Music Crossroads Zimbabwe, Nhimbe Trust launch MUDEWO programme

The partnership, titled Music Decent Work (MUDEWO) Global Monitoring Programme, will focus on the operationalisation of global normative frameworks to guide stakeholders in ensuring inclusive and equal treatment in access to decent work and livelihoods. It will also provide support to local communities, and protect the fundamental rights of musicians through practical measures on the ground.

“While the Music Crossroads Zimbabwe, through their main flagship music education programme, the Music Crossroads Academy, has been focusing on music business development in Zimbabwe, it has become apparent that the aforementioned goal can never be achieved in stifled working contexts for creatives hence our decision to strongly be active in upholding music decent work rights,” Music Crossroads Zimbabwe director Melody Zambuko said.

Through their complementary mandates and expertise, Music Crossroads Zimbabwe and Nhimbe Trust support the development of creatives while protecting their rights and supporting the countries and communities hosting them.

Nhimbe Trust executive director Josh Nyapimbi said: “Nhimbe Trust is committed to supporting music decent work rights through the MUDEWO global reports. We endeavour to make the MUDEWO global reports become a reference point for the international community and helping to advocate for policy reform processes. At a time when musicians are experiencing complex COVID-induced decent work rights violations, we need to stand firm and uphold their rights.”

MUDEWO will be accompanied by a joint Action Plan (December 2022), which seeks to advance collaboration through concrete, practical measures at global, regional and country levels aimed at the following three overarching goals: improved governance of access to the labour market and decent work for musicians, strengthened protection measures and decent working conditions for musicians and cultural and creative professionals and increased opportunities for jobs, income and livelihoods for musicians and cultural and creative professionals.

Over the years, Music Crossroads Zimbabwe and Nhimbe Trust have collaborated on a number of technical areas, including the hosting of a national workshop on artistic freedoms and decent work, co-workmanship on the development of a national music strategy, drafting of Zimbabwe’s Quadrennial Period Report on the 2005 Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions and the hosting of a series of intercultural dialogue sessions, among other projects.

For more about the MUDEWO programme, contact lead researcher and international cultural policy expert Florence Majachani via email at  mudewo@nhimbe.org.