many are now going for medical tests to ascertain their HIV status.

~A pre-primary school for the education of the HIV AIDS orphans was started in early 2004. The school currently has only two volunteer teachers one of who is a member of the organization and a retired educator.

~The organization has managed to plant a number of trees in collaboration with local conservationists. Trees have been planted in homes and river beds to curb erosion and land degradation.

~The organization has made strides in creating awareness on sustainable agricultural practices and conservation agricultural practices.

PROBLEMS FACED BY GREEN HILL WOMEN GROUP (GHWG) PROJECTS

~Lack of funds to pay for the higher education of the HIV AIDS orphans.

~Lack of funds to complete furnish the pre-primary school building.

~Lack of well trained volunteer teachers for the HIV AIDS orphans.

~Lack of funds for further training and purchase of training facilities for the members and other volunteers to assist in awareness and disemmination campaigns.

~Lack of facilities such as flyers, brochures, demonstration kits in HIV AIDS and Reproductive Health Awareness campaigns and anti-drug abuse campaigns.

~Lack of funds to purchase land and construct proper offices and a secondary school for the education of the HIV AIDS orphans.

~Inadequate volunteer-educators in conservation of environmental biodiversity and conservation agriculture campaigns.

GREEN HILL WOMEN GROUP (GHWG) PARTNERS BY JANUARY-2005

~The African Israel Church.
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