Gaza Community Mental Health Programme received a delegation from the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) including; Mr. Giancarlo Depicciotto, head of SDC office in Jerusalem and coordinator of GCMHP consortium of donors, and Mr. Mazen Shaqoura, head of the SDC office in Gaza Strip. The delegation met with the GCMHP general administration and President, Dr. Eyad El-Sarraj in the Programme’s headquarters in Gaza.
At the beginning of the meeting, means of mutual cooperation between the Programme and the SDC were discussed as well as ways of strengthening the work between the Programme and the SDC in the coming years.
Then, another meeting was held with the participation of the heads of the three women associations after their spin-off from the Programme. These women associations are as follows: Aisha Association for Women and Child Protection, Wifaq Association for Women and Child Care in addition to Al-Zahra’ Association for Women and Child Development. During the meeting, the Directors were informed that the SDC will fund the three associations with the amount of two hundred thousand dollars in the year 2011.
In addition, Mr. Depicciotto pointed out that the other consortium partner contributions are under process and the three organizations will be updated of any developments.
It is worth mentioning that the meeting came as a follow up to a meeting held two week ago with the three women associations. The women associations were informed of the SDC grant and cooperation as part of the consortium commitment towards the spin off approach and the new organizations and GCMHP’s efforts to help and provide financial coverage for the three associations for the year 2011.
