Going on air in a drought
We are pleased to announce that Simooya Community Radio is now on air on 94.3 FM. The new ...
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]]>Simooya Community Radio, Pemba District
Amplifying Voices partnered with the Chibozu Community Trust, an NGO registered in Zambia and the UK, to set up Simooya Community Radio station which went into its testing phase in April 2024. The station provides education for children and adults, culturally relevant entertainment and dialogue, covering the Pemba district of Southern Zambia and serves a rural population of 81,000 people.
Chibozu Community Trust has employed a station manager and recruited a team of enthusiastic volunteers from Simooya village. The radio team is responsible for engaging community members and local service providers to create content and develop the station as a locally sustainable non-profit community resource.
Context
Simooya Village is rurally located in the Southern Province of Zambia, where high levels of poverty create significant health risks. The nearest town to Simooya is Choma, on the main road from the capital Lusaka. Choma is quite accessible. Simooya and its 12 surrounding villages are not. The majority of people in these villages are subsistence farmers. Due to drought, and increased food prices, families spend around 65% of income on basic food needs.
However, Simooya community members want to change the outsiders' perception that they are too poor to help themselves. Their new radio station aims to equip villagers' own development initiatives, working towards “fullness of life” instead of poverty.
Our Role
Amplifying Voices
- provided studio equipment and support to repurpose unused premises into studios
- facilitated a community consultation and media training workshop
- and is providing ongoing project accompaniment
... to build the station’s long term sustainability by working with staff, board and volunteers to develop their skills in local media production, ongoing community engagement, station management (building partnerships), and volunteer training.
Due to ongoing electricity shortages we are also seeking funding so Simooya Community Radio can install solar equipment to keep the station running during powercuts. The solar will also power the village borehole and the school classrooms.
Station Goals:
- Voices of Simooya (and surrounds) will be amplified.
- People will develop through ...
- Learning new skills
- Learning about agriculture
- Improved productivity and livelihoods
- More specifically ...
- Easy access to news and information (eg announcements, local news)
- School can reach parents more easily - announcements.
- Business will be boosted (advertisements)
- Education for young people
- Opportunities for young people (eg volunteering)
- Inform authorities about disasters.
- Support the work of local churches.
- Entertainment
- Improve people’s health by sharing health advice and announcements.
Key Radio Station Policies
- Information/ News values -
- Be objective – consider all sides
- Be neutral/ impartial – no bias to one side
- Be accurate – verify sources
- Promote peace – don’t stir up hate/ or violent conflict
- Politics - Equal representation to different parties – no favouritism
- Music – 60% local, 40% non-local, including international music
- Culture – Promote progressive local culture -Challenge harmful cultural practice
- Language – mainly in Tonga and some English (other Zambian languages to be included if requested by speaker or audience)
- Religion – All local churches will be included, and will be given slots throughout the week
- Inclusion – actively seek out and partner with minority service providers, e.g. organisations working with blind or deaf people
Recent updates from Zambia
Transforming life in the village
"Radio will help me with my missing animals," a local headman told Johnny when he visited the village ...
A new community radio station for Southern Zambia
There are only a few areas of Southern Zambia that don't have their own radio station. Pemba district ...
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]]>The post Bright Home – Cholistan appeared first on Amplifying Voices.
]]>Roshni-Ro-Ghar (Bright Home)
Our partner, Amplifying Voices Pakistan is working with a Marwari community in the desert region, Cholistan, to create new opportunies for women and young people. New Hope is one of the Bright Home group of projects, integrating community-centred media with vocational skills classes and other off-air activities
Bright Home (Roshni ro Ghar in Marwari) provides vocational classes for women or young people. In partnership with regional health care providers, health camps provide advice, medical checkup and basic medication.
Media training provides women an additional route for building skills, self confidence, and for participating more widely in community life and wider society.
Women and young people from the community use media skills to create audio content that promotes social developments, good health and hygiene, and supports livelihood development. Content is aired via speakerbox and WhatsApp, with a view to providing FM radio content as skills grow.
Background:
Pastor Lazur heard about Roshan Ghar in Sargodha from a WhatsApp group in June 2023 and invited Amplifying Voices Pakistan to help set up a Bright Home project a Marwari village near Rahim Yar Khan, on the the edge of the Cholistan desert.
Bright Home projects aim to build foundations for trust, by creating livelihood opportunities and addressing health concerns before engaging in media.
During earlier projects in we found that media activities can be sensitive. Local power-brokers are suspicious when minority figures suddenly gain prominence. Working primarily with minority Marwari people in a multi-ethnic region, Roshni-ro-Ghar activities encourage participation from across the Hindu, Muslim and Christian communities.
Our Role:
Provide support to Amplifying Voices Pakistan for project planning, including funding proposals and design of participatory community-based research and learning.
Read more about Amplifying Voices Pakistan.
Related Stories:
Opening doors in Sargodha
Transitioning from sewing classes to live radio may seem like an odd route for a project to take. ...
Amplifying with care
Through Bright Home groups, Amplifying Voices Pakistan promotes change at a pace that allows time for long-held cultural ...
From rage to peace
Taking part in a "Bright Home" group helped six sisters to overcome their rage at having “nothing to ...
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]]>The post Hope Village – Morobo appeared first on Amplifying Voices.
]]>Hope Village, Morobo
Communities in South Sudan-Uganda border regions (Yei, Morobo, Lainya) are affected by refugees returning to South Sudan, and through internal migration of cattle herders after several years of flooding making traditional grazing grounds in other states unusable. The internal
migration has led to inter-communal violence and loss of crops.
Amplifying Voices has been invited by South Sudanese partner Community Development Centre (CDC) to support this project with training and equipment.
Objectives:
Support community efforts to improve long-term community stability through peacebuilding and natural resource management.
Our Role
Amplifying Voices
- provided basic studio equipment
- facilitated a community consultation and media training workshop
- and is providing ongoing project accompaniment
So that the Hope Village team can increase impact and engagement through
- MP3 "Speakerboxes" and weekly SD card distribution equip additional listener groups in remote locations most at risk from lack of information, misinformation, or social exclusion.
- partnership with Iyete FM, a community radio station.
- Regular audio programmes designed and produced in Morobo
- Informal content distribution via bluetooth and mobile to mobile transfer.
- Promotes and enables dialogue between settled community groups, returnees and locally-stationed armed forces.
- Also provides possibilities for accessing radio content produced for refugees by other local partners.
Expected Outcomes:
- Prevention of conflict flare-ups due to open and informed discussion of rumours, and due to greater trust and understanding between communities, returnees and armed actors.
- Newly returned refugees are able to access services faster and to feel more at peace in their new surroundings.
- Vulnerable groups within communities build confidence through accessing relevant information in response to voicing concerns
- Health workers and other development experts are more effective because they are welcomed as guests of community rather than seen as imposed opinions.
Recent updates from CDC projects in South Sudan and Uganda
Backpack radio for Gaza
In a matter of weeks from now, we hope to see a much-needed humanitarian radio station going on ...
Tree planting to restore dignity and peace
A tree planting campaign, which took root in radio conversations, quickly grew to become a shared community activity, ...
Amplifying Climate Solutions in Tana River
Today, on World Radio Day 2025, we celebrate the power of radio in addressing climate change. And there’s ...
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]]>The post Bright Home – Sargodha appeared first on Amplifying Voices.
]]>Roshan Ghar (Bright Home)
Our partner, Amplifying Voices Pakistan, is working with community activists in Sargodha district in Punjab province, to create new opportunies for women and young people. New Hope is one of the Bright Home group of projects, integrating community-centred media with vocational skills classes and other off-air activities
Bright Home (Roshan Ghar in Urdu) provides vocational classes for women or young people. In partnership with regional health care providers, health camps provide advice, medical checkup and basic medication.
Some class participants go on to do Media training as an additional route for building skills, self confidence, and for participating more widely in community life and wider society.
Women and young people from the community use media skills to create audio content that promotes social developments, good health and hygiene, and supports livelihood development. Content is aired via speakerbox and WhatsApp. As of 2023, some Roshan Ghar content is also broadcast from a local FM radio station.
Background:
When first invited to Sargodha district to implement a community-centred media project, Amplifying Voices Pakistans started off by listening. They heard women's aspirations for improved education opportunities for women and girls, opportunities for women to use their skills to earn a living, better health services, and better access to clean water and hygiene facilities.
Around this time, the first Bright Home pilot in Nowshera was proving an effective way to engage women and young girls in improving their own future, while engaging sensitively with local power brokers. Media activities are important for building local self-confidence and awareness, but local power-brokers want to see evidence that local concerns and goals are truly respected before they offer their buy-in. Bright Home projects start by creating livelihood opportunities and addressing health concerns to help create foundations for trust.
Our Role:
Provide support to Amplifying Voices Pakistan for project planning, including funding proposals and design of participatory community-based research and learning.
Read about Amplifying Voices Pakistan on their Facebook page.
Related stories:
Opening doors in Sargodha
Transitioning from sewing classes to live radio may seem like an odd route for a project to take. ...
Amplifying with care
Through Bright Home groups, Amplifying Voices Pakistan promotes change at a pace that allows time for long-held cultural ...
From rage to peace
Taking part in a "Bright Home" group helped six sisters to overcome their rage at having “nothing to ...
The post Bright Home – Sargodha appeared first on Amplifying Voices.
]]>The post Bright Home – Nowshera appeared first on Amplifying Voices.
]]>Rokhane-e-Kore (Bright Home)
Our partner, Amplifying Voices Pakistan, is working with local women in Nowshera district, Khyber Pakhtunkwa, to create new opportunies for women and young people. Light of the Dawn (Noor-e-Saher) is one of the Bright Home group of projects, integrating community-centred media with vocational skills classes and other off-air activities.
Bright Home (Rokhan-e-Kore in Pashtu) provides vocational classes for women or young people. In partnership with regional health care providers, health camps provide advice, medical checkup and basic medication.
Some class participants go on to do Media training as an additional route for building skills, self confidence, and for participating more widely in community life and wider society.
Women and young people from the community use media skills to create audio content that promotes social developments, good health and hygiene, and supports livelihood development. Content is aired via speakerbox and WhatsApp. As of 2023, some Rokan-e-kore content is also broadcast from a local FM radio station.
Background:
During community listening in Nowshera district we heard women's aspirations for improved education opportunities for women and girls, opportunities for women to use their skills to earn a living, better health services, and better access to clean water and hygiene facilities.
During earlier projects in Nowshera we found that some activities are more sensitive than others. For example, although media activities are important for building local self-confidence and awareness, local power-brokers want to see evidence that local concerns and goals are truly respected before they offer their buy-in. Bright Home projects start by creating livelihood opportunities and addressing health concerns to help create foundations for trust.
Our Role:
Provide support to Amplifying Voices Pakistan for project planning, including funding proposals and design of participatory community-based research and learning.
Visit the Amplifying Voices Pakistan Facebook page.
Outcome stories:
Amplifying with care
Through Bright Home groups, Amplifying Voices Pakistan promotes change at a pace that allows time for long-held cultural ...
Things no-one talks about
Bright Home (or Rokhan-e-Kore in Pashtu) helps women to create new opportunities for themselves and their families in ...
Listen – then listen again
In a village in Pakistan, we were recently reminded why it is so important to listen, then listen ...
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]]>The post Amplifying Voices in Disaster appeared first on Amplifying Voices.
]]>Amplifying Voices in Disaster - Goal
That community voices play a central role in humanitarian responses, and communities recover quickly from disaster, growing in confidence, capacity, and resilience as they do so.
Amplifying Voices in Disaster - Purpose
So that communities engage in humanitarian responses with effective communication platforms for:
- Talking and listening to each other, re-building local confidence and planning local action in response to the disaster.
- Engaging with humanitarian service providers in a way that puts community voices at the centre of response communication and activity planning.
- Finding ways to cope together, to restore aspects of normality, and to highlight local strengths, good news stories or achievements.
Amplifying Voices in Disaster - Response
Amplifying Voices in Disaster - Preparation
Amplifying Voices in Disaster - Experience
Backpack radio for Gaza
In a matter of weeks from now, we hope to see a much-needed humanitarian radio station going on ...
Read More 
Amplifying Voices in the Pakistan floods
Since June, Pakistan has been devastated by record monsoon rains causing the worst flooding in decades. The provinces ...
Read More 
Responding to Covid19
COVID19 has highlighted the vital role of communication for disseminating health and hygiene advice in a crisis, and ...
Read More 
Responding to Covid-19
Countries around the world are struggling with the Covid-19 pandemic. HCR and our partners are continuing to reach ...
Read More 
Information is a basic need during challenging times
One of my earliest experiences in community centred media took me to Banda Aceh a number of years ...
Read More 
Localising the international response to Coronavirus
In a health crisis, fear can spread faster than a virus, and with that, the potential for hatred ...
Read More 
Buzi bounces back
Empowering Yesterday Cyclone Kenneth made landfall near Pemba in Mozambique, the second cyclone to hit Mozambique this season. ...
Read More 
Disaster Response Radio training in Pakistan
Following the Asia Tsunami and numerous earthquakes in Pakistan, radio broadcasters have come to see the need for ...
Read More Radio MAMA provides emergency information for Carnarvon community affected by Cyclone Olwyn
Tropical Cyclone Olwyn has decimated many banana plantations in Carnarvon, WA (Picture: ABC News, Doriana Mangili) Last Friday ...
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]]>The post Naway Saher – Charsadda appeared first on Amplifying Voices.
]]>In a village near Charsadda, in north west Pakistan, Amplifying Voices Pakistan has trained community volunteers to produce community-centred radio programmes. The programmes tackle issues raised by community members, and encourage everybody to be involved in dialogue. Naway Saher is breaking down barriers between community groups that were traditionally separated by cultural and religious factors. This project, which started in response to floods in 2010, combines on-air and off-air activities to promote health, dialogue and inclusion.
What: Naway Saher, Pashto for ‘New Dawn’ is a Community services group working as CBO for resolving issues and community matters along with having youth mobilizing programme. Naway Saher activities include:
-
FM radio programme which is run by community, produced by the community.
-
New production team of community volunteers (men and women) trained to produce content for FM radio programmes.
-
Youth sport programme started daily in the evening from October 2018.
-
Health service clinic for poor patients with free medicine donated by friends, and mobile motorbike service.
-
Community health slips with minimum charges for medicine and check up.
-
Clean water well for communities
Outcomes: Community members are gathering together to listen to radio
Community members are discussing health hygiene issues they hear on the radio and making changes to practice.
Community members are motivated to be included in creating programming that addresses local issues.
Women and young girls are participating in community health education and in radio production.
Our Role: Facilitation, project design, consultancy, training of community members.
Sorry, we couldn't find any posts. Please try a different search.
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]]>The post Adivasi Voices – Maharashtra appeared first on Amplifying Voices.
]]>Amplifying Voices is partnering with Seva Social Welfare Foundation to tackle poor health and build resilience in indigenous Adivasi communities.
Seva augments their healthcare activities by distributing “speakerboxes” which play audio content stored on update-able memory cards. Based on the community’s own stories, the audio content includes local-dialect dramas, music and talk programmes that educate, inform and entertain.
What:
The Adivasi Voices Project promotes health education in isolated and marginalised communities in Maharashtra state, India, supporting off-air activities such as health camps and community visits, alongside audio content on speakerboxes.
Background:
In remote parts of India’s Maharashtra state Adivasi communities don’t have access to radio, television or mobile phones. Many villagers can’t read and are deprived of basic facilities such as clean water, food, sanitation and healthcare.
Following a baseline survey, a pilot project was launched in two communities in September 2018. This revealed low levels of health and well-being in the community due largely to poor nutrition, water, sanitation and hygiene, as well as harmful superstitious practices. Child marriage and early pregnancy was highly prevalent. Many young people leave their villages after the rice crop has been harvested and bond themselves as farm labourers as they cannot find alternative livelihoods.
An evaluation showed that communities which had received speakerboxes reported changes in personal hygiene practice, better care for mothers giving birth, and improved knowledge about protecting drinking water as a result of listening to the audio content. Since 2019 the project has expanded to reach new villages year-on-year and and a mobile app has been created especially to reach out to bonded labourers from the villages.
Our Role:
Amplifying Voices conducted the initial baseline research and project design and is supporting ongoing monitoring and evaluation, coaching, training and appropriate technology support.
Related Stories:
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In a small tribal community nestled among the foothills of the Western Ghat mountains in Maharastra, Anil Warde ...
Connecting Communities
“When we 'do change' to people they experience it as violence, but when people 'do change' for themselves, ...
The Power of Ubuntu
Having grown up in southern Africa, I am very familiar with the concept of “ubuntu”, which was popularised by ...
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]]>The post Soot Semee – Northern Uganda appeared first on Amplifying Voices.
]]>Misinformation fuels conflict but community engagement fosters trust. Soot Semee is a community-centred media pilot designed by South Sudanese refugees living in resettlement areas in northern Uganda.
The project engages community members in making content and in assessing and tracking rumours. It invites service providers based in these communities to provide information that the community needs.
Amplifying Voices provided basic studio equipment to create weekly audio programmes, facilitated a community consultation and media training workshop, and is providing ongoing project accompaniment.
What: Soot Semee, Juba Arabic for ‘Voice of Compassion’ is a pilot project in Rhino Camp, Omogo extension zone. The pilot is being implemented by our South Sudanese partner Community Development Centre (CDC):
-
Weekly audio programmes designed and produced by South Sudanese refugees living in Omugo and in Arua.
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MP3 Speakers and weekly SD card distribution to those most at risk from lack of information, misinformation, or social exclusion.
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Informal content distribution via bluetooth and mobile to mobile transfer.
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Project designed by community stakeholders during community consultation workshop in Omugo zone in October 2019.
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Will support rumour tracking in via the Hagiga Wahid misinformation management platform (in partnership with CDC and the Sentinel Project).
-
Promotes and enables dialogue between host communities and refugees.
-
Also provides possibilities for accessing radio content produced for refugees by other local partners.
Expected Outcomes: Conflict flare-ups are prevented due to open and informed discussion of rumours, and due to greater trust and understanding between host and refugee communities.
Newly arrived refugees are able to access services faster and to feel more at peace in their new surroundings.
Vulnerable groups within communities build confidence through accessing relevant information in response to voicing concerns
Health workers and other development experts are more effective because they are welcomed as guests of community rather than seen as imposed opinions.
Our Role: Facilitation, project design, equipment provision, consultancy, training of community members.
Recent updates from the Soot Semee project
Connecting people aids trauma recovery
Warning: This article talks about causes of trauma that could be distressing to read. As I start to ...
Soot Semee raises up new leaders
Soot Semee audio programmes are proving instrumental in raising up new community leaders in Omugo Zone, northern Uganda. ...
What does peace look like to you?
Soot Semee (Voice of Compassion) is a peacebuilding project that brings people together through speakerbox podcastsA speakerbox, or ...
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]]>The post Vox Radio, Tana River appeared first on Amplifying Voices.
]]>Vox Radio was formerly known as Amani FM.
In an effort to prevent further violent conflict in eastern Kenya’s Tana River County, Amplifying Voices partnered with the Sentinel Project for Genocide Prevention to set up a peacebuiding radio station to promote peace, health and social development among the communities of the region. The station went to air ahead of the 2017 polls and contributed to a peaceful election process.
What: The key objective of Vox Radio (formerly Amani FM) was to promote peace and tolerance throughout the election process in a region which had experienced inter-tribal violence over many years. Amani is the Swahili word for peace and the concept behind the radio station was inspired by the need to give a voice to the local community, encouraging an open dialogue and an attitude of peace among the communities in the process.
Outcomes: In November 2017, Focus Group Discussions were held with rival Pokomo and Orma groups to understand perceptions of the radio station and its programmes. They revealed that the station is already helping to promote dialogue between different ethnic groups and enhancing attitudes of peace. Listeners enjoyed learning new information about their once united historical past, and sending positive greetings to each other across the airwaves during the elections. For some, it was the only source of trusted information available during the election period. Since the station is the first of its kind in the area, there is a large amount of appreciation for its existence, and generally, patience for the radio team as they have got up to speed with the quality and variety of programming.
Our Role: Provided infrastructure for and installed radio station, facilitated project design, community training, ongoing capacity-building, monitoring and evaluation.
View BBC report about how Amani FM’s partnership with Una Hakika is promoting peace
Click here to return to our projects summary page.
Recent stories from the Vox Radio project
Amplifying Climate Solutions in Tana River
Today, on World Radio Day 2025, we celebrate the power of radio in addressing climate change. And there’s ...
Tana River – a new narrative
"I'm tired of the negative narrative around here, where locals believe they are not good enough," said Nyambura ...
From Drought to Deluge: Vox Radio Becomes A Lifeline
In the wake of the devastating El Niño floods that have been sweeping through Kenya's Tana River County ...
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