Nafissatou Diop - Co-ordinator, UNFPA-UNICEF Joint Programme on FGM/C - DFID Girl Summit 2014

"The process of female genital mutilation/cutting is not respecting borders but is following ethnicity." Nafissatou Diop

Panel Discussion: Spotlight on Progress - "Prevention and Safeguarding: Protecting Those at Risk"

Context:  This presentation is from one of the 14 "Spotlights on Progress" video-recorded sessions from the Girl Summit 2014, London, United Kingdom (UK). The sessions were organised to share best practice between practitioners, grassroots activists, and government ministers across the issues of female genital mutilation (FGM) or FGM/C (female genital mutilation/cutting) and child, early, and forced marriage (CEFM). Girl Summit is a project of the Department for International Development (DFID), UK.

Profile of speaker: A featured panelist of this Spotlight session was Nafissatou Diop Co-ordinator, United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA)-United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) Joint Programme on FGM/C, Accelerating Change, presenting "Service delivery for prevention, protection and response to FGM, Africa." From the Huffington Post: "Before joining UNFPA, Dr. Diop conducted several research operations to test and evaluate programs addressing Female Genital Mutilation, such as the Tostan Community Empowerment Program in Senegal and its replication in Burkina Faso, the impact of the law in Burkina Faso, the Conversion of Excisors in Mali, and the Effectiveness of Using Health Providers in the FGM campaign. In 2006-07, she led the qualitative study of the Long-Term Evaluation of the Tostan Program [See Related Summaries below] in Senegal, which provided important evidence for the validity of the holistic social change approach being supported by the UNFPA-UNICEF Joint Program on FGM/C. Beyond the issue of FGM/C, Dr. Diop has directed and managed initiatives to improve community access to quality reproductive health, including Family Planning, Youth, Post Abortion Care and HIV/AIDS services in West Africa."

Strategy overview: The UNFPA-UNICEF Joint Programme on female genital mutilation/cutting (FGM/C): "Accelerating Change", beginning in 2007, to promote the abandonment of FGM/C, initially included 17 countries in West and East Africa and North Africa with the recent addition of Yemen and Nigeria. In 2014, an evaluation was completed showing how the programme is accelerating change in those 17 countries towards the goal of abandonment of FGM/C within one generation. The work is guided by 20 years of research and by fieldwork experience of non-governmental organisations, based on the social norm perspective. The programme is recategorising FGM from a traditional practice to a harmful practice and bringing education to communities while creating space for dialogue and debate among different forces within the community, including the young people themselves, in order to move the way the practice is viewed. This is a basis for acting collectively, including public declarations, so that people begin to question the practice, look at the health evidence, and begin to declare their opposition to the practice very publicly. As a result of the Accelerating Change programme, about 10 million people, through their communities, have declared abandonment of the practice of FGM. The programme, in turn, is monitoring the pledging communities to see if their declaration is followed by abandoning the practice. For example, in Kenya, the council of the elders consists of gatekeepers who have publicly declared and are reminding communities of the commitment to follow through. In another model, from Sudan, the family of a newborn girl and those involved in the delivery go through counselling to learn how to protect the girl and to keep her from being cut as part of the Born Saleema campaign. In Burkina Faso, for girls who have already been cut, there is an attempt to involve the police, whose presence in the communities as investigators sends a message on the importance of protecting girls.

In addition, there is a process of sharing results of practices among the countries engaged in joint campaigning so that they can find the most successful models. As stated in the Summit summary notes: "While strategically leveraging social dynamics in favour of abandonment, the UNFPA-UNICEF Joint Programme provides a solid framework for reaching both rights holders and duty bearers - maintaining focus on girls and women, while engaging Governments, civil society and other parties that have the responsibility to eliminate FGM/C. Ensuring prevention, protection and care for girls and women, recognizing their potential, and empowering their aspirations is fundamental. Also at the core of the Programme is a social norms perspective, therefore its major focus is to revisit the core values of cultures and re-write the script about how those values are expressed in practice. FGM/C is thus re-categorized from cultural tradition to harmful practice that does not correspond to the culture’s core value of protection and wellbeing for daughters. Educational activities on human rights and health, community dialogues, inter-community exchanges and facilitating public declarations are key elements. Evaluation confirmed that the Joint Programme has stimulated an acceleration of change at the community, national, regional and global levels."

Examples include:

• In the Miru Community in Kenya, "the elders have decided that FGM is a harmful practice, and traditional social surveillance mechanisms act to make pledges a reality."
• UNFPA has  launched an e-Learning module to teach midwives about the harms of FGM and to strengthen their ability to serve as champions for change.
• Click here for the 2012 programme report, "UNFPA-UNICEF Joint Programme on Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting: Annual Report 2012".
• According to the Summit document "One Year On: Highlights of Government Progress since the Girl Summit towards the Elimination Female Genital Mutilation and Child and Forced Marriage" [PDF], the "UNFPA has successfully advocated for the inclusion of a target and related indicator on harmful practices, including children marriage, in the proposed sustainable Development Goals."

Overview of this Summit Session: From the Girl Summit summary document: "This spotlight explores what can be done to safeguard girls who are at risk of child, early and forced marriage or FGM, or who have already undergone one of these practices. Focusing on the roles that both communities and agencies can play, it showcases examples of programmes, tools and partnerships which can be used to help protect girls in a range of different contexts.

The session was opened by Marta Santos Pais, UN Special Representative for the Secretary General on Violence against Children.

The speakers, in order of appearance, are:
Stella Nkrumah-Ababio West Africa Region Child Protection Advisor, World Vision - Child protection initiatives, Sierra Leone, with insights from Nepal
Dr Emma McLaren Joint Head, Forced Marriage Unit, Home Office and Foreign and Commonwealth Office - The Forced Marriage Unit, Government of the United Kingdom
Anne-Marie Hutchinson OBE Partner, Dawson Cornwell - Force Marriage Civil Protection Orders, UK
Nafissatou Diop Co-ordinator, UNFPA-UNICEF Joint Programme on FGM/C - Service delivery for prevention, protection and response to FGM, Africa
Keith Niven Detective Chief Superintendent, Metropolitan Police, London - Operation Limelight/Community Engagement FGM Conference, UK

The session is moderated by Ikenna Azuike, the founder of What's Up Africa, a provocative, entertaining internet programme about African news, initiatives and people."

Footage of this (available below) and other "Spotlights" are available on DFID’s YouTube channel.

The Girl Summit is a project of DFID. Click here and scroll down to see the full list of individuals and organisations committed to working on girls' issues, as well as a list of Girl Summit Charter signatories.