The Home Based Care Alliance (HBCA) is a bottom-up federation of grassroots home-based caregivers across Africa. These caregivers are primarily taking care of people living with and affected by HIV and AIDS. They also care for people with other chronic illnesses, the aged and others in their communities who are in need. Although home-based care is vital, life-giving service in communities, most formal health systems, governments and donors do not recognize caregiving for how important it is, and do not include caregivers or their work in their decision-making or resource allocation. So caregivers, most of whom are women, should this burden alone.
The purpose of the Alliance is for home-based caregivers to come together, better coordinate their work, and advocate for recognition, inclusion in formal decision-making structures, and for resources to support their contributions. The work of the Alliance happens locally, nationally and globally. The Alliance members and leaders are grassroots caregivers themselves. NGO staff are principled partners and provide technical support when it is needed.
The Huairou Commission and its member networks are working to support home-based caregivers’ organizing, by strengthening their capacities to negotiate and represent themselves as a group, bridging them to key partners, and supporting their ability to articulate their concerns and recommendations in international meetings & policy events.
The mission of the Huairou Commission is to forge strategic partnerships for advancing the capacities of grassroots women worldwide to strengthen and create sustainable communities.
The Huairou Commission:
- Supports and validates grassroots women’s contributions to development
- Promotes tools and methodologies for peer learning and bottom-up research and negotiation processes among grassroots women and international development practitioners.
The Huairou Commission AIDS Campaign’s main focus is to grow and support the GROOTS Africa Home Based Care Alliance. The goals of the HBC Alliance are:
- To valorize the currently unrecognized contributions of home-based caregivers
- To shift resources and decision-making power to these providing a major unpaid response to HIV/AIDS at the local level
- To form a broad network for peer learning
- To serve as a platform for advocacy and negotiation with government, donors and other decision-makers in the field of AIDS
- To serve as a platform for the creation of collective livelihoods
Find out more about the Huairou Commission
GROOTS operates as a network which links leaders and groups in poor rural and urban areas in the South and the North.GROOTS members exchange practices and develop advocacy around four thematic programs: Governance, HIV andGROOTS members exchange practices and develop advocacy around four thematic programs: AIDS, Caring Community Development and Community Resilience and Recovery.
Grassroots groups and their partners share a commitment to four basic goals:
- To strengthen women’s participation in the development of communities and the approaches to problem solving.
- To help urban and rural grassroots women’s groups identify and share their successful development approaches and methods globally.
- To focus international attention on grassroots women’s needs and capabilities.
- To increase the opportunities for local women’s groups and leaders to network directly across national boundaries
GROOTS International consists of 20 community leaders who support grassroots organization, providing an arena to share resources, information and experience, and collectively consolidating and forging grassroots women’s presence and perspective on a range of issues and topics.
Learn more about Groots International
Huairou Commission and GROOTS international are currently working with Home-Based Care Groups in 14 nations: Benin, Cambodia, Cameroon, Ghana, Honduras, Kenya, Malawi, Namibia, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, UGanda, Zimbabwe, Zambia
