Turudi Shule – Empowering Girls against Jaboya
When the men land their catch at Lake Victoria, women are ready to buy fish for the local market. Since the competition for the catch is tough, it is common for women to pay with sexual services to the fishermen.
In Luo language, this life-threatening practice, that women pay with sex for fish, is called “Jaboya”. Often, young girls at school age contribute to the family’s income base by offering sex as a payment for the catch. However, the risk of pregnancy and being infected with HIV is huge. In fact, the areas along Lake Victoria have the largest prevalence of HIV in Kenya. When school girls get pregnant, the law tells them to stop going to school.
Competition between women in the markets has also become harder in recent years. Climate change, overfishing and increasing population pressure have led to a decline in fish stocks.
“Turudi Shule – Empowering girls against Jaboya”, based on two fishing landing sites, will try to break the evil spiral. Through local change agents and NGOs, the project will contribute to the implementation of attitude-changing anti-Jaboya campaigns, and at the same time exposed girls will be set on track back to either school or job training.
Victoria Institute for Research on Environment and Development, (VIRED) is the partner responsible for the implementation of the project.
Project begins: July 1, 2019
Project ends: July 1, 2022
Project funded by: Danmarksindsamlingen
Project budget: DKK 1,71 mill.
Project documents
Turudi_Shule_Final_VE.pdf
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