GRAND BASSA COUNTY, Liberia — The Liberia Agricultural Company (LAC) is expanding its efforts to prevent sexual harassment by taking awareness and prevention activities beyond the workplace and into schools, company camps, homes, and surrounding communities.
The initiative is being strengthened under the leadership of LAC General Manager Naveen Madan and the company’s management team, who are calling for greater community involvement in preventing sexual harassment and ensuring that workers, students, families, and residents know how to seek help and report concerns.
The campaign is being implemented through the SPEAK UP Project, funded by LAC and carried out by BridgePath International. The project is expected to reach more than 4,000 people, including residents in communities around the company’s concession, workers, and students attending LAC’s 11 schools.
The program is designed to move conversations about sexual harassment beyond company policies and formal workplace meetings. Instead, awareness activities are being taken directly to the places where people live, work, and study, with a focus on rights, prevention, reporting procedures, and access to support.
On Monday, August 31, LAC renewed its appeal for community participation as the project entered a more active phase of implementation.
Madan has continued to emphasize the company’s commitment to creating safer environments across LAC’s operations, including workplaces, schools, homes, and communities where employees and their families live.
As part of the campaign, residents, workers, and students are participating in focus group discussions, town hall meetings, and one-on-one awareness sessions. These engagements provide opportunities for participants to ask questions, raise concerns, and gain a clearer understanding of sexual harassment and abuse.
The project also places emphasis on developing community focal persons who can act as trusted contacts for individuals seeking information, reporting incidents, or looking for available support services.
According to the program’s targets, outreach will cover 83 LAC camps and 43 surrounding communities, in addition to schools located within and around the company’s concession.
The organizers say the campaign is not only about helping people recognize sexual harassment. It is equally focused on ensuring that people understand what steps they can take when they experience or witness inappropriate behavior.
The initiative builds on work carried out by LAC over the past two years to establish gender committees. These committees are intended to help strengthen follow-up on harassment-related concerns while supporting efforts to create safer environments for employees and residents.
The campaign reflects the view that having policies in place is not enough to prevent sexual harassment.
For prevention efforts to be effective, people need to understand their rights, feel safe speaking about their experiences, and have access to reporting systems that are trusted, accessible, and responsive.
Through the SPEAK UP Project, BridgePath International is supporting awareness and prevention education, training community focal persons, strengthening reporting mechanisms, promoting safeguarding, and providing survivor-sensitive support.
The central message of the campaign is that people should not feel compelled to remain silent when they experience or witness sexual harassment or abuse.
For LAC management, preventing such incidents before they happen remains a key part of its broader responsibility, alongside ensuring appropriate responses when concerns are reported.
