A Ban Against Neglect (ABAN) is a new nonprofit that has taken on helping homeless mothers in Accra, Ghana by giving them the facilities to start a new life. After two years, the organization has already achieved success and has helped the women in Ghana begin to achieve their dreams.
The idea for ABAN began when Callie Brauel, a UNC student, studied abroad in Ghana. She quickly realized two major problems that plague Accra. The first was the large amount of homeless children on the streets every night. The second was the tons of waste created daily by the plastic bags, or “sachets,” used for water.
Ghana lacks a formal trash service, so every night around 60 tons of sachets are thrown on the streets. Â
Callie volunteered with Rebecca Brandt, an art major from Concordia University, at an organization that helped homeless children. They were both troubled by the fact that every evening the kids had to return back to the streets.
In a NGO management course at the University of Accra, Callie, Rebecca and a local student, Emmanuel Quarmyne, created a mock non-profit organization that would take care of the homeless children and the waste. Their idea was to teach young mothers to sew sanitized plastic bags into cool products. Â This way the women would learn necessary skills and they would eliminate large amounts of waste simultaneously.
mock organization soon became a reality after Callie won the Carolina Challenge in 2010, giving her the start up to establish the organization.
ABAN is now a program that gives the women much more than sewing skills. Twenty women live on a compound just outside of Accra where they sew unique bags, wallets and aprons. Also, these women are taught math, English, business and life skills along with receiving workshops in art therapy as well as other special skills. Each girl gets a living wage from the product she sews and through the wage match program ABAN has started, these girls will be able to have the money and skills to succeed once they graduate from the two-year program.
Since 2010, ABAN has grown and achieved great success. Recently, Callie and Rebecca have participated in theTEDx talks, ABAN has been awarded a $50,000 grant, the line is due to come out in the Durham Whole Foods in the near future and they are anticipating a Nourish International chapter going abroad over the summer to volunteer at their compound in Ghana.
In February, ABAN is hosting an event  called “United We Love” where Callie and Rebecca will be speaking about ABAN as well as showcasing ABAN products in Chapel Hill.
The organization has already achieved so much in the past two years and they have no intention of slowing down.
Sources:
ABAN woman sewing a bag(photo): blog.chegg.com; http://blog.chegg.com/tag/a-ban-against-neglect/
ABAN bags (photo):newglobalcitizens.org; Â http://www.newglobalcitizens.org/global-projects/projects-by-region/africa/a-ban-against-neglect-aban
ABAN Ghana team (photo): aban.org; http://www.aban.org/about-us/how-aban-started