
South Africa is one of the many countries in which women and girls face immense difficulties. Many lack access to supportive family networks, basic income, and opportunity. Women and girls have always been subjected to structural disadvantages in society, and these have only been made worse by the coronavirus pandemic.
Period poverty is a severe problem which affects thousands of women and girls across the country. As a result of this, women are unable to go to work and girls are forced to stay absent from school. Lack of access to sanitary products may also pose a health risk to many women and girls.
Sanitary products are expensive, and due to the high rate of poverty in our country, thousands of women and girls suffer extensively every month. If you are a woman; just think about how much your monthly supply of sanitary products costs, and if you are not; think about how much the women in your house spend on sanitary products every month. Now imagine spending that much on sanitary products when you earn the minimum wage – or even less – and still have to purchase essentials, like groceries, and pay water and electricity bills.
Ashraful Aid believes that the empowerment of women is of the utmost importance, and it is a priority of our organisation this year. Join us as we strive toward providing women and girls from vulnerable communities with essential sanitary products which will undoubtedly ease the burden of period poverty they are forced to endure, month after month. We aim to raise funds to purchase 10 000 sanitary packs for 2021 which will greatly assist women and girls across the country.
For only R50, sponsor a sanitary pack which contains sanitary pads, a bar of soap, a facecloth, hand sanitiser, wet wipes, a face mask, and underarm roll-on. All of these are essential to the health and wellbeing of these women and girls. Sanitary packs will be distributed to underprivileged women and girls who cannot afford sanitary products every month.
This will be a continuous initiative, and we urge you to donate monthly. Be a part of this and give women and girls opportunities which they have previously been denied. Your donation can be the reason a woman can go into work and make some money for her family, or the reason a girl makes it to school and further her education.