Afghanaid is a British humanitarian and development organization operating in Afghanistan. In some of Afghanistan’s poorest and most remote communities, Afghanaid has been working with millions of deprived, excluded, and vulnerable families for over forty years. As part of their services, Afghanaid enhances livelihoods, strengthens the rights of women and children, and provides emergency humanitarian assistance to communities.

Women in Samangan tend to depend on community elders and religious leaders to mediate in cases of violence against women and girls (VAWG) in these remote communities an example of the violence is the forced marriage of girls in Afghanistan. During Afghanaid’s field research in Samangan, FGDs were conducted in 549 villages, and it was found that child marriages are relatively common practices and mainly affect girls. In order to solve these issues, it is important that household decision-makers and community leaders are educated about the harmful impacts of forced marriage of girls at a young age. It was also identified that the main factor which increases child marriage in Samangan is the financial relief that a bride dowry provides to poor families.

From June 2002 to December 2022 Afghanaid with the financial support of UN Women launched a project to support women’s empowerment and economic and social well-being, Afghanaid adopts a multi-pronged approach based on the community-based, multi-pronged approach described above. This project targets three key stakeholder groups, acknowledging the multiple barriers to achieving these objectives: organizations at the provincial level, supporters of social justice for the poor and deprived in society, and individual community champions. The target communities include self-help groups (SHGs) and household/community powerholders.

Afghanaid will provide advocacy and EVAWG training to existing provincial-level organizations and individual community champions and connect them to 176 SHGs to enable them to facilitate change more effectively. By targeting pre-existing SHGs initially established to support the livelihoods of vulnerable women, Afghanaid will support them to expand their role to function as community-level women’s groups. As part of this, they will receive training and be connected to a network of provinciallevel organizations, supporters of social justice for the poor and the deprived in society, as well as individual champions within their communities who will serve as resources and safety nets to enable SHG members to assert their basic rights. In addition, the project will cultivate influential supporters in communities who will support EVAWG by engaging community influencers and power-holders within SHG member households.