Change Starts at Home is Equal Access' flagship project challenging gender norms and identities amongst couples in Nepal. As a thought leader within our industry, Equal Access' ultimate aim of the project is to reduce interpersonal violence between couples and increase community support for violence free relationships.
Intimate partner violence (IPV) is a significant public health issue that affects 1 in 3 women globally and approximately 32% of Nepali women in their lifetime and yet little is still know about what kind of interventions work to prevent IPV. Change Starts at Home was created to address this.
Our program aims to: 1) helping couples and families to work towards better mutual understanding and respect by learning how to communicate with each other 2) stopping violence against women in Nepal, by helping couples to find a more equal balance of power in their relationship 3) helping communities better support women who are experiencing violence 4) using the radio and peer to peer discussion groups to break the silence on marital rape and violence against women in the home.
Whilst the project's main objective is to give married couples the knowledge, skills and space to safely address power imbalances in their relationships, the impact is reinforced by activities that aim to bring couples and their family members and community leaders together in a movement to change social attitudes and practices towards girls and women in Nepal.
This project has provided additional documentation in a PDF file (projdoc.pdf).
