Summary of publication

The Australian aid program provided core support to the national program of the Vanuatu Women's
Centre (VWC) for 4 years from July 2012 to June 2016. The program goal was to eliminate violence
against women and children (VAWC) throughout Vanuatu (VWC's organisational goal).

There is robust and abundant evidence from qualitative data that VWC has empowered women and
children to claim their rights and access justice. More women are seeking to claim their other rights
such as for maintenance and custody, counselling has assisted some women to become more aware
of the skills and capacity that they can draw on to be financially independent, some are beginning to
recognise the other forms of violence in their lives (including emotional violence and control by men).
There is also good evidence of the effectiveness and impact of VWC's community awareness and
prevention activities, with most events followed up by women seeking help; there is less blaming of
women by relatives, and more media attention and debate on the issue.

There are several significant examples of changes in policies, protocols and actions where VWC's
work and partnerships made a significant contribution to improve the enabling environment for
change.

There is a huge increase in demand for VWC's intensive community awareness and prevention
workshops and trainings. This is a significant change in behaviour and attitudes, because at the
beginning of this phase, these groups did not see VAWC as a serious issue that needed to be
addressed, most prevention activities were initiated by VWC, and there were no outstanding requests
for prevention activities. Requests are from provincial government, chiefs and other male leaders,
women's leaders/groups, church & community groups and police.

Full publication

• Activity Completion Report 2012-2016 [PDF 2.3 MB]
• Activity Completion Report 2012-2016 [Word 1.8 MB]