Summit 2018 – Hwange Local Board COE
Date: July 12, 2018
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Hwange is a town in Zimbabwe, located in Hwange District, in Matabeleland North Province, in northwestern Zimbabwe, close to the international borders with Botswana and Zambia. It lies approximately 100 kilometres, by road, southeast of Victoria Falls, the nearest large city. The town lies on the railway line from Bulawayo, Zimbabwe’s second-largest city, to Victoria Falls. Hwange sits at an elevation of 770 metres (2,530 ft), above sea level. The town shares borders with Hwange Rural District Council. It is also well known for the Hwange National Park. The council also has a website.
The council has a gender policy that is functional. They also have a number of policies that guide their operations vis-à-vis gender and service provision. Currently, there are 15 councillors (11 male councillors and 4 female). Hwange Local Board has five committees, and two are chaired by women.
In Hwange young people, people with disabilities and women in the community participate mostly in participating freely in consultative meetings, i.e, budget, ward or review meetings. In most consultative meetings, women attendance is usually at par (50%) with men. Hwange has a total workforce of 100, 35% of whom are women. There is only 1 woman in the management team in Hwange Local Board. Despite this, the council, however, has a woman working in the non-traditional area as a Systems Administrator.
Zimbabwe by law prescribes maternity leave thus Hwange provisions for it. There is no paternity leave. The council’s Code of Conduct handles cases of Sexual harassment in the absence of a Sexual Harassment policy in council.
Hwange Local Board allocates a substantial budget to gender-related projects, between 2016 and 2017 as below.
| Category | Budget 2016 | Budget 2017 |
| Resources allocated to gender policy process and action planning | $21 000 | $12 000 |
| Resources allocated to promoting gender equality in decision-making and public participation | $21 000 | $5 900 |
| Resources allocated to promoting gender equality/family friendly/ youth and disability friendly policies and practices | $21 000 | $1 000 |
| Resources allocated to gender-responsive local economic development | – | – |
| Resources allocated to promoting gender/youth/PWD responsive projects on climate change | $648 500 | $378 240 |
| Resources allocated to promoting gender/ youth and disability friendly infrastructure and social development policies and practices | $84 531 | $61 006 |
| Resources allocated to promoting gender/ youth and disability friendly SRHR, HIV and AIDS programmes | $21 000 | $12 547 |
| Resources allocated to ending gender violence | $21 000 | $5 000 |
| Resources allocated to visibility for the Council’s Gender Action Plan | – | – |
| Resources allocated to Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning for the Council’s Gender Action Plan | – | – |
Hwange has local economic development initiatives in which has seen the council offering trading licenses to women, PWD and youth as per request, so that they can legally run their business. Some are employed for casual work by the Council. In addition the Gender Champion had also taken the initiative to offer baking lessons to women in the community so that they gain skills they can use for entrepreneurship.
Click here to read more about Hwange Local Board.
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