Sierra Leone

A strong history of humanitarian response

GOAL undertakes activities to prepare for shocks and emergencies, developing preparedness plans and supporting district-level partners to do the same.

This experience saw GOAL take a central role in the response to the Ebola crisis of 2014. GOAL trucked water to quarantined areas, enhanced facility-based WASH resources, and trained and supported community health workers on disease management and control. Extensive experience from the Ebola response helped GOAL establish the Community-Led Action (CLA) approach, which is now a nationally adopted Social Behaviour Change (SBC) tool aimed at spreading awareness messaging through a community-centred, locally-led approach. 

More recently, GOAL has responded to the 2017 mudslide in the country's capital of Freetown and provided essential supports to health systems in response to the onset of Covid-19 and recent Mpox outbreak. GOAL regularly supports victims of fires and flooding, and provides ongoing support to national response agencies.

Resilient Health across all six of GOAL's focus districts

GOAL supports local District Health Management Teams as they work to improve population health. Within this, we take a particular focus on child protection and adolescent, sexual and reproductive health. GOAL works closely with vulnerable children and youth to reunify them with their caregivers, provide them with non-formal education and access to key health services. We are also working to improve demand for, and access to, sexual and reproductive health services for adolescents. This is a key step in combating high levels of teenage pregnancy and maternal mortality in the country.

GOAL delivers urban and rural Water, Sanitation & Hygiene (WASH) programmes in Freetown and Kenema districts. WASH interventions include direct service provision (such as a Faecal Sludge Management in Freetown - the first of its kind in the country, and access to clean water in Kenema) whilst promoting positive behaviour change for increased service demand.

Through the Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health (ASRH) project and the YoCARE initiative, young people were equipped with the knowledge and advocacy skills needed to improve access to healthcare and champion family planning services in their communities.

GOAL also provided critical COVID-19 response support to communities and national governing health teams, utilising experience from the Ebola response to form the Community-Led Action (CLA) approach. This was also utilised nationally to support the uptake of COVID-19 vaccines among low-uptake communities.

Promoting financial inclusion in Sierra Leone

GOAL’s inclusion programme currently runs in five districts: Freetown, Kenema, Kambia, Bombali, and Koinadugu. Work is designed to focus on ‘decent’ work, address reliance on informal work sectors and combat human trafficking and child labour.

Advocacy is an important part of this. Our team is working to deliver practical activities on the ground, strengthen child protection structures at the community level, and lobby for key regional and national developments.