A baseline survey was done by Mr. Shamsi Mhina on the year 2003 at Ruhembe ward-Kilosa District, the results of the survey revealed an increased rate of HIV/AIDS infections among youth, children, pregnant mothers and adults, increased number of orphans, low income level of the people, inadequate opportunities to pre-school education, adult illiteracy, insufficient portable water and poor sanitation, gender inequality and poor farming practices. The needs to find means of addressing those problems in a collective and sustainable ways becomes imperative at that material time, where, in February 14, 2004 Tujikomboe Group was officially born for the purpose of build such a group of an organization in order to respond to the needs and problems of the people residing both in rural and urban settings and for other matters related to it.  Tujikomboe Group has been fully incorporated under the laws of Tanzania since November, 2004 with registration number SO: 12888, works from village level to national level with the aim of improving lives of the people by reducing income poverty through provision of agricultural extension services, promote the rights of children and gender equity, preventing and mitigating the impact of HIV/AIDS, improved acess to water and sanitation practice and promoting basic education. Currently, Tujikomboe Group has two offices. The main office, which is situated at Ruaha Area, Kidodi ward-Kilosa District and the sub-office which is located in Tanga City at the junction of Jamaa Road and 20th Street. Tujikomboe Group has 12 staffs and more than 15 volunteers.

     Products and Services offered

(a)   Increased community awareness on HIV&AIDS prevention to in-school children. Currently, more than 580 in-school peer educators were trained as peer educators on HIV in two wards of Kidodi and Ruhembe located in Kilosa District. The in-school peer education program on HIV has increased wide understanding on HIV & AIDS. In-school peer educators were trained on HIV prevention, stigma reduction and counseling skills. The in-school peer education program on HIV made children to get courage to go for HIV testing. A total of 21 in-school children (male 10 female 11) have been tested for HIV. If you visit one of the primary school in the project area, you will find HIV education posters placed against the walls of the classrooms. The posters have been made by peer educators as a mean to educate other pupils. This shown that peer education intervention on HIV prevention has sustained at the project areas. Also, community meetings on HIV/AIDS prevention, stigma reduction and impact mitigations were also offered at the village levels where community members in the four wards-Kidodi, Mikumi, Ulaya  and Ruhembe benefited. 

(b)    Tujikomboe Group offer legal education on probate procedures, inheritance laws and will writing to parents, guardians, teachers, community leaders and children were educated. This intervention was done in the wards of Kidodi, Ulaya, Ruhembe, Malolo and Mikumi in Kilosa District-Morogoro and in Kilulu ward in Muheza District Tanga.  This intervention is done based on Tujikomboe Group finds that, in many cases, parents died without making a “will”.  Relatives took the properties of the deceased parent leaving children homeless and property less. Children and the widow are mostly affected as they have no power to claim their right to inherit.

(c)   Conduct community mobile birth registration to reach children in the remote areas and provide them with birth certificate.  Mobile birth registration strategy which implies registering births at the village level has first been conducted in Tanzania by Tujikomboe Group since the year 2006 with financial support from Firelight Foundation. In this process, Birth and Deaths Registrar is contracted by Tujikomboe Group, join with Tujikomboe Group team in a car, and went to the villages with all the necessary registration documents for registering child births. A total of 1,372 children who reside in the wards of Ruhembe, Kidodi, Malolo, Mikumi and Ulaya were registered and provided with birth certificate. Among those registered, the <5 years children are 291(male 173, female 118), children aged 6-10 years are 490(male 289, female 201), children aged 11-18 years are 591 (male 340, female 251).  In the year 2011 in Kilulu ward- Muheza District-Tanga region, a total of 407 children and young people were registered and provided with birth certificates while 45 parents, guardians, teacher and community leaders trained on the laws of inheritance and will writing. In the project area, mobile birth registration gain a substantial achievements as it really sustained at the local level such that: many parents who were not registered their children during the scheduled days of mobile registration due to different reasons, are now use to save money and travel to Kilosa District to meet the Birth and Death Registrar so as to register their children and redeem birth certificate, the situation which was not a common practice before the project

(d)   Tujikomboe Group offer extension services to small scale famers. This is done by conduct Participatory Reflection Action (PRA) at the village level where the three most identified felt needs are outlined by community members during community meetings and researched for actions to be taken. For example PRA conducted at Kitete Msindazi Village in Ruhembe ward-Kilosa made youth (men and women)  to come out with feasible plan of utilizing a piece of  land of 3 acres  for horticulture. The land is crossed by spring water that adds value for irrigation farming. The group grows onions, tomatoes, lady fingers and salad. This group has embarked to this project after researching for price of inputs, market of their products, competitors and other factors such as environment.

    Facilities Available at Tujikomboe Group

(a)   Dedicated staffs who works with and for the people to address their felt needs

(b)   Availability of computers, printers and internet services

(c)   The office has motorbike used for project field outreach

(d)   Training manuals on HIV Prevention, Stigma reduction, Legal Education and Will Writing, Community access to safe water and sanitation practices, Home Based Life Saving Skills(HBLSS)-for reduction of maternal and < 5 years child mortalities.

(e)   Consultation services on water (policy, strategy, program and acts) and sanitation (2) Home Based Life Saving Skills (HBLSS) (3) Probate procedures, inheritance laws and Will writing (4) Agricultural Extension Services to small-scale farmers.

Current Activities

(a)   Conduct legal education, inheritance laws and will writing

(b)   Conduct community mobile birth registration on certification at the local level

(c)   Strengthening national advocacy strategy on free birth registration and certification to children under 18 years  and to ensure that health facilities are used as birth registration points, such that: a baby can be registered and provided with birth certificate within 7 days after delivery.

(d)   Conduct consultation services in areas of water and sanitation,

(e)   Conduct training and advocacy strategy on reduction of maternal and child mortalities through Home Based Life Saving Skills (HBLSS) Approach

(f)      Promotion of children rights and children Act.

(g)   Agricultural extension services to small-scale farmers

(h)   Prevention and mitigation of HIV & AIDS to children in school and out of school, youth and community.

       Future Activities

(a)   To conduct training to medical officer, nurse’s midwives, clinical officers and registered nurses on Home Based Life Saving Skills (HBLSS). This training will be done in Tanga region where maternal mortality is on the increase. More than 40 participants will be trained. The trained participants will be responsible to extend this education to community using house to house training(where pregnant mother residing) and at the dispensary level(during clinic days)

(b)   To strengthen national advocacy strategy on universal birth registrations to enhance free birth registration to children and encourage health facilities to be used as birth registration points.

(c)   To conduct social marketing of will document so as to increase demand driven service on inheritance laws and will writing.

To conduct social marketing of packaging facilities of agricultural inputs especially oranges and paddy. This is because; most famers have no ideas of packaging. Poor packing of agricultural input reducing market value of the product, reduce quantity and quality of goods as most of it damaged as disposal