Virtual Tours Burkina Faso

Is a picture worth a thousand words? Decide for yourself. Visit our photo gallery--and meet the amazing women of Burkina Faso. A picture may be the only way to convey the sense of fun and friendship the women experience during their weekly Credit with Education meetings.

Burkina Faso Photo Gallery

Click on any of the images below for a larger view and description. While they're enlarged, you can browse by clicking the "Next" or "Back" arrows or returning to this page to select another image.

 

Burkina Faso, a landlocked West African country, remains one of the poorest. Over 80% of the population lives on $2/day or less.The Burkinabé people live in rural villages like this one, where subsistence farming provides most of the food.Freedom from Hunger Director of Health Initiatives, Dr. Robb Davis, trains local field agents and coordinators on the malaria module.The majority of Burkina’s population lives in rural areas. In these remote locales, women often gather under trees to conduct their weekly Credit with Education meetings in the shade.Women often begin their Credit with Education meetings with a song to express their joy at having been given the opportunity to achieve their dreams of a brighter future for their children.A field agent from our local partner, the RCPB, answers women’s questions about how malaria is contracted.Women form small groups to discuss what they are learning in more depth. Here, a few women review the picture cards they are given as part of the education on preventing and managing malaria. The cards help them recognize the signs of malaria and even ensure proper dosage of the anti-malarial medicines.While their mothers meet, children wait nearby; the youngest are being looked after by the older children.In their weekly meetings, women enjoy each other’s company and enthusiastically participate in learning sessions.Women begin each meeting by repaying their loans and depositing savings as all the members look on and ensure that accounting is done in the open.Pregnant women and their unborn children are particularly vulnerable to the ravages of malaria. One of the first lessons in the malaria modules encourages pregnant women to spend more time under insecticide-treated mosquito nets.For Freedom from Hunger, malaria is a major focus because over a million children in Sub-Saharan Africa die each year due to malaria.A member of a local women’s group shows Freedom from Hunger Trustee Joanne Leslie the group’s savings and loan register.Many women use their loans to operate a small A field agent demonstrates how to re-treat a mosquito net with insecticide to maintain its effectiveness. Hardworking and ready to help themselves, the women of Burkina use their loans to buy goods and resell them at local markets.Some enterprising women bring food to their weekly meetings to sell, hoping others at the meeting will be hungry and want to buy a snack.This woman uses her loan to buy raw millet in bulk. She then grinds it into flour and sells it at her local market to earn money.The need in Burkina Faso is great, but so is the hope. Freedom from Hunger and its local partner, the RCPB, are demonstrating that, with the right combination of services, families cannot only survive, they can thrive.