Manica Football For Hope Center

Grupo Desportivo de Manica (GDM)
Changing Lives through football

Grupo Desportivo de Manica (GDM) mission is to create an integrated community club that uses sport for social good. The club is an inclusive hub which provides infrastructure and relationships that facilitate change. GDM was founded in 1980, during Mozambique’s civil war, and started with the vision of establishing a sport club that is more than a club, but a family and group of friends.
GDM pursues a holistic approach in which football is the entry point for educational opportunities and skills training. Young participants receive cultural and life skills programmes ranging from English and computer classes to environmental education, Vocational training and HIV/AIDS prevention workshops.
The Mozambican Civil war from 1977-1992 left deep scars which has left the country still on the long road to recovery. Mozambique has one of the highest rates of illiteracy in Africa-currently at 47% consequently; skilled jobs are out of reach for most young people.
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The organization believes that football can bring joy, hope, and reconciliation to Mozambique, as wells as health and positive life choices to young boys and girls.

Manica is a poor, rural area in Mozambique, a country still recovering from a devastating Civil War (1977-1992) that left deep scars. Today, 46% of people live in poverty, only 24% have access to electricity and 39% of the population have unimproved sanitation facilities (UNDP). Furthermore, there is an HIV prevalence rate of 12.6% (UNAIDS) and over 50% of families are food insecure (UNICEF). With one of the world’s highest rates of youth illiteracy at 29% (UNICEF) and high youth unemployment skilled jobs and sustainable livelihoods are out of reach for most young people. In Manica many of the youth we engage are socially excluded, have limited access to school, are under-nourished and face violence at home
Grupo Desportivo de Manica uses ' the beautiful game' to engage girls and boys aged 7-17 in a range of football-based programs with the following objectives:
1) To improve the long -term physical & mental health chances to 600 participants during the year.
2) To improve the educational outcomes and career potential to 600 participants during the year.
3) To promote gender equality and empower young women to be active members of society during the year.
The program contributes towards the achievement of gender equality (SDG 5) The GDM Life-skills will address gender inequality as a key topic and will aim to change attitudes towards women’s role in sport and society we will also aim to engage an equal number of girls and boys both as participants and as coaches. The project will run the following activities;
-Based football training curriculum delivery. With the objective to have increased balanced life-skills of young people during the year
-Gardening and planting with objective to have improved health chances for young people during the year
-Hosting recreational football tournaments with objective for young people demonstrate improved attitudes to gender equality during the year
-English and computing lessons with objective to have young people with improved educational results & job prospects during the year
-Training of coaches’ capacity building with objective to have 20 peer educator coaches trained to apply new skills to deliver the GDM curriculum including 10 male and 10 female as role models in the community.
Monitoring and Evaluation includes pre and post questionnaire and focus group discussions and surveys which will enable us to measure changes in knowledge and behavior change of participants during and beyond the duration of their involvement.
More than 1000 young people have been impacted by our programs through football.
I am currently looking for any organization interested to be principal or lead the applicant of the project.