by Raymond Brandes

11 March 2010

Bangkok, Thailand: As the Outreach Specialist in the UN Partners for Prevention Regional Joint (UNDP, UNFPA, UNIFEM and UNV) Programme for Asia and the Pacific, and liaison to the United Nations Volunteers headquarters, I'll be providing coordination of outreach and networking activities, technical assistance to the network of volunteers and partners, and support to research on volunteerism and gender-based violence (GBV) prevention. I’ll be providing management support as well.

In particular, I'll be reaching out to the stakeholders of the programme to expand partnerships, placement opportunities and participation in activities; ensuring exchange, cross-border sharing and networking; and supporting and coordinating research activities.

The involvement of UNV as one of the Partners for Prevention (P4P) is not limited to solely my role in the programme. The four UN partners have all contributed to a joint basket fund from which the programme is carried out.

UNV is contributing 450,000 USD from the Special Volunteer Fund (SVF) plus in-kind staff time. P4P would also like to make use of the existing UNV networks in the countries that the programme is active in.

UNV Country Office Teams and the UNV volunteers assigned at host agencies that are interested in the subject, and willing to spend some time to support the programme, are welcome to contribute from their side.

Since last year, a national UNV volunteer, Mr. Rajeev Narayan, has been placed at a partner organization in India (an NGO called Centre for Health and Social Justice) and since last week another national UNV volunteer, Mr. Rizwan Latif, has been placed at a partner organization (an NGO called Rozan) in Pakistan.

They are supporting those organizations in their work to prevent GBV and support P4P and me in documenting interventions where volunteering/volunteerism places (or has placed) a significant role in the prevention of GBV.

By turning these best practices into communication products (video, brochures, leaflets etc.) we can share them (online and offline) and advocate for volunteerism as an effective means to prevent GBV.