Archive for category: Women and Female Empowerment

information and Stories about woman and female empowerment.

What it’s Really Like to be a Woman in India

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India has two faces. The first is the one we can see in Bollywood movies: beautiful actresses, extravagant costumes and dances, romantic scenarios, love. The second is closer to reality. Women forced into marriage because their parents cannot support them, waves of femicides, sexual harassment – a few examples on a long list. So, between the romanticized image of women and that of women as victims of society, what is it really like to be a woman in India?

Among the G20 nations, a 2012 poll by the Thomson Reuters Foundation ranked India as the worst place to live for women. Why? In a highly religious and strictly stratified society, women have the lowest status, without a doubt.

In traditional Indian society, women are perceived as inferior to men. Mere housewives, they are expected to stay at home, bear children, and take care of household chores. Most women, even nowadays, are forced into marrying a husband that their family chooses. Furthermore, although female literacy rates have increased, only 65.46 percent of women could read and write in 2011 as compared to 82.14 percent of men. This 16.68 percentage-point gap can be attributed to the traditional view that women do not need to go to school.

This patriarchal mindset is still deeply embedded in Indian mentalities. Even before their birth, women are the victims of discrimination due to the hefty dowry the girl’s family must give the husband’s family upon her marriage. Because women cannot inherit from their families, parents have a strong sex-selection bias towards boys to ensure the survival of their descendant line, triggering waves of femicides. Indeed, femicide has been a great plague in India. Research conducted by economists Siwan Anderson and Debraj Ray found that nearly 2 million women are missing in a given year, due to female foeticide and girl killings.

Despite this appalling observation, femicide was only officially recognized as gender-related killing on March 15 of 2013, during the 57th session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW). For the first time, governments are urged “to implement or strengthen national legislation in order to punish such killings of women, and girls” according to the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women). For the first time, femicide is seen as a crime in itself, and governments ought to “end impunity by ensuring accountability and the punishment of perpetrators of such crimes and reparation for the victims”.

The CSW resolution arrives in a time of social turmoil after the gang rape and subsequent death of a 23 year-old medical student on a New Delhi bus. The wave of rape protests that occurred in New Delhi after this incident spread across Asia, with demonstrations in Nepal, Sri Lanka, Pakistan and Bangladesh. But these protests did not end sexual harassment in India: in April 2013, a 5 year-old girl in New Delhi was raped and tortured for 40 hours before dying.

But it is really the recent scandal involving an American tourist gang-raped by three men in Northern India that drew more widespread international attention to the issue. In the face of these deplorable incidents, women across India and beyond have been mobilizing for their cause, and the heightened international awareness offers hope that Indian women can look forward to a better future.

– Lauren Yeh
Source: BBC, UN Women, Reuters, Guardian
Photo: JNM Journal

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Best and Worst Places to be Women

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One of the Millennium Development Goals is to promote gender equality throughout the world. This is because it has been proven that empowering women often leads to the empowerment of communities. The education of women is key to progress, for a number of reasons.

An annual report by the NGO Save the Children has shed light on a disturbing reality. Through a measurement of life expectancy, education, use of contraception, wages and political power, the organization measured the best and worst places in the world to be a woman. Overall, the results are mostly unsurprising, but show the complexity of the problem of gender inequality. Much progress has been made, but much work is still left to do.

Unsurprisingly, this year Western Europe and Scandinavia top the list of best countries to live with the countries of Finland, Sweden and Norway, followed by Iceland, the Netherlands, Denmark, Spain, Belgium, Germany and Australia. At the bottom of the list, the worst places to be a women include the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Yemen, Somalia, Niger, Chad, Afghanistan, Mali, Eritrea, Sierra Leone and Madagascar.

Though countries like India and South Africa have received significant media coverage for the levels of sexual violence their female populations suffer, they are surprisingly high up on the list. South Africa has an impressive 60% of its population using modern contraceptives and 41% of its government seats held by women. India is significantly less well off, but still beats countries such as Singapore and Korea, with an encouraging life expectancy rate and close to half the population on contraceptives.

What this shows is the multifaceted nature of discrimination; it is not manifested solely in sexual violence, but in a myriad of ways which -– though they may not be as visible -– can be similarly devastating to a women’s physical and mental well-being.

One thing that does stand out is that the link between poverty and gender discrimination is clear. The list correlates surprisingly well as a ranking of wealth as well as status. It is not exact; other factors such as culture and religion play a large role. But all of the top-ranking countries are developed and established, while all of the bottom-ranking ones have many citizens struggling to eke out an existence.

At times, some think of foreign aid as the solution to a given problem — food for hunger, relief for a disaster, supplies for education. But the truth is that foreign aid, successfully delivered, contributes to development which has far reaching implications. Encouraging the development of countries, no matter what way, opens opportunities for its citizens in far more than one area. If we are to fight gender discrimination, we must also fight poverty, one of its root causes.

– Farahnaz Mohammed

Source: Foodtank, The Independent
Photo: Visit Europe

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Pro Mujer International 101

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Pro Mujer International is a development and microfinance organization helping women in Latin America. They provide financial, health, and human development services to help women break the cycle of poverty. Pro Mujer equips women with the tools and resources necessary to build their own livelihoods through microfinance, business training, and health care support.

Pro Mujer is motivated to affect change in Latin American society. They understand the conditions of income disparity and gender inequality. They believe that when women are given the tools to lift themselves out of poverty, they will also lift their families too. According to Pro Mujer, women are more likely to reinvest in their families to provide education, healthcare and to improve living conditions.

The organization is committed to a client-focused approach that actively seeks results. They strive for integrity, transparency, solidarity and they work to maintain commitment to human development. Pro Mujer was founded by Lynne Patterson and Carmen Velasco in 1990 in Bolivia. Their vision for an organization to help lift women from poverty has today become one of Latin America’s premiere development and microfinance organizations for women. Pro Mujer has since been able to allocate over $1 billion in small loans and services including empowerment training, preventive health education and primary healthcare services.

Examples of the financial services provided by Pro Mujer include small business loans, education and housing loans, savings accounts, and life insurance. Their business and empowerment training programs teach women to be more economically independent and informed decision makers as well as teaching basic financial literacy, and empowerment training on domestic violence, communication and leadership skills. Additionally, Pro Mujer is able to provide healthcare assistance including pre and post natal monitoring, family planning, and sexual and reproductive health services to name a few.

Pro Mujer’s current CEO is Rosario Perez. Perez began her career in private banking where she was charged with leading multinational businesses and teams and executing organizational transformations. She is now responsible for Pro Mujer’s portfolio of more than US $100 million and 1,700 employees. Her employees serve more than 2,547,000 clients in Argentina, Bolivia, Mexico, Nicaragua, and Peru.

– Caitlin Zusy

Sources: Pro Mujer, Mastercard Worldwide

Apne Aap: Helping Women Worldwide

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22 women from Mumbai’s red light district who had a vision of a world where no woman can be bought or sold joined together to form Apne Aap. In its founding stages, Apne Aap provided women a safe place to meet, mend clothing, sleep, and receive mail. Throughout the years, it has grown into an influential organization that now provides self-empowerment programs to women and girls trapped in prostitution in Bihar, Delhi, and West Bengal.

Sadly, all of the founding members have passed away from hunger, suicide, and AIDS related complications, serving as an important reminder of the need to empower women in India. Today, Apne Aap provides women and girls safe places to access education, improve their livelihood options and receive legal rights training. The organization reaches more than 15,000 women and girls and is continuing to fight to keep women and girls from being treated as commodities.

Apne Aap is working to increase choices for at-risk girls and women. The organization follows two Ghandhian principles perpetuating resisting violence to the self and others and upliftment of prostituted girls and women.

The leader of Apne Aap, Ruchira Gupta, has led a career focused on highlighting the link between human trafficking and prostitution laws. She also lobbies policy makers to shift the blame from the victims to the perpetrators. Gupta has achieved international acclaim for her humanitarian work and was awarded the 2009 Clinton Global Citizen Award and the Abolitionist Award at the U.K. House of Lords as well as an Emmy for her documentary titled “The Selling of Innocents,” which inspired the creation of Apne Aap. Gupta has widely challenged the belief that slavery and prostitution are inevitable.

Gupta works vigorously to change Indian trafficking laws. She wants to see the Indian anti-trafficking law known as ITPA be amended and to focus more heavily on the responsibility of the perpetrators and not the girls and women. She advocates for enhanced prosecution of traffickers, procurers, pimps, brother owners, managers, and other groups responsible for the proliferation of human and sex trafficking in India. Gupta’s work and the work of Apne Aap provide meaningful and invaluable services to women and girls trapped in the prostitution industry in India.

– Caitlin Zusy 
Source: Apne Aap, Ruchira Gupta
Photo: Change Her World

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The Trickle-Up Solution to Global Poverty

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The Trickle Up aid foundation is turning traditional conceptions of foreign aid on its head, saying that, “investing in individuals at the grassroots level is the most powerful antidote to extreme poverty.”

Attempts to address global poverty have typically originated in large, global corporations whose tactics have been to give foreign aid or to invest in business at the highest level of society in the assumption that benefits from newfound societal organization and prosperity would “eventually trickle down to the rest of the population.”

Glen and Mildred Robbins Leet, the founders of Trickle Up, however, rejected this model as the only way to help the world’s poor, maintaining that the foreign aid money given to developing countries often got lost in corruption at the top societal levels, never quite reaching the country’s poorest members that needed the help most.

Thus, Trickle Up sought a change. Glen and Mildred believed in individuals’ power to create lasting change for themselves, and started a program in which they gave $100 grants to ten people in developing countries, urging them to launch their own microbusinesses.

Along with the small sum of money, the Leets’ model also provided basic business ownership training to their fund recipients, The Trickle Up method relies on the idea that humans feel empowered when they feel trusted and encouraged.

Trickle Up primarily focuses on women as agents of change because they believe that if women have equitable access to and control over resources, a country’s economic development will follow

Trickle Up’s website provides ample information about understanding the program’s ideology, the grant system, and rural poverty itself in an attempt to spread awareness and invite action. By empowering the world’s poor directly, Trickle Up is building a much-needed foundation for a human-rights driven and economically stable developing world.

 – Alexandra Bruschi

Source: Trickle Up
Photo: Life

Women, Pakistan, and Int. Trade

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The U.S. Agency for International Development operates a program in Pakistan focused on increasing the participation of women in international trade. The program recently celebrated its second crop of graduates.

According to the agency, the Women in Trade (WIT) program is part of USAID’s PakistanTrade Project, which represents a commitment to Pakistan to help boost economic growth, education and other areas to help ensure a future of stability and prosperity for the country. WIT is a mentorship and management training program that launched in 2011.

Through WIT women trainees (both graduates and post graduates) have access to three months of management training experience in the private sector with companies that are involved in importing and exporting goods to and from Pakistan. WIT gives the women trainees a monthly stipend for the training.

According to USAID research released in March 2011, women represented just 10 percent of the staff hired by private sector, international trade focused firms in Pakistan. Women’s participation rates in Pakistan’s formal economy are low in general. An estimated fewer than one third of the 31 million women in Pakistan who are of working age are considered economically active. And more than half of the women who are part of the workforce are either unpaid family helpers or low-skilled workers.

Through WIT trainee participants have worked with large international firms, including Target and Li $ Fung (a major apparel supplier). One of WIT’s goals is to help more women explore careers in international trade sourcing, marketing, product design, product development and supply chain management.

WIT launched as a one year program in 2011 with 17 graduates. For the second round of the program WIT placed 57 trainees, 48 of whom completed the full three months of their training by the end of 2012. Thirty-three percent of the WIT trainees in the 2012 cohort have also been fully employed as a result of their participation in the program.

– Liza Casabona

Source: USAID Business Recorder
Photo: Gender Concerns

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Varkey GEMS Fights for Global Education

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Despite the importance of global education, donor agencies and major developed countries have decreased their federal budgets and funding. Developing countries like India are working hard to get children into school and are increasing enrollment rates, but the fact remains that attendance rates and general accessibility to education in developing countries are lower than they should be.

Vikas Pota, CEO of Varkey GEMS Foundation, interprets this as “a major setback for children all over the world”, and states that “we need innovative solutions to make sure children have the opportunity to attend school”.  The Varkey GEMS Foundation attempts to imrove the standards of education for underprivileged children, with one of their major goals being to impact 100 underprivileged children for every child enrolled in a GEMS school. In order to ensure that “every child has a chance to prosper”, the foundation provides scholarships and leadership development, as well as builds schools throughout the developing world. Another core goal of the foundation is to promote gender equality and provide for girl’s and women’s education as well.

At the launch of the foundation in December 2010, Bill Clinton had this to say, “There will rarely be people who launch something with so much potential to lift the hopes and spirits and dreams of children as this Foundation has done tonight. The benefits from an educated child will affect not only the child itself, but his or her family and the wider community… the world is depending on it”. By focusing on education of underprivileged children, it is the hope of Pota and of the foundation that those children will be able to lift themselves from poverty into a life of better opportunities and independence.

Pota believes that the biggest crisis we face in education “is that of not investing enough in our teachers”. Over the next ten years, the foundation hopes to train over 250,000 teachers globally, with the help of government aid. Another problem is that the majority of aid to basic education is not allocated to the lowest income countries where the most aid is needed. Pota calls for collective responsibility and action, which starts with the citizens. Calls to congress people and legislators are the most effective way to show support, and will increase the likelihood that budgets for education-based aid will increase.

– Sarah Rybak
Source: Huffington Post, Gems Education
Photo: A Celebration of Women

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Violence Against Women is Global Health Epidemic

Violence Against WomenPhysical or sexual violence against women is causing a global health problem of “epidemic proportions,” according to a new study released by the World Health Organization on June 20.

The report, “Global and regional estimates of violence against women: prevalence and health effects of intimate partner and non-partner sexual violence,” was released in partnership with the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and the South African Medical Research Council. According to the report, more than 1 in 3 women globally are impacted by physical or sexual violence. The perpetrator of such violence is usually an intimate partner: it affects an estimated 30 percent of women worldwide.

The new study compared this violence in high-income countries with that in other countries. The study found that 23.2 percent of women living in high-income countries experience intimate partner violence, as compared with 36.6 percent in Africa, 37 percent in the Eastern Mediterranean region, and 37.7 percent in South-East Asia.

“These findings send a powerful message,” said Margaret Chan, director-general of WHO. “We also see that the world’s health systems can and must do more for women who experience violence.”

The report looked at the impact of violence on both the physical and mental health of girls and women, including broken bones, pregnancy-related complications, impaired social functioning, and mental problems.

Other findings on the health impacts of intimate partner violence were staggering. The report found that 38 percent of all women who were murdered were killed by their intimate partners. Women who experienced this were twice as likely to have alcohol-use problems and were 1.5 times more likely to acquire syphilis, chlamydia or gonorrhea. In some regions such as sub-Saharan Africa, those women were also 1.5 times more likely to acquire HIV.

The report called for a major scaling up of violence-prevention efforts by addressing social and cultural factors that could be impacting the prevalence of violence. It also called for better health care for women experiencing it. Simply teaching health workers how to respond to violence could be helpful, the report noted.

The report pulled data from dozens of regional and national studies for the first time. By using regional data it was also able to highlight regional patterns. For example, women in Africa are almost twice as likely to experience violence as women living in lower and middle-income countries in Europe.

– Liza Casabona

Source: World Health Organization, The Guardian
Photo: The Guardian

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The Secret to Combining Healthcare and Women’s Empowerment

The Secret to Combining Healthcare and Women's Empowerment|
For decades now BRAC, a Bangladeshi anti-poverty organization formerly known as the Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee, has been providing a different approach to healthcare services.  While most health care around the world is provided by doctors and nurses in a hospital setting, BRAC has been using a door-to-door method of healthcare.  BRAC hires women to deliver primary health care or locally by visiting people at their homes without a doctor or nurse.   Not only does this create healthier communities, but it also elevates these women to a higher status in society and broadens the perceptions of the role of women in these rural communities.

These women join BRAC as frontline community health promoters.  After they receive training from BRAC, they travel from house to house in order to promote many health practices that we hold as staples in the Western world.  Among these is the adoption of contraceptives, identifying pregnancy, proper health while with child, and education about children’s health.  While there, the women also treat basic illnesses among family members.  Further training from BRAC allows these women to raise awareness about other diseases like hypertension and diabetes while giving them access to equipment such as blood pressure gauges and primary medicines.

This sort of medical service without a doctor or nurse is made possible by the fact that many diseases in poverty-stricken and developing areas is the result of simple ailments that do not need extensive medical training to diagnose and treat successfully.  One of the most significant examples of this is diarrhea.  According to the World Health Organization’s website, “diarrheal disease is the second leading cause of death in children under five years old…Globally, there are nearly 1.7 billion cases of diarrheal disease every year.” These women can help stave off the malnutrition which results from diarrhea with simple oral rehydration solutions.

BRAC has evolved from a small relief organization in 1972 into the largest development organization in the world by enacting these types of strategies that utilize poor communities’ own human and material resources to create environments and situations that enable the poor to take control of their own development.  This community health program is a prime example of the best type of development strategy.  It does not consist merely of throwing resources at a community but empowers members of that community to take an active role in development.  This strategy holds even more impact because of its use of women as employees, as the empowerment of women is the key to overcoming global poverty, due to women’s large investment in their own communities.

– Martin Drake
Source: Huffington Post, World Health Organization, Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee
Photo: Global Voices

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Zainab Salbi and Women for Women International

Zainab Salbi and Women for Women International

This is a global humanitarian Zainab Salbi. She is an Iraqi-born humanitarian that founded the organization Women for Women International. Salbi has dedicated the majority of her life to helping women in war-torn countries rebuild their lives and their communities. Growing up, her father was Saddam Hussein’s personal pilot and her family was firmly in the clutches of Hussein’s inner circle. After an unsuccessful arranged marriage in America to avoid the clasp of Hussein, Zainab remarried and founded Women for Women International.

In 1993 the news of rapes in concentration camps during the conflict in Bosnia propelled Salbi to found an organization to help female victims of war. The organization provides economic aid, emotional support, job skills training, and rights education to empower women and stop the cycle of violence.

Women for Women International currently works in eight war-torn countries. The organization provides a one-year program for women to receive job and business training, enabling them to earn a living. This program helps women understand their rights and liberties and provides them with the opportunity to become leaders in their communities.

Women for Women International has mobilized more than 300,000 people in 185 countries to support female victims of war. Their support has provided assistance to more than 351,000 women through education, microfinance programs, and small business development, as well as other initiatives. Women for Women International has been able to distribute $108 million in direct aid to women.

Women for Women International works in four modules. They aim to help women sustain incomes, be aware of their rights, be educated as family and community decision-makers, and provide them with social networks and safety nets for support.

Zainab Salbi has founded a massively successful and vitally important international aid organization. Women for Women International places female empowerment and recovery at the center of its philosophy to create positive social change in the world.

– Caitlin Zusy

Source: Women for Women International Ted Talk Profile
Photo: Zimbio