Announced in June, SCI international held the awards ceremony on Saturday, August 2, 2014 during their annual conference.
WASHINGTON, DC – Richmond Sister Cities Commission has won Sister Cities International’s 2014 Innovation Award
(Humanitarian Assistance) for a city with a population between 100,001 and 500,000. The 2014 Sister Cities
International Innovation Award (Humanitarian Assistance) recognizes the accomplishments of outstanding community
and individual sister city programs that promote peace through mutual respect, understanding, and cooperation.
In 2013, the Richmond Sister Cities Commission (RSCC) and its community partners hosted the Women, War, and Peace
in Africa Conference at Virginia Commonwealth University. The conference helped to publicize the partnership between
Richmond and its sister city Ségou and how RSCC is working to highlight Virginia’s links to West Africa by nurturing
collaboration between schools, universities, organizations, and community groups working in the field of human
development. …. To successfully implement this conference, RSCC’s working group members collaborated with Virginia Commonwealth University, the Richmond Peace Education Center, Virginia Friends of Mali, and many hardworking volunteers and affiliate NGOs.”
Click here to read the full press release.
Click here to see the full slate of 2014 winners.
VFOM and RSCC will host a delegation of 9 officials from Segou October 7 – 16, 2014 that will include the governor of the region of Segou, his Excellence Monsieur Boubacar Thierno CISSE, and the mayor of the city of Segou, his Honor Monsieur Ousamane K. SIMAGA.
The purpose of this visit is to further the progress of our sister city projects: Project CURE and humanitarian aid in Segou, the grant from the Bill Gates Foundation through which Segou-based HIV-AIDS clinical trials are being conducted, cooperation between our universities, the Haidara Foundation, and other projects that have recently been started.
A number of these projects were the topics of workshops during the Women, War & Peace conference last fall. As quoted from the SCI’s June press release, “New initiatives featuring activities by RSCC and its community partners working with Project C.U.R.E. to bring medical supplies and clinical trials on HIV-positive women in their sister city of Ségou, Mali were highlighted during the event. As a result, it is expected that at least one and perhaps two containers of medical supplies will be shipped to Ségou in 2014, valued at approximately $450,000 each.”
The formal delivery date has been pushed back to 2015, but fundraising for the project has been successful with contributions from VFOM members and friends, the city of Segou, Orange – French telecommunications company in Mali, covering the entire $24,000 necessary for needs assessment and shipping costs. The contents are entirely donated.