UNFPA Cameroon supported Women in Entrepreneurship and Technology (WE-TECH) to officially launch “Alert GBV”, its digital platform for the timely access and referral of survivors to Gender-based Violence related services. The event which was held in Douala, on Friday 17^th February 2023, was also supported by the Littoral Regional Delegation of the Ministry of Women Empowerment and the Family and brought together representatives of other public administrations, members of the diplomatic corps, activists and civil soceity organisations working in the domain of GBV.

The “Alert GBV” online platform, a website with a free downloadable mobile application, ranked among the 10 world-wide winning innovations of the UNFPA, WIPO and ITU “Joint Innovation Challenge 2022” aimed at supporting women and girls’ empowerment. The platform was developed to ease access and communication to persons in need of GBV-related services and various service providers. Thanks to funding from UNFPA Headquarters, its founder, Elodie Nonga Kenla, nurtured the ambition of rolling this solution out to serve as a quick meeting point for GBV service providers and survivors. “On the platform, you can find the contacts of partners, organisations, therapists and legal practitioners who can help you in your healing and care process.” Says Elodie.

The official launching ceremony was therefore an opportunity for service providers not only to showcase their work and network but also to explore

possibilities of integrating the use of the platorm in their everyday work. It is in this light that panel discussions on various GBV-related thematics served as a means to sensitise actors and organisations on the need to harness digitalisation and innovation to efficiently provide support to the women and girls in need of it in real time.

Gender-based Violence remains a reality in Cameroon. According to the latest Demographic Health Survey (2018), 1 of 3 women is exposed to physical violence. “This is even more so due to the various socio-political and humanitarian crises affecting some regions of the country.” says Liliane Munezero, UNFPA GBV Coordinator. The ongoing crises in Cameroon have caused heavy displacements, prompting people to settle away from adequate services in search of security. A mobile and digital solution therefore comes in handy to orient and follow up survivors beyond any physical encounter from both parties. An initiative highly welcomed by Mrs. Gisèle Caroline Ekoh, Regional Delegate of the Ministry of Women Empowerment and the Family “Our

Ministry is always available to support such activities…we will readily work with all organisations wishing to join us in ending GBV in Cameroon.”

UNFPA’s Strategic plan for 2022 – 2025 sets Innovation and digitalisation as one of the accelerators to help the organisation reach its 3 Transformative Results by 2030. These are

• End unmet need in Family Planning
• End preventable maternal deaths, and
• End Gender-based violence and harmful cultural practices.

It is in this light that UNFPA Cameroon has been supporting WE-TECH’s “Alert GBV” roll out. Prior to this official launching, UNFPA organised a workshop bringing together long-serving GBV actors and experts to restructure and fine tune the functionalities of the ‘Alert GBV’ platform to be more user-friendly and respect GBV core principles. UNFPA Cameroon and WETECH are committed to working together to use innovation and digitalisation to end GBV in Cameroon.