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.
BOMISO COMIC BOOK
Bomiso is a beautiful adolescent girl; intelligent and sassy. A shining light among her friends and peers who live together in a fast-paced high-density suburb of a town in her native country, Zimbabwe. Bomiso episodes account the lives of Bomiso, her adolescent big-brother, Munzwa, and their father’s sister, Tete Pai; clear-minded and equally sassy woman in her mid-thirties. Tete Pai has her eye on the patriarchal world they all live in. She sees through its underlying values and knows that some of them affect how adolescent girls and young women, like Bomiso, relate to HIV/Aids issues.
Hunhu
Condomise
Dating: Boyfriend and Girlfriend
CULTURE FUND DREAMS IC IN COLLABORATION WITH VICTORY SIYANQOBA TRUST HOSTED THE LAUNDRY CAFÉ