Establishment of a novel Community Birth Attendants (CBA) Academy embedded with mobilemoney solutions for safer deliveries in Imo State, Nigeria

The problem is lack of skilled/equipped Traditional Birth Attendants(TBAs) with financial resources to provide quality care during birth in hard-to-reach communities in Imo State Nigeria. TBAs are unskilled and their maternity homes lack electricity, clean water and proper equipment to conduct evidence based practices. TBAs are usually unbanked, financially excluded which limits their access to credit.

The project will adopt a service delivery approach to validate a new way to increase skills and equip TBAs who are economically strengthened along with pregnant women using ICT mobilemoney solution in hard-to-reach communities.

The objective is to establish a novel Community Birth Attendant(CBA) Academy to train 300 TBAs to provide quality care during birth for 10,000 pregnant women in hard-to-reach communities in Imo State in 2-years; and to economically strengthen CBAs and pregnant women through an ICT mobilemoney solution that extends money through cell phones. The impact will be a model ICT-enabled CBA Academy can significantly contribute to an increase in access to quality care during birth for pregnant women, due to an increase in skilled/equipped birth attendants in hard-to-reach communities who are financially included and empowered.

There are no formal training facilities for TBAs in Nigeria; TBAs learn through an informal apprenticeship system. This idea is new in Nigeria. The Academy will continue to train hundreds of TBAs annually to reach over 500,000 pregnant women with quality care during birth in 5-years from project startup.