The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) has provided support to some 500 female head porters at Tema Station in Accra.
The head porters were empowered through a 6-month-long project dubbed the Kayayei Assistance Project (KASPRO).
The project, which was supported by Prudential Life Insurance Ghana saw the beneficiaries being equipped with sexual and reproductive health rights education as information on sexual and gender-based violence.
Within the period of the project, which started in June 2020, the head porters were also equipped with vocational skills including bead making and soap making.
According to the UNFPA Country Representative, Niyi Ojuolape, the project was conceived when Ghana’s capital, Accra and Kumasi were put under a lockdown as part of efforts to stop the spread of COVID-19 in the country.
He said although the head porters and other vulnerable groups received various forms of assistance during the period, most of those supports were not sustainable hence UNFPA’s intervention.
“When COVID-19 came and there was a lockdown, government recognized that there were people who were vulnerable in the society and so they were given food and all that but you only feed them for one day or two days. We were responding to the vulnerabilities of the poor. The kayayei are poor and what makes their case worse is the fact that they don’t have shelter so they sleep in the parks, outside so that makes them even poorer,” Mr. Ojuolape told Citi News on the sidelines of the climax of the project.
“Because they are women, their vulnerabilities include rape, STIs and unwanted pregnancies. So what we decided was to do a programme that will give them information and train them in order to take care of themselves so that they don’t get raped, so they don’t suffer gender-based violence so that they don’t have unwanted pregnancies,” he added.
He said he was hopeful that the head porters will be able to live sustainably “stand on their own” with the vocational skills they have been equipped with through the project and gave assurances that the UNFPA will continue to monitor the progress of the beneficiaries.
Head of Marketing and Communication at Prudential Life Insurance Ghana, Madam Frances Baaba Ofori applauded UNFPA for the execution of the project and urged the beneficiaries to put to good use the knowledge and skills they had acquired.
Some exceptional beneficiaries were awarded at the event.
A sales exhibition was also held with products made by the beneficiaries on sale.
About the project
The KASPRO project, launched in June 2020 provided the first cohort of 500 kayayei from the Tema Station in Accra with food items, dignity kits, sexual and reproductive health education and vocational training in shea butter making, beading, yoghurt making, baking, soap making among others. All 500 beneficiaries have also been enrolled onto the National Health Insurance Scheme.