SUPPORTING WOMEN EMPOWERMENT THROUGH THE WEB



KUBATANA WOMEN CLUB
One small Acer laptop is what it takes for Rebuild Sakubva to ensure that the women of the old Sakubva township get visibility and oppportunities to get international markets for their projects.With unemployment rate going over 80% in Zimbabwe some women in Sakubva have taken it upon themselves to be the breadwinners of their families.In Sakubva 60%of the women are household heads.They are engaging in various activities that bring in household income.Kushinga women's group is based in Devonshire,Sakubva Mutare and has 10 members.They make juices by mixing concentrated powder and citric acid.They then sale the products locally at a cost of USD2 for every 2litres.Their juices vary from orange,creamsoda and raspberry flavours.They sell on overage 10 bottles per day on a good day especially during month ends.In some cases they sell on credit to known customers.



Challenges
Although these women make very good juice the bottles are not branded and this stops them from putting up their products in supermarkets.They also do the mixing at home because they do not have space to work from.One of the group members Mai Bakasa said that if they can get a bigger space to work from and capital to buy more inputs they can make more juice and thereby make more money.Most of the group members are widows and they use the money to pay for house rentals,water and electricity bills as well as school fees for their children.



Our Role as Rebuild Sakubva
Rebuild Sakubva uses its website and Facebook page to create awareness for these women and other women groups so that they can get more and better markets.This has proved very useful as people outside Sakubva who have intyerest in their products are beginning to make enquiries of the product and project.For the women whose projects and products are being put up on internet this is their chance to learn about websites,Facebook and other social media.each day they come to get feedback on their product and page.ReSa Director also takes this chance to teach them on how to use the computer,make price list brochures and how to communicate with customers.The women enjoy the comments from people and everyday they come to check on how their product is faring on the web.Most of the women are not computer literate but they like to get feedback from the social forum and so each day they visit ReSa offices for the much needed feedback.They are now starting to appreciate what it means to have a computer and its uses.

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