Joint Field Visit | Gwembe District, Zambia | 27–29 November 2024
Conferences set the agenda. Field visits test it. The case of Gwembe field visit.
After months of training, partner meetings, and regional events, SAFOD and its partners went to Gwembe District in Zambia. They wanted to see what the DiDRR project looks like in practice. They looked at wards, gardens and self-help groups, where change either happens or it does not.
Who Joined the Gwembe Field Visit?
The three-day visit brought together SAFOD, FODPZ, ZAFOD, REPSSI, ADRA and CBM. Government joined too. Officials from the Disaster Management and Mitigation Unit (DMMU) and the Department of Social Welfare took part. Local ward leaders joined throughout.
That mix matters. Partners, funders and officials saw the same reality side by side. No report can build that shared view.
Day One: Meeting the District Authorities
The team began with a courtesy visit to the District Commissioner and the DMMU coordinator in Gwembe Plateau. This is standard practice, and it counts. Buy-in from local government decides whether community work lasts beyond a project cycle.
Days Two and Three: Inside the Communities
The team visited demonstration plots, self-help groups and satellite committee members. They covered three areas: Plateau, Sinafala Ward (Mandonda Zone) and Bbondo Ward.
What they found was encouraging:
- Disaster risk committees in all three wards include persons with disabilities.
- Demonstration plots, small farms built for food security and resilience, are working.
- Persons with disabilities are not only beneficiaries. They practise backyard gardening at home and apply what they have learned.
That is a shift in agency. It is what the DiDRR project aims to produce.
What the Gwembe Field Visit Showed
Writing disability inclusion into a project plan is one thing. Finding it at work in a rural ward is another.
These communities are not waiting for policy to change. They are building resilience now, with the knowledge and tools the project helped provide.
A Shared Reference Point for Partners
The visit also gave partners a common picture. When they return to their offices and meetings, they carry what they saw. They saw people with disabilities at the centre of community disaster planning, not at the margins.
That is the measure of progress that matters most.
From the Gwembe Field Visit to the Global Stage
The evidence from Gwembe has travelled. Read how SAFOD took it to the Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction in Geneva. See the earlier advocacy training for OPDs and the partner meeting in Johannesburg. The 2026 DiDRR regional meeting planned the next phase. For the wider policy context, see the Sendai Framework.