Binti Project | Africraft

Menstrual Hygiene Management for school girls

Basic menstrual hygiene is a crucial part of a woman’s wellbeing and dignity, which every woman should have the right to have access to.

However, poor menstrual hygiene is still a situation that many girls from low-income families face in Tanzania today. This is mainly due to the lack of accessibility and high costs of pads. As a result of this many schoolgirls’ often do not attend classes on their periods, which has a strong negative impact on their education.

According to Tanzania Water Sanitation Network (TAWASANET) report of 2015, the majority of the school girls miss between 1-3 days of class every month due to the lack of proper facilities for menstrual hygiene. About 63% of school latrines don’t have a place to dispose of sanitary waste, while 38% of school don’t have wash facilities like water. This results in school drop outs, absenteeism and lower academic performance of girls.
Source: Tanzania Water Sanitation Network (TAWASANET) report of 2015

Why is Menstrual Hygiene Management a Problem?

Schoolgirls often do not attend classes during their period, in some areas, girls are locked away by their parents during the period and are not allowed to participate in daily societal life
Girls cannot afford to buy sanitary napkins and often use unhygienic fabrics or banana fibres
Affordable sanitary napkins are not available specifically in the rural area
Disposable sanitary pads are no long-lasting solution for girls from poor families
Disposable sanitary pads are harmful to the environment when not disposed of properly

What we do

Creating awareness on MHM within the local society including local governments, parents, teachers
Educating school girls and boys on stigma-free MHM
Training student ambassadors in promoting MHM at the school level
Training tailoring mamas in the villages in sewing re-usable sanitary napkins
Set up of a long-lasting social marketing system for sanitary napkins at village level
Setting up emergency sanitary napkin dispensing system at the school level
Advocating local governments for increased MHM funding within their annual budgets
Developing adopted promotional material on MHM
Developing a complete set of MHM care including re-usable sanitary napkins, napkin holder, clutch, waterproof bag, soap, MHM instructions, menstrual calendar, recycling pen and panties
Documenting the project activities in the media (TV, print media, social media)
Promoting the BINTI project to partners interested in supporting the project

BINTI sanitary pad kit

BINTI sanitary pad kit provides means of menstrual hygiene to school girls in Tanzania. Girls will no longer miss classes as they feel safe to attend school during their period. Our BINTI sanitary pads are reusable. They are eco-friendly as they do not have to be disposed of after use.

What is inside the kit?

Column 1

Big fabric bag (drawstring bag) in which all the items are put
Small fabric bag (clutch) in which holds five sanitary pads
Big waterproof bag which will be used to put a used sanitary pad when at school
Small waterproof bag with a anti-bacteria soap which can be used after changing the pad
Two panties
An instruction paper on how to use and clean the kit as well as a calendar to track the menstrual cycle

Support Binti project!

AfriCraft Social Projects activities can only be carried out in the future without your support and donations.

As a nonprofit organization (NGO), we have committed ourselves to use all funds and donations only for the realization of our statutory goals. We do not strive to maximize profits, but rather to maximize community engagement and youth empowerment, environmental protection and nature conservation, especially for sustainable development.

For further information please write to us via email at social.projects@africraft.de or the address below.

AfriCraft NGO
P.O BOX 105882,
21 Guinea Rd Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
+255 (0) 759 785 223