Sectors

Sectors that AFAP works within

While AFAP programs reach out to whole communities, we are particuarly conscious of supporting the more marginalised or vulnerable groups within these communities, including people with disabilities, women, children and ethnic minorities.

AFAP supports work in the following sectors:

Water and Sanitation and Hygiene

Access to clean water and sanitation are key issues in human development and good health.  Over 2 million people a year die because they do not have access to safe water or adequate levels of sanitation.  It is one of the biggest killers of children under the age of 5 in developing countries.

The provision of safe water and sanitation is a central feature of AFAP’s work.  As it is one of the most effective ways of improving the lives of the poor.

Health

Health remains one of the global challenges of the 21st century, particularly in low income countries.  Because of the interconnectedness of health outcomes with many other issues, nearly all of the initiatives that AFAP and its partners are involved with have some influence on the health status of the beneficiary communities on some level.

Our work has a strong primary health care focus around issues related to HIV and AIDS and Maternal and Child Health (MCH).

Food Security

Poverty means that people often do not have access to sufficient quality or quantity of food to maintain good health.   AFAP supports a wide range of initiatives that are aimed at enabling people to purchase or grow the food they need.  Unfortunately for many, a households ability to live without hunger is dependent on complex factors that are beyond its control.  Access to land and labor, political stability and favourable climatic conditions all affect a household’s ability to be able to access food.

As many of the poor are rural farmers a great deal of the work we do is aimed at increasing  agricultural production at the household or community level.  Diversification of livestock and crops is encouraged in order to reduce risk of dependency on one food source as well as improving access to a wider variety of nutritious food. We also promote conservation agriculture techniques so that farmers can produce greater quantifies of food.  We also promote access to technical training so farmers are better able to meet their own needs.  As production increases we also encourage the development of small scale marking co-operatives so that farmers are able to sell their produce if they chose to do so.

When we work with people who do not have access to land, our food security work takes on more market based approaches.   We often work wit women on income generation programs so they can purchase the food they need.

Environment

AFAP has a long history of supporting environmental and resource management Programs.  Sustainable use of resources is central to the success of many of our programs and environmental management is strongly linked to our food security and livelihood development work.

Education

AFAP strongly believes in the essential role that education plays in development. Providing education opportunities for children and adults means we help give people more choices to create a brighter future for themselves.

Through Programs that AFAP supports, vulnerable children are able to stay in school.  We also support youth vocational training opportunities in a number of countries.  However, education, training and capacity building is a central feature across all the sectors in which we work.

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