Burkina Faso: Community education program scaled-up in Burkina Faso

The government of Burkina Faso is committed to the improvement of women’s reproductive health. Within this context, the Population Council’s FRONTIERS Program collaborated with two nongovernmental organizations, Tostan in Senegal and Mwangaza Action in Burkina Faso, to replicate the Tostan community-based education program. Originally developed in Senegal, this program provides modules in local languages on hygiene, problem solving, women’s health, and human rights as a means of promoting community empowerment to facilitate social change. The intervention, implemented from 2000 to 2003 in the provinces of Bazega and Zoundwéogo in Burkina Faso, compared the performance of 23 participating villages with 23 control villages. To measure the program’s impact on awareness, attitudes, and behavior regarding reproductive health and female genital cutting, researchers conducted pre- and post-intervention surveys of women and men in the intervention and control areas, and qualitative interviews with key community members. To measure the diffusion of knowledge, researchers surveyed men and women who lived in the intervention area but did not participate in the study. They also assessed pre-and post-intervention changes in the number of girls under 10 who had been cut.