05 October 2004

Bonn, Germany: When UNV’s Caring Cities: Support to Intra-City Volunteerism (ICV) project started in Falmouth, Jamaica, some fishermen were asked what they hoped to get out of the project. Their response was, “We need high-speed boats and freezers.” When the same question was put to them a year later, their answers changed: “We want to be a legal association and join together so we can defend the beach from developers”.

This transformation, where the community takes its future into its own hands through volunteerism, is at the heart of the ICV project.

Since 2002, ICV has been engaging and mobilizing citizens to improve their communities through activities aimed at bridging the divide between their needs and what local governments can provide.

In the project’s three pilot cities – Esmeraldas/Ecuador, Falmouth/Jamaica, and Amran/Yemen – a small team of UN Volunteers work with volunteer groups, civil society and policy makers to raise awareness and demonstrate the value of voluntary action. They also build alliances between local authorities and the private sector to support volunteer activities.

One example of ICVs efforts can be found in the schools of Falmouth. In May 2004, the ICV team met with parent-teacher associations (PTAs) to discuss the fact that a number of students were without textbooks. While the government does offer a book rental programme at a cost lower than purchasing the books, Jamaican UN Volunteer Ingrid Spence says many students during the last school year were unable to pay the US$10 fee. She says the PTAs decided to set-up a book drive and open a public fund to assist those students in meeting their needs.

Spanish UNV Berta Brusilovsky (right) shares her knowledge and skills as an architect with the Caring Cities project in Esmeraldas, Ecuador.
Photo: VNU/Andrew Smith
 
At the book drive launch on 28 May, some 1,800 books were donated and contributions deposited into an account. The handover of the funds will take place at the start of the new school year.

Thousands of kilometres away in Amran, women are benefiting from ICV’s presence in their community. Raising the profile of women within Yemen, while respecting Islamic law and values, is one focus of ICVs activities.

Yemeni women, like many women in developing nations, lack access to education and information on family planning. Working to change that reality, the ICV team reached out to women in the community to encourage them to form an association representing their needs. After an intense period of door to door campaigning, the Al-amal women’s association was created. With some 110 members, Al-amal and the ICV team are making dramatic strides in heightening the status of women in the community.

For the first time, women-led partnerships with the Ministry of Health are raising women’s awareness on nutrition and family planning, and through the Department of Adult Literacy, reading and writing classes are improving the lives of women and men. To help the environment, the association also teamed up with other volunteer groups to plant some 3,000 trees to counteract the pollution generated by a local cement factory.

In Esmeraldas, where 70 percent of the city’s 140,000 residents live in poverty, a lack of services provided the ICV team with several opportunities to engage the community in development activities. One initiative was the renovation of 11 dilapidated schools. The schools were completely refurbished inside and out, while tires donated from a petroleum company were used as playground equipment.

Another unique initiative in Esmeraldas was the establishment of a Municipal Volunteer Office. Inaugurated last year on the eve of International Volunteer Day (IVD), 5 December, the office serves as a hub on volunteer activity within the community allowing volunteer groups to continue the model instituted by the ICV project and to foster new activities and partnerships.

Isabel Iturralde of Ecuador, the UNV Communications Specialist for the ICV project, says that with the project set to end in November 2004, the project teams are meeting with their counterparts to ensure the tools are in place to further the momentum created around the project. Already, the ICV team is working with other municipalities in Ecuador to replicate the Municipal Volunteer Office platform.

For the more than 900 volunteers who were involved in the project, Isabel is confident that many will continue volunteering, as they experienced first-hand what can be achieved in their communities through volunteerism.

More information on the ICV project can be found at: http://www.caringcities.org