GHARP Workplace Initiatives

OCTOBER 2008 — The GHARP Project and its partners recognized that the workplace is often an ideal place for HIV/AIDS education. Particularly within Guyana's mining and logging industry, opportunities exist to reach people with messages about prevention and other key issues.

Workers in Guyana's mining and logging sectors are often mobile men away from their families; this population is considered most at risk of contracting and spreading HIV. From July through September 2008, the GHARP Project supported the training of 40 rangers from the Guyana Forestry Commission in a program implemented in collaboration with two NGO partners, Hope Foundation and Youth Challenge Guyana. The rangers were trained to reach loggers at the loggers' work sites in several regions of Guyana. Interventions were designed to prevent the spread of the disease through education, information, and training and to mitigate its impact through workplace linkages to support, care, and treatment, as well as promotion of voluntary counseling and testing, faithfulness, partner reduction, and correct and consistent condom use. GHARP developed a six-hour curriculum with inputs from the NGO partners and oriented them on its use. The program was highly successful in reaching the targeted populations. 102 workers were reached with prevention messages and 54 chose to be counseled and tested through mobile VCT services at three private companies in the mining and logging sectors. 

As a result of this initiative, miners and loggers in four of GHARP's public/private sector partner workplaces were sensitized and showed great interest in STI prevention and condom use. They also expressed interest in participating in follow-up sessions and being trained as peer educators. Hope Foundation reported that the program was "a great initiative which can result in behavior changes among miners and their social networks." The Forestry Commission added, "We have bonded in a very special way as a result of these interventions and we have taken what we have learned into our homes and communities."

The rapid expansion of private sector and workplace programs in Guyana earned GHARP the position of a national leader in HIV/AIDS workplace program development, implementation, and private sector engagement. Significant work was accomplished with private sector partners, including the development of workplace policies and a workplace education program. This has resulted in a region-wide demand from Caribbean countries for collaboration and support in the development of their own workplace/private sector programs. It is estimated that private sector partners reached well over 20,000 employees and an additional 60,000 families and members of local communities. In addition, the Guyana Business Coalition (GBC) on HIV/AIDS was formed. Developed from the USAID/GHARP Private Sector Advisory Board, the coalition comprises CEOs and human resource managers of partner organizations and is the largest coalition of its kind in the region. The GBC has been invited to represent the interests of the Global Business Coalition in the Caribbean.

PHOTO: Volunteers participated in a Workplace Focal Persons Training hosted by GHARP, to become supporters and implementors of HIV/AIDS workplace policies (FHI/Guyana).