A city just about 3 hours away from Congo’s second largest city Lubumbashi,this state of the art center was built by our partnerTenkeFungurumeMining CommunitySocial Fund organization to assist young school dropouts gain access to vocational training. HEAR Congo manages the center and runs a state certified program. This projectsupports its participants in becoming self-sufficient, placing them among leaders and actors in their community and thereby promoting economic growth in the region. Since 2016, 300 participants have been registered in our program.
Our ongoing training at the Centre de Promotion SocialeTenke provides the following:
- Literacy program
- A state certified associated degree in Sewing and designing, cosmetology, welding, masonry and fitting
- Computer classes
- Training in leadership skills, governance and peer education in relevant subjects to the community such as health, conflict resolution and human rights
- Saving Clubs where they learn how to sustain themselves, grow their businesses and establish credibility.
- Training in reproductive health, nutrition, early childhood development and parenting skills.
- They learn good housekeeping and basic hygiene as well as how to prevent diseases and other common causes of death in DR Congo.
- An advocacy network and support system
HEAR CONGO launched its first agricultural program in Minova, North Kivu in 2014. The program began with fifty teen mothers. These women were taught literacy and numeracy and were trained by a female agronomist to grow more environmentally friendly crops, thereby providing better food in greater out of which they not only feed their families but are able to profit by selling a percentage of their crops. Because of its success, this agricultural project model will be expanded to other locations where HEAR Congo carries out its work.
This organization comprising skilled Congolese helps teen mothers acquire life skills and develop leadership. With few resources, they were able to deliver new information to target audiences in camps, who will then return to their villages with increased knowledge about health and rights. It was the first initiative of its kind. Since 2012, HOLD DRC has assisted more than 300 Teen Moms and their more than 500 children regain their dignity and social status through their programs. The baby room at the center while their teen moms are training in Culinary Arts, Cosmetology and sewing classes offered at HOLD-DRC in Goma, DRC. Through resources and technical support, HOLD DRC serves as a project implementing partner of Hear Congo in DRC.
One hundred twenty internally displaced families remained among the last to be resettled. HEAR Congo provided them with food, medicine, school tuition, supplies and uniforms for children. HEAR Congo also worked closely with the office of UN Higher Commission for Refugees to help these families resettle.
HEAL Africa Hospital was a safe heaven for women and girls who had survived sexual violence. HEAR CONGO provided surgical tools, medical instruments and medicine to the hospital.
HEAR Congo organized two medical missions to assist the vulnerable population in Bukavu. St-Vincent opened its door to the most vulnerable population, including survivors of sexual violence. Tree of Life International joined Hear Congo on one of these missions.
Mugunga III refugee camp, located about 15 kilometers outside the city of Goma, held some 20,000 internally displaced people for many, many years. Nearly all of the country’s humanitarian efforts were directed here. HEAR CONGO worked, as part of that effort, with Congolese and American health professionals to organize four humanitarian and medical mission trips. More than 200 families were provided with medicines, baby nutrition and vaccinations. In Shasha refugee camp, more than 50 pygmee families received similar assistance.
2008-2012: 2550 lives impacted
From 2008-2012, we conducted medical and emergency missions to war affected regions in Eastern and South Eastern Congo. Women and children bore the worse brunt of the violence. With a team of healthcare professionals, we focused our efforts on supporting local medical initiatives by providing medicine, baby nutrition, vaccination, medical equipment and instruments at HEAL Africa, a safe heaven for rape survivors. In South-Kivu, at St-Vincent Hospital, vulnerable women, rape survivors and many members of the community benefited from our medical missions.
We also provided medical treatment in refugee camps in North-Kivu, Mugunga and Shasha.
In Lubumbashi,the second largest city in DR Congo, we enabled women at the Kenya displacement camp,to found savings groups and opene small businesses selling clothing and baked goods,and making brooms and other wares. The results of their enterprises have enabled more than 70% of them to cover school tuition for their children.
EDUCATING WOMEN TO EDUCATE MORE WOMEN: FROM 40 WOMEN PEER EDUCATORS TO 22,000 HEALTH-EDUCATED CITIZENS
With incomprehensible resolve, 40 women ranging in age from 16 to 56 years old and from grandmothers to teen mothers, determined to educate the entire population of one of the poorest and most populated neighborhoods in the capital, Kinshasa. They reached every household in Kimbaseke, teaching about prevention of HIV and malaria, early detection of breast cancer, and protection from domestic violence. After graduating from a literacy program provided by HEAR Congo's partner, Alfacongo, these 40 women were trained to be peer educators and community leaders who, within two months and with the assistance of a host of experts from the UN, World Vision and The Red Cross, brought their knowledge to 3932 households, four schools and four churches.
These 40 peer educators, drawn from Human Development Clubs (which have 10 members in each group), began a Women’s Entrepreneurship Network. They trained 120 more women, bringing the total number of peer educators and community leaders working in the Kimbaseke neighborhood in Kinshasa to 160 and Human Development Clubs to sixteen.