TAILORING
TMOF intends to teach widows tailoring skills.
Groups of widows will be provided with additional training for operating a small business, then take a loan for initial expenses and will be provided with sewing machines.
These widows would then start a small business as a team and also partner together for the care of their children.
These would become successful ventures, as these widows will see them selves making a valuable contribution to their community.
The need
There is increasing evidence to show that female-headed house holds face the incidence of poverty much more than the male-headed ones.
A study in Botswana found out that male-headed households had about 2.6 times and 8 times more earning power in the urban areas and rural areas respectively.
This situation places enormous responsibility on women as sole breadwinners and has adverse implications for productivity and income generation at the house hold level and for child survival and development.
Considering that the chances for a widow, more so an AIDS one, to find a spouse - be it part-time, are immeasurably remote, then it is a fore gone conclusion that their situation is bound to be ugly.
Yet more research in Uganda about will writing and succession planning reveals that well as standby guardians (those to whom children are willed prior to parental deaths) are predominantly male, it is women who assume much of the responsibility for orphaned children ultimately.
TMOF found out that the income generating capacity of these households is profoundly constrained by numerous dependent children; lack of opportunity to accumulate productive resources like cattle, goats, and farming implements; and difficulty in getting access to credit.
They are further constrained by limited education and training which limits their employability. TMOF has countered this trend by organizing widows in groups, and then trying to offer them different skills, depending on their own choice and demonstrable ability for sustainability. Some have chosen to learn sewing.
