CROSS-CUTTING

Gender Equality, Disability & Social Inclusion

KTF’s Commitment

Kokoda Track Foundation (KTF) recognises that equality of women and girls and the inclusion of people with disabilities are fundamental human rights, and necessary for a safe and prosperous community.

KTF is committed to development in line with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Here, the SDGS indicate that:

• Goal 5 – Achieve Gender Equality and Empower all Women and Girls: Women and girls, everywhere, must have equal rights and opportunity, to be able to live free of violence and discrimination. 

• And that disability is an internationally agreed development goal with the focus on inclusion and equal opportunities. Social inclusion calls for equal opportunities to be promoted to all, regardless of ability, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, stature, race and ethnicity, facilitating participation in society for those disadvantaged by their identity.

Therefore, it is critical to address gender inequality and discrimination of people with disabilities directly in our programming. We aim to remove barriers to participation and achieve equal opportunity and equitable outcomes for all in order to empower, build capacity and ensure the sustainability of programs, projects and outcomes.

KTF Adopts a Twin-Track Approach

KTF’s approach to Gender Equality and Disability and Social Inclusion is shaped by our cross-cutting policies and embedded throughout the operations, programming and working directly with Papua New Guineans. KTF implements concurrent activities that include gender-specific initiatives targeted at women and girls and initiatives targeting people with disabilities, as well as mainstreaming initiatives ensuring that all development programmes are inclusive of all genders and people with disabilities. KTF’s Project Zero and KTF’s Kicks for Kokoda, both are aiming to advance gender equality, disability and social inclusion principles through a significant twin-track approach. 

Project Outcomes

KTF are proud of our programming outcomes, reflective of the promotion of equitable inclusion for women, girls and people with disabilities:

Education

All FODE College Data:

Data comparison of enrolment between female/male bridging gender equity

• 2021: 49% Female (397) / 53% Male (415)

• 2022: 53% Female (438) / 47% Male (393)

• 2023: 50% Female (667) / 50% Male (670)

Students with disabilities across the FODE Colleges continues to increase every year. In 2019, we started with 19 students with disabilities representing 8% of the total FODE student body. Whilst in 2023, 186 students with disabilities were enrolled across all FODE Colleges, representing 14% of the total FODE student body.

Onto successful pathways post-graduation:

• In 2021:

  • Onto successful pathways into Education - 32% of students with disabilities

  • Onto successful pathways into Health – 28% of students with disabilities 

• In 2022:

  • Onto successful pathways into Education - 12% of students with disabilities

  • Onto successful pathways into Health – 18% of students with disabilities 

Kokoda FODE College - In 2023, record number of students with disabilities (13) enrolled, highlighting the invaluable partnership with Oro Disable Foundation. 

Balimo College – embeds inclusive teaching education into their modules to provide practical learning for students around disability inclusion for children.

Light for Learning aims to achieve gender parity in the recruitment of Solar Champions. Since the project inception, Light for Learning has recruited a total of 10 women and men with disabilities as Solar Champions, showing the community that people with disabilities deserve the opportunity.

Health

As of September 2023, Healthy Communities achieved gender parity for our team of Health Workers. KTF is proud of this significant achievement, given the safety consideration of female staff in rural and remote villages where Aid Posts operate. 

Healthy Communities - Number of pregnant women accessing prenatal and postnatal clinics

• 2021: 126

• 2022: 374

• 70% of pregnant women seeking a supervised birth from a qualified health professional; increases with longevity of Community Health Worker postings and familiarity with community

Healthy Communities partners with 4Eyes for KTF’s Eye See PNG initiative to deliver innovative vision testing services for remote and rural PNG and specialised training for health workers. 

Kicks for Kokoda over three years (2021-2023):

• Trained Coaches delivering the program with efforts for gender parity: 

  • 31 female coaches

  • 25 male coaches

• Achieved gender equity and inclusion through adolescent participants:

  • 407 female participants

  • 367 male participants 

  • 4 youth with disabilities participating (2 female, 2 male)

From Kicks for Kokoda - SKILLZ intervention:

The project has had a significant impact on adolescents’ knowledge and behaviours, with the following outcomes reported by participants:

• Improved ability to communicate effectively with the opposite sex

• Improved self-efficacy, and ability to make responsible decisions regarding sexual and reproductive health and alcohol and violence

• Changed attitudes towards gender norms

• Improved capacity to access support services and discuss contraceptives, STIs and HIV

Equality

Since 2020, Project Zero has:

• Supported 100+ survivors of FSV at Oro Province’s only Safe House, primarily women and children survivors by providing support for repatriation, legal services, health and medical services, counselling, police and rescue interventions, and safe house care services, including food and accommodation

• Assisted 100+ Community Leaders in undertaking FSV referral pathways training, empowering them as community advocates

• Reached over 6000+ people through FSV and GBV awareness

• Delivered the first-of-its-kind Basic Counselling Course to 24 eager participants dedicated to supporting survivors of violence

• Established and supported the operations of Oro Province’s first two safe houses for survivors of GBV and FSV.

From 2019-2022, Strongim Meri Bisnis project had:

• 400+ women participating, undertaking small business and literacy training and technical skills training in the production of Pawa packs, face masks and solar-based businesses.

• Production and sales of over 10,000 reusable face masks for income generation for women's groups during COVID-19 pandemic Production and sales of over 400 reusable sanitary packs for women and girls

Leadership

Archer Leaders Program finds and fosters the next generation of PNG leaders, at its 13th year (as of 2023) with an objective for gender parity and actively including people with disabilities. Representation of women and people with disabilities is imperative to achieving social inclusion and ensuring their voices are heard.  

Advocacy

Advocacy is integrated throughout KTF; advocating for the rights of women, girls and people with disabilities within project activities, partners and community. Recent advocacy achievements: 

• Continuously engaging with National and Provincial Government for the recognition of women, girls and people with disabilities in PNG across various spheres of society.

• Gender, Disability and Social Inclusion is incorporated into our partner capacity plans and KTF seeks to work with partners to strengthen inclusive approaches in policies, procedures, governance, operations and monitoring and evaluation.

• KTF continues to produce knowledge creation and tools for staff and partners to transform discourse on gender equality, disability and social inclusion.

• Recent submission to Papua New Guinea’s Permanent Parliamentary Committee on Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment (June 2023).

• Recent submission to the Australian Government for their new International Gender Equality Strategy to ensure the voices of Papua New Guineans are captured.

GEDSI in our News