Updated for 2015, this social media toolkit has sample messages, blog ideas, and resources to help celebrants and handwashing champions spread the word about the annual Global Handwashing Day (15 October).
Ebola Communication Preparedness Implementation Kit (I-Kit) (HC3, 2015)
This Ebola Communication Preparedness Implementation Kit (I-Kit) provides national and local stakeholders, as well as program managers, with key considerations and a roadmap for instituting and implementing critical, relevant, practical and timely communication for responding to the threat of an Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) outbreak. The I-Kit guides countries in social and behaviourr change communication (SBCC) and risk communication activity planning, including communication plan development for every stage of an Ebola response.
Communicating with children: using an integrated approach [hand-washing in Indonesia] (UNICEF 2011)
In their 2011 publication, ‘Communicating with children’, UNICEF consider how children process and experience learning, using the example of their ‘Let’s Wash Hands’ poster.
“The poster “Let’s Wash Hands” was developed for school-aged children during a capacity-building workshop on holistic child development in Indonesia.The group chose a girl to be the model for a photo-based poster; broke down steps for a correct hand-washing sequence (wet, soap, scrub well, rinse); used a catchy rhyme with each photo; and finished with the girl proudly holding out her clean hands. Supplementary activities included adapting the rhyme to a song to be sung at school or at home when washing hands.The poster integrated hygiene, early learning through rhyme and building self-confidence, especially of girls. It can be used as a model to teach a variety of skills to children as well as adults.”
For more details visit: http://www2.unicef.org:60090/cwc/cwc_58608.html
Increasing Access to Balanced and Objective Reporting: BBC World Service Great Lakes Lifeline Service
In response to the conflict in Rwanda and the Great Lakes region, the BBC World Service established its Lifeline Service in 1994, broadcasting news and factual material from the United Kingdom gathered by its locally situated reporters in Rwanda, Burundi and the Great Lakes region.
The service, which is currently being supported by DFID, has a mixed format that comprises news, sports, human rights issues, tracing messages, music and a drama produced in Kigali by the NGO Health Unlimited.
The service was commenced in light of the clear need within the region for fair and accurate news and factual broadcasting.
Biased local broadcasters have been widely implicated in the genocide of the Tutsi that occurred in Rwanda, with the Hutu- run Radio-télévision libre des mille collines (RTLM) being particularly active.
To counter hate radio of this kind funding is increasingly being channelled towards media activities that promote free, fair and accurate reporting. Many such interventions are international in scope due to the absence of suitable partner organisations in country.
However, since it does not rely upon local broadcasting partners, the BBC is able to exercise its policy of impartiality effectively with little or no interference from external sources. The quality of its news is high.
Despite this, there are concerns associated with this type of international media response to conflict because little local capacity tends to be built through such interventions and they are generally not sustainable in the long term.[1]
[1] DFID’s ‘Working with the Media in Conflicts and other Emergencies’ 2000
Multi-Media Response to Colombia Earthquake
Following the earthquake that hit the Colombian town of Armenia in January 1999, a local NGO, Viva la Ciudadanía, has started a multi-media project to aid the reconstruction, involving radio, TV and newspapers. A model that is earmarked for peacebuilding as well.
Radio is the major component with news and magazine programming, plus a soap opera called Los Nuevos Vecinos (Our New Neighbours). The soap’s writers are a creative group of five people living in the camps or temporary housing. Focus groups are being created in different parts of the affected area to discuss what needs to be said by the characters in the soap opera. The actors are also people of the affected community.
In addition, there are community correspondents who have been trained in radio and writing workshops so they can provide copy for the radio magazine and the newspaper. These correspondents are drawn from a wide range of society – youth groups, senior citizens’ clubs and community leaders.
Phone-ins encourage listeners to comment on what they have heard. The project was started to counter the lack of information about the reconstruction process, with the national media concentrating only in corruption and other dramatic events.
The project organisers have succeeded on enlisting commercial and community radio’s co-operation in broadcasting the programmes at the same time, so the entire affected area is being reached. The plan is to use this project as a model for the peace-building process elsewhere in the country.[1]
For more information see: http://viva.org.co/
[1] DFID ‘Working with the Media in Conflicts and other Emergencies’ 2000 http://reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/C8ECCFBA7563F7F4C1256D570049D0B4-DID-mediaandconflict-aug02.pdf