AFRUCA News
Keep up to date with our latest activities for children, young people, adults and professionals here.
January To March 2024 Highlights
FGM Training for social workers, Leeds council
Four Square Church Birmingham. Child Protection training for Congregants
Four Square Church Birmingham. Child Protection training for Congregants
Christ Apostolic Church, Kingsmead, Middlesborough. Child Protection Training for Congregants
AFRUCA Children's Champions at a child protection community event
AFRUCA Consultative Meeting on Youth Violence and County Lines in Manchester
AFRUCA Consultative Meeting on Youth Violence and County Lines in Manchester
AFRUCA session with the pupils of Loretto College, Manchester
AFRUCA session with the pupils of Loretto College, Manchester
2023 Highlights
Debbie Ariyo CEO of AFRUCA with the Mayors of Southwark and Haringey at the Central Association of Nigerians in the UK Annual Dinner
AFRUCA Team presenting on Adultification to the Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service
AFRUCA at the Wonderfully Made Woman Event on Trafficking of Women
AFRUCA Senior Social Worker with a visitor to AFRUCA stand at Seymour Road Academy Community Engagement sesion for parents
AFRUCA Child Protection Comunity Engagement Lead with member at Women of Covenant conference
AFRUCA Team presenting to the Igbo Men of Birmingham
Panel of Lived Experience Expert at AFRUCA Black History Month event on Farmed Children and Barrel Children
AFRUCA CEO with the young people at Focus on Disability Home in Nigeria
AFRUCA Xmas Cake Sale at Universal Square
AFRUCA Champions at a child protection session, Redeemed church in Coventry
AFRUCA Champion at NASFAT Muslim Women's Group Dartford child protection session
Debbie Ariyo CEO visited the King of Ososa in Nigeria to discuss joint working
AFRUCA London team at the October Black History Month event
AFRUCA school material for primary school children in Ososa, Nigeria
AFRUCA presented on Modern Slavery at Manchester Catherdal Thoman Clarkson Commemorative Day event
AFRUCA Social Workers at an outreach event
London staff end of year dinner on 7 December 2023.
Manchester staff end of year dinner on 12 December 2023
Black History Month October 2023
Farmed Children, Barrel Children: Exploring Historic Black UK Child Rearing Practices
To celebrate Black History Month 2023, AFRUCA Safeguarding Children held an event on 6 October 2023 to explore the historical experiences of "Farmed Children” and "Barrel" Children” in the UK and learnings to improve protection and safeguarding of children in today's Black communities. We had a fantastic panel of experts with lived experience - Evadney Campbell MBE, Ibironke John and Gamal Turawa. The event focused on the experiences of many children born in the 1950s, 1960s, 1970s, 1980s and possibly the 1990s to Caribbean and West African parents in Britain who experienced different forms of upbringing.
Panellists shared their experiences of separation from birth parents as a result of different child rearing practices. We looked at the experiences of West African children who would be given to White foster carers far away from their families to enable their parents study and work while someone else looked after the children (Farmed children). We also discussed how Caribbean children would be left back home in the West Indies with relatives to enable their parents travel to the UK to work (Barrel children) before re-joining their parents in the UK.
We examined how these practices led to different types of emotional trauma in the children due to long term separation from birth parents, and other loved carers. We explore the long term impact on today’s adults, their relationships with siblings born in the UK who did not experience similar separation. We looked at how these childhood experiences affect their own child rearing practices but also open up the path towards healing and recovery.
We are thankful to our panellists and participants for a truly enlightening and educative event.
Funded by the UK Modern Slavery and Human Rights Policy and Evidence Centre, BASNET at AFRUCA, in partnership with the St Mary’s University Bakhita Centre, the Sheffield University and the Nottingham University Rights Lab was delighted to launch our new research report exploring Equality, Diversity and Inclusion in Publicly funded Modern Slavery Research on 17 July 2023
On 8 July 2023, our staff and Board members converged in our Manchester office for our yearly “Away-Day”. This was an opportunity for us to meet face to face, network, share ideas and plan our organisation’s strategy for the coming year.
Our CEO Debbie Ariyo OBE delivered a Keynote Presentation at the launch of the African Research Interest Group at Anglia Ruskin University.
Our Social Work Team delivered a two day Induction Training Programme for Newly Arrived Social Workers from Zimbabwe and South African working for Manchester City Council
Our CEO Debbie Ariyo attended the INRICH Network Conference in Paris earlier in June to present learning from our work on Child Sexual Abuse and Exploitation in Black communities in the UK.
AFRUCA celebrated "Windrush Day" on the 75th Anniversary of Windrush. Event organisers AFRUCA Staff Jamila, Kofi and Brian take questions from the audience
AFRUCA CEO Debbie Ariyo OBE presenting a paper at the Global Sustainability Network Conference "Ending Modern Slavery: Harnessing Scalable Solutions".
County Lines Service Manager Brian Talabi delivers a parenting session as part of the County Lines Family Support Service
Ekanem, Community Engagement Lead delivered a safeguarding training to a group of churches in Birmingham.
Tech Volunteers, Hanshi, Bolaji and Manos and Course Leader Brian from the AFRUCA Young Coders Club.
AFRUCA Social Worker's promoting the Child Protection and Family Support Service at World Social Work Day with Hackney City Councils Anti- Racist Practitioner, Irma Thomas.
Our Young Coders Club Project Team with May 2023 graduants
AFRUCA Windrush Day event 2023
Child Protection Awareness Sessions
Are you a faith group seeking to improve child protection awareness within your congregation? We deliver child protection training programmes for faith groups across the country.
Contact Ekanem Robertson Community Engagement Lead for further information and to arrange a session.
AFRUCA Conference on Adultification of the Girl-Child 2023
On 27th April 2023 AFRUCA held a conference focusing on the Adultification of the Girl - Child in Manchester, in partnership with Manchester City Council.
This was a thought - provoking event, which aimed to open conversations among practitioners to develop awareness, knowledge and reflection on this issue.
We have received very good feedback about the conference from many participants.
Adultification is such an important issue, so we are pleased this conference has been well received.
Read the conference report here.
Watch a part of the Young People’s Panel discussion here
Visit the Conference Photo Gallery here
A Massive Congratulations to Our First Cohort of AFRUCA Young Coders For Completing The Course!
The first cohort which started in January 2023 had their final session on Saturday 18th March.
The project has been a success and we thank our tech volunteers for all their hard work and support with the project
This project is part of the County Lines Child Trafficking Prevention Service. Children aged between 12 - 18 can take part in our free coding lessons every Saturday at our Manchester Office.
We also provide hot meals for participants. Please note, this programme is specifically aimed at young people from low income families.
The Launch of ‘The Phoenix Project’
On the 8th March in honour of International Women’s Day we launched ‘The Phoenix Project’
The Phoenix Project supports Young Women and Girls at risk of Exploitation in Manchester.
We will provide one to one support, which includes mentoring and emotional wellbeing support that focuses on building self - esteem, promoting healthy relationships and understanding indicators of coercive control and grooming.
The project will also include group activities for young people to get involved in.
Find out more here.
2022 Highlights
AFRUCA Hackney Conversations: Protecting Children from Sexual Abuse
Our latest Hackney Conversations on child sexual abuse was a success. We were delighted the Deputy Mayor of Hackney, Councillor Antoinette Bramley and Councillor Midnight Ross were able to join the session. The Deputy Mayor spoke about ongoing work in Hackney to protect children from sexual abuse. We were also delighted to have children’s author Victoria Adepoju present her book, ‘No More Secrets Simi’.
The BASNET Residential Capacity Building Programme For BAME Anti-Trafficking Innovators Was a Success!
We are really delighted about the successful outcome of our inaugural Residential Capacity Building Programme facilitated by BASNET (BME Anti - Slavery Network) which was held at our Manchester Offices.
We are thankful to our funders The Churchill Fellowship, all participants, speakers and trainers.
We Celebrated James Titi - Lartey, our Head of Finance and Administration’s 10th Year at AFRUCA!
November 2022 marked our Head of Finance and Administration, James Titi - Lartey’s 10th Year at AFRUCA. We are delighted to have celebrated this important anniversary. We thank James for all his hard work and dedication to AFRUCA and look forward to many more years of working together.
AFRUCA Visited Nigeria
Session on Child Trafficking with Children
Our CEO Debbie Ariyo visited Makoko, Lagos Nigeria to talk to children in the community about protecting themselves from child trafficking. We thank CEE - HOPE Children’s Charity Nigeria for organising this important event.
Session on Child Protection with Potential Migrants
Due to our concerns about the number of newly arrived Nigerian families referred to our child protection service at AFRUCA, because of culturally based child abuse, Debbie held an event in Lagos with CEE- HOPE. The event focused on UK Child Protection issues with potential student migrants and others in attendance. It is crucial that newly arrived people are aware of the differences in child rearing and child protection rules so they do not fall foul of the laws.
You can watch the recording of the event on CEE- HOPE’s Facebook page.
We Celebrated Black History Month 2022!
To mark Black History Month throughout October we put the spotlight on 10 influential people in the UK that have contributed to positive changes and growth in the Social Work and Child Protection Sector.
It’s not too late to find and follow these posts. Visit our Instagram @afruca where you’ll find them all!
Media Launch of 'Smuggled' by Angela Karanja
The booked ‘Smuggled’ by Angela Karanja has shown how powerful is the role of young people in the fight against human trafficking and modern slavery. We were delighted to have hosted the launch of this important book on 23rd September at our London office in Hackney.
If you weren’t able to attend, it’s not too late to watch the event which was streamed live. Watch now by visiting our Facebook page.
Third Private Screening of AFRUCA’s 20th Anniversary documentary
Aug 15, 2022
AFRUCA’s 20th Anniversary documentary video’s third private screening reception was held at the AFRUCA head office in Hackney on Thursday 11th August
The documentary reflected AFRUCA’s history, journey, challenges, success stories and future plans. The 32-minute high-definition documentary featured politicians, civil servants, practitioners and AFRUCA’s service users.
The evening’s guest of honour, Lola Gani-Yusuf, a previous employee of AFRUCA, said that the documentary showcased the enormous impact AFRUCA has been making in the BME community in the UK. She added that she feels proud to see AFRUCA’s huge progress and to have worked for the organisation.
During the Q&A session, attendees asked questions to AFRUCA’s CEO, Debbie Ariyo OBE, about AFRUCA’s work and ambitions, and pledged their full support to the charity.
Watch the full documentary click here.
African Parent-Students and The Challenges of Parenting In The UK
Many foreign parent-students come to the UK for private education or sent by their governments or on scholarship programmes to study at universities across the country. Most of these students arrive in the UK without provision of adequate information that could help them to familiarise themselves with the culture and norms as well as to understand the UK’s law on child protection and well-being.
AFRUCA, as the UK’s leading charity in safeguarding Black and ethnic children and supporting families, has been at the forefront of providing seminars, trainings and workshops to parents and carers to educate them on raising their children in line with the UK’s law.
As part of this, on 9th July 2022 Debbie Ariyo OBE, CEO of AFRUCA, gave a lecture to almost 80 parent-students who are studying at the University of Lincoln. This ‘Parenting in The UK’ seminar was organised by the Health Gospel CIC.
AFRUCA was delighted to participate in the special event to help parent-students integrate into mainstream society and enhance protection for their children.
Jul 13, 2022
AFRUCA has produced a 32-minute documentary to help capture its work safeguarding children in the UK over the 20 years of its existence.
Two private screenings with specially invited guests were held in its Head Office in Hackney on 15 June and 12 July 2022 . The documentary reflects AFRUCA’s history, journey, challenges, success stories and future plans. The documentary features service users, former and present staff, practitioners, policymakers and politicians all of whom have been involved and are familiar with AFRUCA’s work over many years.
Prominent among attendees at both events were Professor Kurt Barling, former BBC London Special Correspondent; Councillor Michael Situ, Deputy Mayor, London Borough of Southwark, Cllr Sade Etti, Mayoral Advisor, London Borough of Hackney, Councillor Susan Fajana Thomas, Cabinet Member for Community Safety and Regulatory Services, London Borough of Hackney and Sanchia Alachia, former Mayor, London Borough of Barking and Dagenham.
Following the film screenings, attendees used the Q&A session to discuss with AFRUCA’s Founder, Debbie Ariyo OBE, about AFRUCA’S work and aspirations, and to pledge their full support for the charity.
Watch the full documentary click here
