Activists Seek to Replicate Small Successes in Bid to End female genital cutting FGC

This article explores the issue of female genital cutting, (FGC) and one organisation's work to address the issue. It states that (FGC) has declined little in about 28 African countries despite years of work and laws to discourage the practice; activists say they badly need to replicate promising projects such as the one run by the Senegalese NGO Tostan.

Tostan ("breakthrough" in Wolof) runs programmes that work to end FGC in West Africa. The organisation adopted a holistic approach to addressing the issues around FGC, a procedure that involves the partial or total removal of the external female genitalia. Generally performed without anesthesia by traditional elders, in some cases for pay, FGC has health consequences that include hemorrhage, shock, pain, infection, psychological and sexual problems, and difficulties during childbirth, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO).

The author explains that with several hundred teachers deployed throughout Senegal, Tostan conducts 30-month adult and adolescent programmes that teach through the use of stories, theater, poetry, proverbs, song, and dialogue. These "Village Empowerment Programmes" have aimed to enhance women's life skills and improve their socioeconomic conditions. Organisers and participants say the abandonment of FGC is an indirect result.

The article further states that over the last 25 years, governments, nongovernmental organisations (NGOs), and donor agencies have increasingly recognised FGC as a health and human rights issue and have used various means to try to stop the practice. Their approaches have included community-based education programmes, the introduction of alternative rituals that could be substituted for cutting ceremonies, and work with health providers to help them treat FGC complications. Now, health and women's advocacy groups say they need to focus on replicating the approaches that work. But getting communities to end an ancient practice that remains a rite of passage for an estimated 2 million girls every year is not easy. Experts say ending the custom would require complex cultural changes as well as greater financial resources and political commitment.

The U.S.-based Population Council, which has studied the Tostan approach, says the programm's key success factors include a comprehensive, participatory approach to learning that highlights positive cultural factors and values, encourages use of the women's own stories, and promotes the sharing of information with relatives and friends. The Council says other organisations and African countries could use this programme.

Health and development experts say FGC abandonment programmes could be expanded and supported in many ways: In a 1999 report, WHO and the Programme for Appropriate Technology in Health (PATH) recommended that policymakers:

• Provide greater support to scale-up pilot projects into broad-based programmes;
• Pass and enact anti-FGC laws to provide legal support for project activities; and
• Increase awareness among health providers of the extent and severity of FGC-related complications.

In addition, those who design and implement FGC-related programs could:

• Use a participatory approach when designing programmes, and include young girls and women;
• Conduct country-specific research, bearing in mind that programmes should incorporate local perceptions of the practice, reach audiences with low literacy rates, and convey nonjudgmental messages;
• Include urban-educated women and men since FGC occurs among all socioeconomic groups;
• Build on the positive community values that underlie FGC; and
• Include work with the mass media.

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Source: PRB website