For 27 months, between January 2006 and March 2008, Minga Peru, a non-governmental organisation (NGO) in Peru, with support from United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM), implemented an Intercultural Radio Educative Project to fight against violence and HIV/AIDS in rural communities and schools of the Peruvian Amazon. The UNIFEM project capitalised on the popularity and credibility of Minga's thrice-weekly intercultural educative radio programme (Bienvenida Salud, or "Welcome Health") and its on-the-ground community resource persons (community promotoras). These elements were strategically leveraged with a year-round school-based initiative, involving teachers, students, and community members to prevent and reduce domestic violence and HIV/AIDS, empower victims of violence (mostly children and women), and reduce prejudice, stigma, and discrimination associated with being HIV-positive. Further, as part of the UNIFEM project, several students in each participating rural school were trained as radio correspondents, in charge of encouraging youth in their respective communities to listen to Bienvenida Salud and then provide feedback, including proposing new subjects for inclusion and treatment on the radio programme. These radio correspondents, along with their teachers and Minga's cadre of community-based promotoras undertook training and other programmatic activities on the topic of domestic violence and HIV/AIDS for their respective communities.

Primary data collection activities took place in Peru during a single week in mid-April 2008. These activities included 6 focus group discussions (FGDs), comprising a total of 57 participants, and 4 in-depth interviews. In addition to the primary data, Minga provided the evaluators with reams of secondary and archival data sources on the UNIFEM-supported domestic violence and HIV/AIDS project. A total of 164 teachers and 235 students were also surveyed.

Results of 170 teachers surveyed showed that 75% had ever listened to Bienvenida Salud and 16% were frequent listeners. Among 235 students, approximately 10 per school from 24 participating schools, 94% had ever listened to the programme and 77% claimed to be regular listeners. Listenership among rural students was higher (89%) than among urban students (50%), suggesting that the radio programme is actually reaching those young audiences who, to begin with, have little access to outside information.

Some 174 school teachers in 24 rural schools were trained by Minga Peru to integrate issues of domestic violence and HIV/AIDS into a revamped school curriculum. These teachers reached 283 primary school students and 4,254 secondary school students - in multiple courses.

Radio correspondents, promotoras, and teachers reached an estimated 3,600 families in the Peruvian Amazon with various programmatic activities on the topic of domestic violence and HIV/AIDS. Minga also distributed relevant educational material on domestic violence and HIV/AIDS to teachers, including a CD of several episodes of Bienvenida Salud, which they could play in classes or in their communities.

From January 2006 to March 2008, the staff of Bienvenida Salud received a total of 4,860 letters. Of these, 21% of the letters (N=1003) made a direct and explicit reference to issues of violence in the community or domestic sphere, or raised questions or concerns on HIV/AIDS.

Adult women, the primary intended audience of Bienvenida Salud, wrote most of the letters (45%) to the radio programme. Many of the adult women listeners wrote in to share that they have either abused their children or been abused by their partners. Adult men and youth (both male and female) are increasing as an audience segment of Bienvenida Salud and also increasingly writing in to the programme. This finding, evaluators assert, suggests increased involvement of men in the welfare of their families and their partners. The analysis of senders for the same time period shows that 46% were youth radio correspondents: "In focus group interviews, correspondents voiced a sense of 'pride' in that their school and Minga trusted them to receive the training. They take seriously their role in writing letters to Minga informing of cases of violence in their communities, as also their responsibility to search for alternative and local solutions to problems of domestic or community violence."

"In general terms, students emphasized that they now talk about these issues with their friends and family members, especially about domestic violence."

"...[P]rimary and secondary data clearly shows that students have learned about their rights as individuals, about different forms of violence, and about taking preventive measures for not contracting HIV/AIDS."

"Prior to the implementation of the school-based program, students noted that they had several misconceptions about HIV/AIDS. Many thought that it was 'a small animal' that could be transmitted by touching someone. HIV also attributed as being synonymous with having sex with homosexuals or prostitutes. Although some misconceptions still persist, the secondary school students show mindfulness in acknowledging that the person they have sex with may have multiple partners."

"A great majority of the students said that they are 'better informed and less afraid': that after talking to their teachers and listening to Bienvenida Salud, they now know how to prevent the spread of HIV and other sexually-transmitted infections."

"Many teachers acknowledged their own biases, misconceptions, about HIV/AIDS and family violence, and how they now know what they should have known all along. For instance, a teacher in Nauta noted: 'Before, I thought that when somebody was infected with HIV and they did not eat all of their food that another person could get infected through the food, or when somebody kissed an infected person they would become infected. Now I know I was wrong.'"

"In our discussions with students, while acknowledging the difficulties in broaching these topics with their girlfriends or boyfriends, they expressed a desire for change, including delaying of sexual relations, limiting sexual partners, and using condoms in sexual encounters."

Listening and Healing in the Peruvian Amazon: An Assessment of Minga Peru’s Intercultural Radio Educative Project to Prevent and Control Domestic Violence and HIV/AIDS [PDF] [8], by Arvind Singhal and Lucia Dura, June 30 2008.