Action Family Network (AFN) - Nigeria

The Action Family Network (AFN) is a community-based NGO working in Nigeria in the areas of family life, health, and community development. AFN identifies the family as the point of intervention for any sustainable solution. It deals with family-related issues such as nutrition interventions, disease control, prevention of teen pregnancy, reduction of abortion-related deaths, and youth and adult criminality. Objectives of the organisation include:

• to articulate and implement programmes that promote authentic marriage and family values, upholding the rights, dignity, and responsibilities of the family.
• to work to rectify any and all policies or practices (traditional, contemporary, or circumstantial) that may be harmful to the individual dignity, family life, or the well-being of the society.
• to defend and promote the sanctity and inviolability of human life, from conception to natural demise.
• to provide vocational training centres (VTCs) and promote job creation projects that enhance personal and domestic prosperity, such as micro-credit services and small enterprise initiatives to alleviate poverty.

Main Communication Strategies
While AFN designs its programmes around whatever people in the community need, one special emphasis is on the family (both as a nurturing base and as a caring home). For instance, AFN's initiatives tend to be structured around 3 areas of family life (Family Life and Marriage Issues, Family Health & Nutrition, and Family Economy). Programmes include the following:

• Abstinence/fidelity education: "True Love Cares (TLC)" Clubs in schools teach character formation, chaste lifestyles, and academic excellence. Presentations are made to community groups, town unions, and religious parishes.
• Youth clinic: offers adolescent reproductive health and HIV/AIDS information and counseling services.
• Pre-marriage preparation: family life counseling services for couples, as well as family therapy sessions.
• Natural family planning (NFP): courses for couples and groups such as church parishes.
• Crisis pregnancy management: AFN promotes the "culture of life through practical charity." For teenage girls who become pregnant outside of wedlock, the organisation provides accommodation, antenatal care, and maternity services free of charge in affiliate hospitals. The babies are thereafter cared for by grandparents or, in rare cases, put up for adoption.
• HIV/AIDS: advocacy and intervention activities featuring efforts to empower families with culturally-sensitive preventive information and behaviour change models. For those already infected or affected by HIV/AIDS, AFN seeks to motivate and equip the family with necessary capabilities to cope with challenges. Strategies include counseling, advocacy campaigns, and care and support - including home-based care for people living with HIV/AIDS (PLHAs) and people affected by HIV/AIDS (PABAs). Anti-stigmatisation awareness interventions with families, religious groups, and community groups are also conducted.
• Nutrition education/domestic food security: food care practices, exclusive breastfeeding, immunisation outreach for children, child survival education, and motherhood welfare information and care services.
• Domestic healthcare: education, accident prevention, and first aid care for both adults and children. The School Health Programme is an extension of the philosophy that adequate nutrition is critical to the physical, mental, and intellectual well-being of the child and the family.
• Micro credit schemes: set up for rural poor families and groups to alleviate poverty through self-employment, trading activities, and other income-generating initiatives.
• Widow support: especially for AIDS widows and members of marginalised groups.
• Skills acquisition: for women and youth, including vocational training, basic information and communication (ICT) education, dressmaking, and apprenticeship programmes. Entrepreneurial training for school drop-outs is also provided.

Development Issues
Health, Family Planning, HIV/AIDS, Education, Women, Children, Immunisation, Youth, Economic Development, Nutrition.