2013-2014: Women's Hope Workshop

Women's Hope is a workshop (workshop and shop) where female former drug users can be trained in various crafts and then sell their products, thus facilitating their dignity and livelihoods.

Project:

The project focuses on preventing relapse among women in Tanzania who have been treated for drug addiction. There are many reasons for relapse, but conversations with the women and experiences from the environment on Zanzibar indicate that it is often a lack of opportunities after treatment that leads the women back to active drug abuse. Furthermore, many of the women have children, and without income or support from their families, they have little opportunity to establish themselves. As a result, women often return to the environment in which their addiction developed and thus return to active drug use. The workshop allows women to start a new life gradually. It serves as an aftercare project to support the women's reintegration into society. The workshop consists of a workshop and a shop located in Stone Town, Zanzibar, Tanzania.

By having both a workshop and a shop, the women can acquire new skills and sell the products they make in the shop. In this way, the women gain success experiences, new skills and a more stable economic livelihood. The workshop is run by the women themselves.

Status:

The workshop has been active from July 2013, when it was established, to January 2015, when it was put on stand-by. It is still on stand-by as the existing residential treatment center for women in Zanzibar is not functioning optimally and thus there is no basis for an aftercare project. The plan is to reopen the workshop after the treatment center is established and there is again a need for an aftercare project and relapse prevention.