The South African Chamber of Business (Sacob) has won a $20 000 award for its simple toolkit to assist small and medium enterprises address HIV/Aids in their workplaces.
Sacob said many surveys on the effectiveness in addressing HIV/Aids in the business environment conclude that small business is not addressing this problem effectively, purely because it does not have the time, resources, skills and knowledge to do it in an effective manner.
To help address this burning issue, Sacob developed a simple toolkit with the support of the Congress of South African Trade Unions, as well as the departments of health and labour, which will be contributing pamphlets, booklets and posters for insertion into each toolkit.
The World Bank hosted a competition over the past few months for Southern Africa Customs Union countries (Namibia, Botswana, Lesotho, Swaziland and South Africa) that are actively engaged in presenting new and creative ideas for dealing with HIV/Aids.
The chamber also won accolades for its strategy to monitor the implementation of this product through its chamber movement.
Sacob will launch its toolkit over the next few weeks and will institute a programme to effectively mobilise it in the small business environment.
South Africa has the highest number of people living with HIV/Aids in the world, with more than one in 10 of the population of 45-million infected.
HIV prevalence among antenatal clinic attendees has risen from only 0,7% in 1990 to 4% in 1993, 17% in 1997 and 26,5% in 2002.
The 2002 provincial split varied from a low of 12,4% in the Western Cape to a high of 36,5% in KwaZulu-Natal. The prevalence rates for the other provinces were 15,1% for the Northern Cape, 15,16% for Limpopo, 23,6% for the Eastern Cape, 26,2% for the North West, 28,6% for Mpumalanga, 28,8% for the Free State and 31,6% for Gauteng. — I-Net Bridge