By Thupeyo Muleya
The International Labour Organisation is mobilising funds to empower communities living within the Beitbridge-Chirundu corridor, an official has said.
In an interview during an ILO workshop in Beitbridge yesterday, the body’s Zimbabwe national project co-ordinator, Mr Colly Masuku, said they were training people to come up with viable businesses and they would provide seed money for the projects early next year.
He said this was part of the second phase of their programme on HIV prevention and economic empowerment along Southern African transport corridors.
Mr Masuku said they were yet to come up with the exact amount that would be channelled into the scheme.
"We have realised that most of the push factors leading to the rapid spread of the disease are economic hardships and hence we need to address some of the challenges by empowering communities living within international corridors.
"From experience, we learnt that prevention of the disease alone is not enough without economically empowering communities. With that in mind, we are working with several stakeholders, among them, the Ministry of Small and Medium Enterprises, the Department of Immigration, the Ministry of Health, the police, local authorities and the Beitbridge Business Association.
"Through the implementation of some inventions we developed during our first phase of the programme, a lot of projects have come to fruition in Beitbridge, Ngundu and Chirundu.
"We have, with assistance from our partners, managed to have more clinics for opportunistic infections along the corridor" he said.
Mr Masuku said they ultimately wanted to reduce the impact of HIV and Aids in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Acting Beitbridge district administrator Mr Peter Moyo challenged workshop participants to effectively make use of the ILO initiative and bring about positive change in their areas.
Published by; The Herald 3 August 2010
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