The Mothers’ Union Savings with Education (SwE) Program recognizes that addressing the financial and social needs of women has a direct impact on child and women’s health and survival. Our partnership’s SwE groups include child-health focused dialogues to improve the health of children under five. Together with the Church, we implemented a water and sanitation program supported in part by a grant from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) to improve community-managed water and public sanitation facilities and to promote household-adoption of improved sanitation and hygiene practices in order to reduce the frequency and severity of disease.
Our partnership works with the Angola Mothers’ Union to promote savings groups that increase women’s access to financial resources, supporting the health and nutrition needs of their households. The program also integrates focused dialogue about the prevention of violence against women and children in the groups. The goal of Angola Mothers’ Union Child Survival & Savings with Education program is to continue to facilitate the transformation and empowerment of Angolan women to increase their economic independence; to prevent, address and increase dialogue on gender-based violence (GBV) against women and children; and improve child health.
In Angola’s northern Anglican Diocese of Cristo Rei (Christ the King), the Church’s development team is leveraging their water and sanitation programming success and long-standing relationship with community members to pilot an integrated climate resilience project in the face of recurrent cycles of droughts and floods. To strengthen household resilience against a changing climate, the Church’s work expands its promotion of a savings culture through the mobilization of additional Savings with Education (SwE) groups among both male and female smallholder farmers engaged in crop production and livestock breeding.
