Having a period is unaffordable in West Africa yet no one wants to talk about it but Pad Man Africa and MIPAD 100 wants to make a Difference with Gifting Eco-Friendly Pads…
When NK at the Pacelli’s got her first period, she was afraid she was dying. Terrified, she stuffed bits of cloth and cotton inside herself to try to stem the bleeding.
Too frightened to tell her parents what was happening, she kept quiet. She spent her school day terrified blood would leak out, exposing her to ridicule from her classmates.
“At first I was so scared, I didn’t know what it was, I thought I had hurt myself,” explains NK over the Hour of Hygiene at the Pacelli School of Blind, her school and one of Nigeria’s largest school of the Visually Impaired. The hour of hygiene has been organized by non-profit Giving Garage organisers of the Pad Man Africa, which provides gender equality & menstrual hygiene awareness and sanitary pad to girls like NK.
But Nk’s initial experience is common across Nigeria, and the rest of the continent. As many as one in 10 girls in sub-Saharan Africa are missing school during menstruation
One of the biggest problems girls who grow up in poverty face is the lack of proper and hygienic solutions when they have their period. If their parents don’t have money to buy pads they end up using anything at hand like cloth, leaves, tissue, pieces of mattresses or even have transactional sex for pads. These practices are dangerous to their health but also make many girls miss several days of school every month. Some drop out of school for good.
Today, little trace is left of that fear. As we want NK to join other girls in eastern Africa who uses a menstrual cup or Reusable pads that she can wash regularly and use for up to ten years. “[Menstruation] happens to all girls, why would I be embarrassed?”
“Girls don’t talk about these issues, so I’m not sure if any other women face them, the real reasons PadMan Africa is adopting the United Nations’ He For She Model to encourage men to play a role in soliciting for adequate funding and awareness for this cause and rebuff the idea of other girls thinking women could only become pregnant by having sex during menstruation.
The Kenyan government is considered a global leader on access to sanitary products. It repealed added tax on pads and tampons in 2004 to lower the price — a tax that still exists in the US — and since 2011, with the help of Zana Africa, the government has allocated money to distribute free pads to school girls.
The Pad Man Africa is also designed to promote loudly and unashamedly the role of good Menstrual Hygiene Management in Secondary schools as a trigger for better, stronger development of Schoolgirls attended the Pan African Youth Conference at the UNEP HQ in Nairobi and hopes to collaborate with the Zana Africa team to reach school girls in Nigeria with the assistance of Mandy Sanghera, Green Pads, Hamzat Lawal, Sarah Makiki, UN Women (HeForShe) Kenya, UNICEF Kenya, MIPAD 100, Kenya Airways, Samsung Mobile and other public spirited individuals and brand who supported his delegation to Kenya.
In other News…
The National Youth Green Growth Secretariat (NY2GS), Green Economy Alliance Star Partners (GEASP) in collaboration with the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources, United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), Organization of African Youth (OAY) and African Youth Partnership Initiatives (AfYPI) hosted the Pan-African Youth Conference under the theme; Partnership for Capacity Development on Sustainable Urbanization, Protection against Hazardous Chemical and Waste towards Achieving 2030 Agenda for sustainable development.
The conference held at the UNEP HQ, in Nairobi from the 19th -20th April 2017.
The conference main objective helped raise awareness, identify collaborative partnerships for the youth and representatives of governments, private sector and civil society organizations to identify priorities of action needed for capacity building and training, challenges and opportunities available for youth towards development agenda and accelerating Sustainable development in Africa. This forum strengthened cooperation and partnership links between youth, governments and stakeholders in the sector.
The PadManAfrica Convener Chaste Inegbedion also had the opportunity to share a presentation on Waste Management in Nigeria, moderated the Break-out session on Advancing Social Innovation that reduces vulnerability of youths & environment and joined the draft committee on the Youth statement to the UNEA3 and the Triple COPs in Geneva and Nairobi Respectively and finally the Action plan.
This experience met our expectations aligning with the themes helped us in demystifying the roles of youth in the theme actions, opportunities available, future perspectives and organizational role in the theme process.
After Party: We hosted a Pad Party to discuss opportunities for collaboration using the United Nations “He For She Barbershop Conference” to promote Gender Equality and the Environment.
share ideas and devise strategies for addressing discrimination and on the role men can play in achieving equality. The mini conference over pizza helped also in discussing ways to combat violence against women and girls.
The Convener who had earlier visited UBA Kenya, UNICEF and UN Women Offices for courtesy visits and advocacy chat to make a difference in providing bio-degradable washable pads for girls in Africa.
📷 — all photos taken on the Samsung S8+ during our kenya Trip.
