In 2013 The WDB Group incorporated two sites of the Development Caravan, a program initiated by its sister organization, the South African Women in Dialogue (SAWID), to enhance our non-financial service offerings. WDB adopted the methodology of the SAWID Development Caravan and advanced it to become the WDB Zenzele Development Programme
Zenzele (do it by yourself) creates a bridge between women living in poverty to the services that they are entitled to receive from the public sector and the services they qualify to obtain from the public sector, which they have not reached yet due to lack of knowledge, psychosocial support, and bureaucratic barriers. The work of Zenzele facilitators is to bring the existing services and their rights to their attention and show them the path to obtain them for themselves, thus reinforcing their agency and fostering their self–empowerment. Our process entails an active accompaniment from the point of goal setting to the achievement of the landmarks established in a set period of three years, after which the Zenzele team exits the area.
To become a go-to integrated development model for poverty eradication and protection
To link and support households in under-resourced, rural communities to a range of development services towards productive self reliance in a changing world.
Link poorest households to development resources in order to help them graduate out of poverty.
Mobilize, support and catalyze community self organization.
Develop and strengthen sustainable partnerships and networks
Exit the area and the families once they are able to self manage and sustain themselves.
Social work is a central component of the service delivery model of the Zenzele Program. Its approach to practice has over the years been the Asset Based Community Development (ABCD) approach, which recognizes the ability and potential of individuals and communities to deal with life challenges, including the illusive challenge of addressing poverty.
Zenzele has a solid orientation for locating ourselves in the communities where we serve instead of having our clients visit our offices. Zenzele’s approach to poverty eradication encourages better connections between people and builds a stronger sense of self and community with a four-step strategy:
Using the Poverty Stoplight Tool (PST) the data for the families is gathered with the support of the Development Facilitator.
Families have the opportunity to reflect and analyse their status through the 18 dimensions and 50 indicators.
A Family Development Plan is agreed based on the "red" and "yellow" areas according to the stoplight. A "social contract" is signed with the most needy families
Interventions take place on family and group levels. Tracking of development plans is done in year 2 and in year 3 the exit process starts.
The Zenzele Programme has in its National referents the National strategic plan on gender-based violence and feminicide from the Department of Women, Youth and persons with disabilities of South Africa and, the development Caravan Model of poverty eradication from the South African Women in Dialogue (SAWID).
Zenzele is relevant to some of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The Zenzele programme addresses the following in its strategy to address the problems identified:
Pile village is located in the Limpopo province, Thulamela municipality ward (15) under ward councillor MR Pandelani T.S. It is a rural area which has
On March 07th this year, the leadership team of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (CoGTA) and the executive team of the WDB Group met to
ZENZELE DEVELOPMENT TRUST: OUR EXPERIENCE OF THE ABCD APPROACH TO SOCIAL WORK PRACTICE Anne Letsebe*, Luz Helena Hanauer** Zenzele Development Trust is the development arm
