Serving disadvantaged communities in West Africa by empowering local leaders who have a positive humanitarian vision for their community.
This blog maps the evolution of the organization's vision through the thoughts, experiences, and collaborative projects of our team. Visit GroundUpGlobal.org for more information and how you can help!
Catching Elephant is a theme by Andy Taylor
Running the Nutrition Program
On January 13th through 15th, The SCHEF Organization ran a Nutritional Certification Program for our ten the Kitchen Project staff on Buduburam. The program began with breakfast each morning followed by a seminar or workshop, then a communal lunch that the women cooked together as a hands-on means of learning about nutrition and sanitation in the Kitchen. Our seminars covered a variety of topics that the women will need to fully support the Kitchen Project beneficiaries in the coming months.
The Nutritional Program was not only successful in teaching our staff the knowledge they need to holistically support the single mothers and children who will benefit from the Kitchen Project, but also it served as a unifying experience for the women, who smiled and laughed throughout.
We covered detailed nutritional information on the different categories of vitamins and minerals as well as their specific function in the body and in what foods they can be found. In addition to listing the different ingredients in our daily lunches and categorizing the functions of these vitamins and minerals, we also held seminars on maternal health and proper breastfeeding techniques, psycho-social health, and Sexual and Gender Based Violence (SGBV.) Having knowledge of all these subjects will allow our staff to interact with our beneficiaries, who have been forced into commercial sex practices as a result of conditions on the camp, in a holistic and constructive way.
Stay tuned for more pictures, video, and introductions of our ten new staff members!
This holiday season, give a fair trade gift from the BUDU fashion initiative, hand made by women on the Buduburam Refugee Camp in Ghana!
Launch of Clean Up Campaign
The latest news from Buduburam is grim. While Haiti receives millions of dollars in doctor services and supplies in response to its cholera outbreak, no such help exists for the forgotten refugees on Buduburam. Keith Kortu, Director of SCHEFO, reports on the situation on the camp.
“Poor sanitation on the Buduburam Refugee settlement is the root cause of the malaria and cholera outbreak. This especially affects women and children, which constitute a greater percentage of the camp population.
The outbreak is due to the insufficiency of basic sanitation services such as public toilets, waste removal, insecticides and other sanitation implements. These are unavailable to the refugee settlement where more than 50,000 Liberians, Ghanaians, Nigerians, Sierra Leoneans, and Ivoirians live.
The SCHEF Organization in this light, has decided to conduct a clean-up exercise once a month, as effort to assist the National Catholic Secretariat (N.C.S.) that is currently responsible for sanitation in the camp.
Our first clean-up exercise began last month, targeting the zone 9 area which is known as one of the camp’s poorest sanitation areas. Education about sanitation is paramount to achieving healthy living conditions in the camp. SCHEFO is planning to do this through community through workshops, community outreach, and the provision of garbage bins at various locations in the twelve zones of the camp. We recognize that true results will only be achieved through adequate monitoring and funding.”
- Keith Kortu, Director of The SCHEF Organization
The Sexual Economy ( and what we can do about it )
by Camilla
When women are given agency over their own bodies, big change happens.
A new topical gel can be used by women to prevent transmission of HIV through sexual intercourse, The New York Times reported on Monday. The microbicidal gel contains tenofovir, an anti-retroviral. Many in the field have already dubbed it “a game changer.”
This latest benchmark in the fight against AIDS is in synch with the greater movement towards women’s rights and empowerment.
