Grantee Spotlight: Rural Women's Movement in Swaziland

An email update sent to Nafi Chinery, AWDF’s Capacity Building Officer: Feedback from Rural Women’s Movement (RWM), an AWDF grantee in Swaziland on their experiences at the recent International Resource Mobilisation Workshop (IWRM) held in Bangalore, India. AWDF supported RWM and 4 other grantees to attend the IWRM.

Dear Nafi,

On behalf of RWM I wish to thank AWDF for its support.

My being part of the 9th IWRM in Bangalore was an eye opener for me. I have always been too scared to ask for financial assistance. Since I initiated RWM in 1998 I have been getting like 30% of my salary because asking for money for me has always been difficult. Even working on a budget has been difficult it has always felt like we are asking for too much. But after participating in the 9th IWRM I feel confident enough to ask for financial assistance without feeling like we are a burden.

My expectations were met and I had an opportunity to meet with fundraisers who have been in this field for a long time. All the sessions were relevant for me. But of course there were some that did not really meet my expectations. The sessions that I really liked were the sessions that were tackling issues about how to raise funds in the time of this recession. Those covered topics that prompted me to start looking for local support and not depend on international financial support. It also prompted me to look into making financial requests to Business sector. As the RWM we have not looked into the sector and have not tapped on the local resources. So the sessions were great in opening these potential opportunities for RWM.
The lesson I learned was that it is important for organizations to create space to reflect on our work and share our experiences. It was very informative for me to learn from other people’s experiences. Sitting and listening to presenters sharing their experiences was inspiring.

Some of the stories were painful like the one where a local man (I have forgotten )his name was talking about starting a sanitary towel organization, in communities where women had no material to use as sanitary towels and were using sand. But because of his passion he raised funds and mobilized resources for the program and the program is now making 6,000 sanitary towels a day and women have not have to suffer using sand which is cold in winter and very hot in summer. In his presentation he says after raising awareness about the plight of women in his area funders poured financial support in such a way that he had to ask them to channel money to other organizations because it was too much money for his organization. The lesson I learned on his presentation is that it is good for one to follow ones heart and try something that has never been tried before. And that if a proposal is clear and it responds to the communities needs and aspirations it is not a challenge to get financial support for the program/project.

I also learned that in most situations it helps to make a request for what [the] organization needs and not the money. Like in the issue of a presentation on sanitary towels the fundraiser was not asking for money to buy the sanitary towels but he was asking for pieces of materials so those who had unused pieces [of] material donated material/fabrics and those who did not have fabric/material donated money. When writing a proposal I have always been asking for money. I learned that it’s a great idea to ask for a computer rather than asking for money to buy a computer because the funder might know someone out there who might be desperate to give away computers and not money. Also I learned that the funding communities do not have time to read lengthy proposals its good to prepare a short proposal and it must be clear and to the point.

The challenge was that there was a lot going on, very good sessions happening at the same time. I think the program was a bit too tight there was no time to connect with other participants and engage on the issues coming out of the sessions and learn from one another’s experiences.

If the resources allow it would be good to keep a bit of time for reflection and for the participants to connect and share ideas, even just for half an hour a day. The participants are a very good resource in events like the IWRM; they have a lot to share with other people and to learn from other people. The sessions did not create much of that space because of time constraints.

The idea about having this kind of event in India was great. I think India has a lot to teach other developing countries about how they dealt with their own development challenges. From the experience I learned at 9th IWRM, after listening to my report RWM has started looking at resources within RWM. The RWM Committee is suggesting to the members that members should contribute about $1-50 per year. We are also working on a strategy on how we are going to approach the business sector and individuals who are sympathetic to RWM work.

I feel honoured to have been part of the IWRM event and would like to thank AWDF for making this opportunity available to RWM. It would be very good for me to learn from other participants experiences, how they found the IWRM and how it has changed their approach in their respective organizations. We did not have time to connect this might be a space for us to share our experiences.

Sizani Ngubane, Rural Women’s Movement