BACKGROUND

Burundi is one of the poorest countries in the world and has just come out of 13 years of civil war. Buterere community - on the outskirts of the capital city Bujumbura - has 33.500 inhabitants and is one of the poorest communities in Burundi. 

The community is made of various ethnic groups, people displaced during the war and refugees from both national communities and neghbouring countries, HIV/AIDS orphans and children with no family. The number of the people living in this community doubled during the war, leading to the worsen of life conditions and general empoverishment. 

In Buterere 97% of families live below the poverty line, with less than 1 dollar a day. Surveys show that many people are illiterate and have received neither education nor informal training, and that more than half of the households go to bed without food at night. 

A community with very few resources often surviving sifting through rubbish dumps and through prostitution (hence reinforcing the viscious circle of poverty and disease).

ACTION

To start tackle the tragic vicious circle in which this community is livig, ASASS together with the local administration has set up the Buterere Community Development Centre (BCDC).

The project aims at improving the living conditions of the community through the provision of the following services:

Reproductive and sexual health
Pre-natal and neonatal healthcare promotion
Education, capcity building and training
Micro-credit and local development
Buterere Community Development Centre is a resource centre for the community, able to empower people to become active members of the centre and in turn reaching out to those in need.