ACHIEVMENTS

As many as 175,000 girls may have been spared FGM in our region to date. FGM has been dramatically reduced – not just by fiat or by laws, but by the consent of communities that have learned the reasons these customary practices are harmful. KMG conducted a baseline survey in 1999, which showed that almost all female teenagers were cut before marriage. Today, FGM has been reduced by 97-98% in Kembatta and Tembaro Zone. Only 2-3% elders say they want their daughters to be cut and their sons to marry cut girls, according to the study. Today, FGM has been virtually eliminated in many communities.

KMG established a new cultural celebration- - Whole Body, Healthy Life- Freedom from Female Genital Mutilation, replacing the old rituals that used to be celebrated during the rites of passage when the girls are mutilated. The Whole Body festival now annually celebrates the courageous uncut girls, the young men who marry them, their mothers, and the communities who have accepted them. 

For the first time, in the history of the struggle to stop FGM, KMG has developed a systemic, multistage approach to the elimination of FGM, which can be used anywhere, where there are such practices.

KMG, with support of UNDP piloted a social mobilization tool against HIV/AIDS called Community Capacity Enhancement-Community Conversation (CCE-CC). KMG developed the change indicators and the first working manual for CCE-CC training.  In 2004, the National government adopted the methodologies and launched them nationally. KMG was contracted to train all HIV/AIDS Prevention and Control Offices in all the regions, for a year. Currently, CCE-CC is a single major tool used for prevention and control of the disease in the country.

When KMG began its work, AIDS was considered a “sinners’ disease.” Today, in KMG’s operating region, both Christian and Moslem institutions find it unacceptable for young couples to marry without tests for HIV/AIDS. Each woreda has established care support organizations to assist people living with the virus, to mitigate new infections, and reduce fear, stigma, and discrimination.

Women trained and supported in electoral process have assumed political leadership at all levels. Women, by and large, are aware of their rights. They own, inherit and manage property in the zone.

Strategic interventions developed by KMG have educated and mobilized communities on environmentally sound practices: rehabilitating natural resources that have been abused; introducing fuel-saving stoves, and alternative energy sources such as biogas and new building materials.

Fugas’ (historically marginalized artisans) lives are changing. Today they are regaining human entitlements, including human dignity.

KMG is increasingly being recognized nationally and internationally. Among its eleven major recognitions are: The North-South Award of the Council of Europe in 2005; the Jonathan Mann Health and Human Rights Award at the Global Health Council in Washington DC, USA, 2007; France's Chevalier de la Legion d’Honneur in 2007; The Larissa Award - Pan African Award at the African Child Policy Forum in 2007, Kembatta Temro Malmat Mahiber, September in 2007.