Economic Constraint
Girls from economically disadvantaged backgrounds can find the costs associated with equipment, transportation and competition unrealistic for their families.
Additionally, playing sports can mean time away from paid jobs and work that generates income for a family. Parents can be resistant to letting their daughter stop an activity that brings the family money in favour of something that many cultures see as a waste of time or unproductive.
Our recommendations
In the infographic below you can see some recommendations for dealing with this barrier. You can adopt these to suit your context. You can also download the infographic to use offline.
Case Study
You can see a case study of how other organisations have addressed this barrier by clicking the accordion menu below.
Soccer Without Borders (SWB), an organisation using football to build a more inclusive world, has a programme site in Granada, Nicaragua. Many of the girls in the community could not afford proper football boots to play in so the organisation gathered donated football boots and created an equipment library, allowing participants to “check out” boots for practice and games and return them when the game or practice was over. At the end of the season, players who attended practice regularly and showed commitment to the team get to keep a pair of boots or a new uniform.
Vijana Amani Pamoja uses the power of football for the social and economic empowerment of young people in Nairobi. In addition to their sport and life skills programmes, they provide opportunities for participants to access training opportunities, which can serve as an incentive for families to encourage and allow their daughters to play in the first place.
VAP’s employability and entrepreneurship program is an exit initiative that integrates graduates of VAP’s programmes into vocational training courses and apprenticeship opportunities. Participants who graduate from vocational training courses and apprenticeships are linked into job opportunities, internships and entrepreneurship support.
The vocational training courses are aimed at engaging and motivating VAP’s programme graduates, providing them with valuable professional skills including: catering, hair and beauty, baking, financial and computer literacy. Courses prepare them for the job-market as well as helping them create their own sustainable income generating opportunities. VAP works closely with well-established salons and restaurants for the purposes of providing internships and job placements for the graduates.
