Ra Naari Parishad (RNP) began in the wake of the 1987 Military Coup as a response to assisting rural Fijian women of Indian descent who were affected within the rural Ra community. It was officially incorporated in 1989 and has today grown to where it is a fully-fledged NGO.RNP’s focus is on improving the lives of all women of Ra by empowering them, through many different projects towards independence and self-sustainability. This is achieved by working through registered women’s clubs who meet on a regular basis as well as with donor agencies.
Website: http://www.ranaariparishad.org/

Project Date: February 2018 – January 2019
Grant Value: Type B – FJ $141,000
Area of Focus: Rural women life skills programme
Project Status: COMPLETED

A grant from the Fiji Women’s Fund enabled RNP to conduct activities across three key programmatic areas; Income Diversification, Attainment of Qualifications and life-skills workshops.  The project supported 110 rural women to diversify household and community income via the delivery of fortnightly trainings and workshops on a rotating basis to the 11 mother’s clubs.  It is hoped that these activities will help increase its current membership by 30% (from 110 to approximately 145) and increase confidence in business skills, leadership, nutrition, female health, and financial literacy.

Project Date: April 2019 – March 2021
Grant Value: Type B – FJ $300,000
Area of Focus: Women’s economic empowerment and organisational capacity building

RNP will deliver the project in collaboration with 14 women’s clubs located in Rakiraki. RNP will support three bee-keeping communities in Ra by providing full sets of equipment with bees, customised training, and other business development support to sustain women and family bee businesses.  RNP will also identify and respond to the income-generating needs of nine women’s groups in Ra through economic mapping, GESI, leadership and skills trainings, and product development support to increase women’s entrepreneurial capabilities and empowerment.  RNP is working toward building the capacity of its volunteers, staff, Management, Board/Executive Committee members to enhance the organisation‘s profile, effectiveness, efficiency and relevance to women of Ra.