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USAID, Peace Corps Help Kenyan Women Leave Risky Work Behind
FrontLines - April 2009
By Kim Wylie
Mariakani, Kenya—One year ago, Heather Domenico and Grover Ainsworth had never heard of USAID. Today, the two Peace Corps volunteers work on a USAID-funded project to help Kenyan women gain financial independence and fight the spread of AIDS.
Their work is part of the ROADS project, which stands for “Regional Outreach Addressing AIDS through Development Strategies.” USAID started the project in East Africa in 2005 and aims to reduce the spread and impact of HIV/AIDS in towns along major transport routes. These towns have high rates of commercial
sex work and multiple sexual partners, and, consequently,
high rates of HIV.
As many as 80 percent of women in these communities have turned to sex work, including with truck drivers, because few opportunities exist for other kinds of work.
This young woman takes a break from her job at LifeWorks Shukrani Ltd., a for-profit company in Kenya that produces home and fashion accessories. She is among a group of women who are finding financial rewards in a USAID-Peace Corps initiative.
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The ROADS Project has established HIV/AIDS resource facilities, called SafeTStop centers,
at major truck stops, which offer truckers an alternative
environment
to bars and brothels. Each center is equipped with HIV/AIDS educational
materials
and recreational
facilities. They also have trained counselors,
who provide truckers with voluntary HIV counseling and testing, and refer them to other HIV/AIDS services.
The LifeWorks Partnership Trust, one component of ROADS, supports alternative jobs that help women earn money. LifeWorks Shukrani Ltd., for example, is a company that produces shawls, placemats, napkins, table runners, and tote bags. It employs 21 Kenyan women.
The business, based in Mariakani, is about 45 minutes from Mombasa, a tourist haven with palm-fringed beaches along a turquoise Indian Ocean. The gritty port on the less scenic
side of town leads to a superhighway that leaves Mombasa, cuts through Mariakani, and stretches through Kenya into Uganda and to the Great Lakes Region.
Domenico, 34, and Ainsworth, 35, came to Kenya with the Peace Corps with an interest in marketing and business.
Domenico, who had helped American corporations use Web-based technology for marketing goods, works on developing local markets for Shukrani products.
Ainsworth, who has an MBA and worked on small businesses,
develops export markets.
To date, Shukrani has made more than $30,000, with sales in Kenya, Uganda, the Caribbean; and ABC Carpet and Home and Bodanna Inc., both in New York City. Shukrani is still operating in the red, but is expected to turn the corner in the next 18 months.
The stories of the Shukrani workers appeal to socially-conscious
buyers who are able to put dollars into the pockets of the most vulnerable in these communities—women and older orphans.
Shukrani’s workers earn a fair daily wage and don’t have to engage in risky survival strategies
to care for themselves or their families. “And we’re giving
women access to health benefits
and insurance and supporting
them to open their own private bank accounts,” Domenico added.
Seamstress Wanjiku (a pseudonym), 22, who was orphaned at 16, said: “This project recruits people who are hopeless in life and kind of gives them a safe haven. They can meet their basic needs and there’s no reason to go back to the road” to sex work.
Workers participate in periodic health education programs and educate
others on the AIDS epidemic. They also help with volunteer community
outreach—producing skits about drugs, alcohol, and HIV/AIDS during evenings and weekends.
★
FrontLines is published
by the Bureau for Legislative and Public Affairs
U.S. Agency for International Development
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