COVID-19 Fairtrade Emergency Initiative funded by BMZ in the Philippines for the safety of women & children!

During COVID-19 lockdown women, girls and children face distinct challenges related to their safety and well-being such as access to healthcare services, gender-based violence, and other human rights violations, and economic insecurity. A pandemic further exacerbates any social inequalities that exist in a country. As such making creating awareness and making provisions for the safety of women and children becomes of national importance.

In the Philippines, through the COVID 19 Fairtrade Emergency Initiative funded by BMZ, gender-related safety and awareness materials and COVID-19 educational flyers published by the Philippines Commission of Women and Save the Children organisation were reprinted in the local language and distributed to 700 farmers and 2500 children and students.

The materials were distributed to 8 Fairtrade small producer organisations in Davao and Negros region to educate the community about the different forms of harassment against women, its consequences and penalties to offenders and to make the women aware of different help-line centers available for their safety (both Govt. and Private crisis and rescue centers, hospitals, police, and legal agencies).