Culture Fund
Our vision is a world in which Culture and the Arts, imbued with Africaness, thrive and are sustainable; contributing to wealth creation for African communities. Our purpose is to connect African communities with financial and technical resources; to lead African Thought research and discourse and to harness the power of the creative arts to help positively change the lives of ordinary people.
We help strengthen Community Based Organisations (CBOs) capacities, empower girls, support women communities and promote peace, dialogue and social cohesion.
Resultant of the renewed development partnership between the Culture Fund and the Embassy of Sweden in Harare, CultureACTIONs was launched in 2017 with the aim to reduce Gender-based violence, child marriages and foster environmental sustainability in the face of climate change. It especially targets girls and young women. Culture-based arguments and societal norms that disempower girls and young women are being debunked through a Creative Knowledge Toolkit and used in advocacy and awareness campaigns to mitigate the social ills in the three districts of Mazowe, Makoni and Chipinge.
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Women Can | Our Planet
CULTUREACTIONS
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A consortium of eight African, European and international partners joins forces with the European Union to create new opportunities and mobilise stakeholders to promote intercultural dialogue and cultural diversity in urban and peri-urban areas in Africa as drivers for social inclusion and sustainable human development.
DREAMS
Innovation Challenge
The Culture Fund’s Creative Arts Debunk Cultural Taboos in Zimbabwe | GIRLS CAN KNOW DECODE and ACT project was funded by a grant from the United States Department of State as part of the DREAMS Innovation Challenge, managed by JSI Research & Training Institute, Inc. (JSI). This project was successfully implemented and ended on the 31st of March 2019. It drove demand creation targeting 6,000 AGYW aged between 15 -24 years in the 6 DREAMS Zimbabwe districts of Mazowe, Gweru, Bulawayo, Mutare, Chipinge and Makoni over the 2 year period. The target beneficiaries were situated in communities with high HIV AIDS prevalence according to the DREAMS assessment and confirmed by the Zimbabwe Demographic Health Survey 2015 (ZDHS) and the 2012 Zimbabwe Population Census results. The intervention used creative arts to debunk cultural taboos inhibiting AGYW access to sexual reproductive health services (SRH). The Culture Fund programme created new imaginaries among the AGYW so they were motivated to seek services unfettered by the cultural barriers. The programme provided evidence that creative arts and platforms unlock greater engagement and participation of AGYW in HIV interventions as Girls can Know, Decode and Act. Ultimately the Culture Fund made a contribution to the overall target of reducing HIV prevalence among Adolescent Girls and Young Women. The Culture Fund DREAMS IC programme received support from United States President’s Emergency Plan on AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) through John Snow Inc. (JSI); under the broader 10 African Country programme, DREAMS Innovation Challenge. Culture Fund’s solution,
GIRLS CAN KNOW, DECODE, AND ACT.
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Dreams activities.
CULTURE IMPACTS
Advocating Change
This programme successfully ended in July 2017 having sought to improve social cohesion through provision of interaction platforms benefiting the diversity of Zimbabweans, especially the disenfranchised; and to encourage dialogue on pertinent national social issues.
Culture Impacts two year programme activities were successfully completed in July 2017. Trust auditors, Grant Thornton, carried an expenditure verification audit in September/October, delivering a favourable report that was dully submitted to the EU together with all other final reporting deliverables. Additionally, a set of films covering programme change stories were produced by Tagteam films serving as useful tools to market the Trust programmes locally and internationally.
DEEPENING THE FOUNDATIONS FOR PEACE, DIALOGUE AND SOCIAL COHESION IN ZIMBABWE
In partnership with UNDP and GOZ (Government of Zimbabwe)
Running under a 3 year programme (2016-2018) seeking to enhance national and community dispute resolution capacities and providing dialogue platforms for consensus and confidence building around potentially divisive national issues (and processes), fostering tolerance and encouraging inclusiveness and collaboration in the delivery of development dividends to Zimbabweans.
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A Youthfull O' Peace campaign engaged and mobilised young Zimbabweans around the idea of peace and constitutionalism through various platforms;
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Peace Mascot Official Launch
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Our Peace My Peace
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Talk to the Mascot
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International Day of Peace
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Intra Community Conversations
CULTURE BASED SOCIAL NORMS RESEARCH ON WOMEN’S BODILY INTEGRITY AND THE REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH AND RIGHTS OF YOUNG WOMEN
C4D Public Seminar: Culture Fund in partnership with UNICEF
Running under a 3 year programme (2016-2018) seeking to enhance national and community dispute resolution capacities and providing dialogue platforms for consensus and confidence building around potentially divisive national issues (and processes), fostering tolerance and encouraging inclusiveness and collaboration in the delivery of development dividends to Zimbabweans.
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STEP
Sustainable Tourism Enterprise Promotion (STEP) Zimbabwe (Honde Valley): 8 rural schools (20 children per school – 50% girls), 150 female-headed households and a total of 300 people in 4 rural wards reached.
OWN YOUR RUBBISH (OYR)
5 community groups, 12 local artists, audiences in 5 exhibition venues, audiences from schools
NMMZ TRADITIONAL VILLAGE
National Museums and Monuments of Zimbabwe (NMMZ Traditional Village at the Great Zimbabwe): 4 large communities surrounding Great Zimbabwe, significant number of the 119,834 of the recorded Great Zimbabwe Monuments visitors (2015-16) visited the Shona Village.
MORDPPNCH
Ministry of Rural Development, Preservation and Promotion of National Culture and Heritage (MoRDPPNCH): Culture and Heritage sectors, government departments and structures in 73 districts of Zimbabwe as well as the wider Zimbabwean society on full dissemination
CULTURE IMPACTS OVERALL RESULTS
Estimated 287,000 audience under free expression activities; 200,000 respondents to ICT social dialogues, 10 community groups under arts training; 20,000 reached under GBV awareness activities; 60 youth trained in various art forms; 1 culture policy impacting the whole of Zimbabwe.
IGNATIUS MABASA
Animated Folktales that captivated over 3500 story listeners.
IMPLEMENTING PARTNER RESULTS
Here are the results of our Culture Impacts partnerships over the whole year.
EVENTS @ CULTURE FUND OFFICES
EU ARTS CAPSULES - FOOTPRINTS BOOK LAUNCH
SWEDEN AND CULTURE FUND - GENDER BOOK LAUNCH
VIDEOS ON CULTURE FUND TV
There is so much to see, watch and hear on our YouTube channel. We are adding more eye-opening and uplifting material for you to sit back and enjoy or take action and intervene positively in our Zimbabwean community. Subscribe and get updates in your inbox.
“A man who calls his kinsmen to a feast does not do so to save them from starving. They all have food in their own homes. When we gather together in the moonlit village ground it is not because of the moon. Every man can see it in his own compound. We come together because it is good for kinsmen to do so.”
CONTACT US
+263 4 794211/ 794617/ 794530
Our deepest gratitude to our partners whose generous support helps us to change the lives of ordinary Zimbabweans.
