Heartwarming Video: Final Sneak Peek!

We find ourselves in a time when sanitation and hygiene are more important than ever before. WEEMA is proud to have been an advocate of community-based hygiene and sanitation solutions dating back to our first Mudula water project to ensure much-needed water access for both drinking and sanitation. Today, as we get ready to launch our new website, we wanted to share this heartwarming video highlighting our work in sanitation and hygiene. 

Enjoy and stay tuned for our website launch this coming week!

Thrilled to be launching our new website very soon!

We’ve been hard at work on a new website for WEEMA. It will include brand new footage of our work in Southwest Ethiopia, interactive maps showing you which communities we work with and many other cool features to celebrate the collective impact we are making with community-led development in Ethiopia. We can’t wait to share it with you all and hear your thoughts. In the meantime, here is a sneak peak of our introduction video. Stay Tuned! :) 

Inspiring Youth Mobilization Against COVID

Young people from Mudula quickly answered the call to donate blood amid a national shortage.

During challenges that seem insurmountable, we often find inspiration in the younger generation mobilizing to take action. WEEMA is happy to find such inspiration in the youth of Kembata-Tembaro Zone as they organize to reign in the spread of COVID-19 in their communities. Here are some of the major activities the youth are spearheading: 

• Voluntary blood donation campaign: Despite an increasing need for blood donors after the start of COVID, there has been a national decline in voluntary blood donation in Ethiopia. Prime Minister Abiy and first Lady Zinash have put out a national call urging for blood donations at this critical time. Following this call, the youth in Mudula Town gathered in Mudula primary hospital and donated 53 units of blood in one day and the donations are expected to continue for three successive months.   

• Promote Hand washing stations: The youth volunteers manage hand washing stations at places of public gatherings such as open markets and bus lines. 

• Manage Water Tankers: The water tankers set up by the Health department and WEEMA are handled by these amazing youth volunteers who set up the tankers each day, re-fill them throughout the day and return them back to the storage location at night. 

• Home to Home and public awareness creation: The youth have been leading public educational sessions, through home-to-home awareness creation, flyer distribution to service providers like restaurants and hotels or public area campaigns using microphones to spread critical messages to the community. 

• Resource Mobilization: The youth volunteers have been helping in gathering resources like sanitary supplies, food items for the quarantine center, cash, and other materials for the prevention of COVID-19 in the Tembaro community.  

 What an inspiration indeed! WEEMA is encouraged to continue its fight and do our part against COVID and we hope you are too. 

Have a productive rest of the week! 

Mudula youths donating blood after Prime Minister Abiy’s call to action.

Enough is Enough

Community coming together to march, holding signs that say Black Lives Matter.

WEEMA Wednesday is generally a platform to share the work that our team is doing in Ethiopia, thanks to your support.  However, we cannot ignore the current events and the incredible pain caused by the tremendous injustices in today’s America.  WEEMA as an organization stands in complete solidarity with our Black brothers and sisters. We are heartbroken, devastated and angry to see the continuing unjust treatment of Black people in this country. 

The United States is in crisis.  Black people have been fighting for justice and equality for generations and they are so, so tired.  The violence, the trauma, the pain is more than our black brothers and sisters can bear alone. It is long overdue, but if we want real change, we must demand it.  It is time for white people to take meaningful action. 

This is the way forward.  The more we all stand together, the more quickly we can make a “new normal” that is not just about dealing with a viral pandemic, but also deals with the pandemic of racial injustice. 

Today, once again, we are asking for your support - your support against this crisis of racial injustice.  

Listen. Learn. Research. Vote. Act.

Periods Don't Pause for Pandemics

Girls from Mudula proudly showing off the pads they received in WEEMA’s most recent delivery.

WEEMA is excited to celebrate Menstrual Hygiene Day on May 28, 2020. This day is a reminder of our commitment to ensuring equitable access to menstrual hygiene management (MHM) products and resources for girls and women in Ethiopia. Here are some photos of our most recent pad distribution to Buho and Mudula Primary Schools right before the lockdown of the COVID pandemic. 

In light of tomorrow’s #MenstrualHygieneDay, we are happy to debut a video on our Menstrual Hygiene Program. This video, by Emmy award-winning director, producer and cinematographer Mary Olive Smith, is a sneak peek from our new upcoming website that we’ll be launching soon. Our MHM program is working to destigmatize topics of menstruation and reproductive health for both girls and boys in southwestern Ethiopia. Happy International Menstrual Hygiene Day!

Students receiving pads during our most recent delivery to local schools.