COMPAS AFRICA ORGANIZES TRAINING COURSE FOR CSOs IN EAST AFRICA
From 13th- 18th October 2018, the New compass Africa organized a successful training course for over 35 participants from fifteen CSOs from eight countries, hosted by the Institute for Culture and Ecology (ICE) in Meru. The participants came from Uganda, Tanzania, Kenya, Ethiopia, Ghana and Zimbabwe. Two other participants came from the First Nations in Canada. Majority of participants were from Pastoralist organizations in northern Kenya. The theme for the training course was “Building on Local and Indigenous Knowledge for Community Resilience”. This is the second in a series of capacity building programmes designed to revitalize Compas Africa and strengthen the knowledge of CSOs on the concept and practices of endogenous development for building resilient communities in Africa. The first was held in Techiman, Ghana in 2016 for CSOs in West Africa. Plans are underway for a third training course for CSOs in Southern Africa to be hosted by Muonde Trust in Zimbabwe.
Training was in three sections - first an overview of colonialism and the impact on the resilience of present day African communities. A second session was an introduction to endogenous development as the new paradigm shift that will move African communities from a dysfunctional status back to resilience. A third section provides capacities for using tools and methodologies for facilitating ED in communities. At the end of the training, each participating organization developed take-home plans indicating how the new knowledge will be integrated into their on-going work at home. The good news is that ISID, one of the pastoralist organization is already using the new knowledge in a programme to revitalize the “Deedha” council of elders as an indigenous institution for policy influencing for natural resources management. https://youtu.be/GIb8FvatTpE. The course was co-organized by Compas Africa and the Coady International Institute if the St Francis Xavier University in Canada and funded by the Christensen fund.
Posted on behalf of Mr Bernard Guri.
