Preventing Gender-based Violence in South Sudan

IsraAID’s unwavering support for communities facing protracted humanitarian crisis in South Sudan recently advanced to a transformative new platform, as we launched a new digital solution to accelerate our support for women and girls facing gender-based violence (GBV). GBV impacts two-thirds of women and girls in South Sudan and is especially prevalent in the country’s crowded internally displaced persons (IDP) camps.

AnenaSawa is a WhatsApp bot that drives faster, more targeted support for GBV survivors. It is the latest addition to our diverse toolkit: IsraAID has partnered with IDP populations in South Sudan to build community-led GBV prevention and response mechanisms for more than 13 years.

Every day AnenaSawa is used by dozens of community outreach workers. Outreach workers are IDP women themselves, and they have been trained in IsraAID’s methodologies to support women and girls facing a variety of challenging situations. When outreach workers meet GBV survivors, they refer them to our case managers, who follow up 1:1 to help them access psychosocial, medical, legal, and security support.

As our outreach workers are broad protection experts rather than GBV specialists, AnenaSawa’s guiding questions help them recognize GBV cases more easily. It also prompts them to provide the most suitable initial support, befitting the type of GBV disclosed and each survivor’s personal circumstances. By augmenting the outreach workers’ knowledge with this technology, more cases are being identified, and more vulnerable women and girls are receiving truly tailored support.

AnenaSawa completes a digital referral of every identified GBV case. These are faster and more accurate than the handwritten forms we used previously, so case managers can provide detailed, relevant guidance sooner. Digital data helps protect survivors’ privacy, reducing a major risk in a society where they could otherwise face severe stigma. It is also environmentally friendly and more cost-effective, helping us focus our resources on what matters most.

Alongside immediate transformations in the pace and quality of support for survivors, AnenaSawa will enrich IsraAID’s long-term prevention programs. As we build comprehensive digital records, we can analyze complex data more easily and integrate the findings into program development. For example, we can track the most common types of GBV and target future prevention initiatives directly to these.

With AnenaSawa already making significant impact in its first few months in South Sudan, we are excited to keep strengthening the support we offer to GBV survivors. We also hope to explore adaptations to other humanitarian settings in the future.

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