Women Deliver is excited to announce that the Youth Scholarship application for Women Deliver 2013 opens today for young people who will be under 30 years old at the time of the conference! We will offer full scholarships to a select number of participants in order to maximize participation from those who are traditionally under-represented; namely, young people and those from the Global South. This support includes conference registration, round-trip economy class airfare, hotel accomodations and a fixed stipend for visa fees and other incidentals. Read more...
Updates
Michelle Bachelet Outlines Action Agenda to Advance Equality as UN Women Completes One Year
February 2nd, 2012
Statement Of Ms. Bachelet On UN Women One Year Anniversary: Calls for global mobilization and commitment to women’s rights as political and economic changes continue worldwide
New York, 2nd February — At a press conference in New York today, UN Women Executive Director Michelle Bachelet called for galvanizing greater commitment and action for women and gender equality, as political and economic upheaval threaten progress on women’s rights (remarks enclosed here). She called the press conference to report on the first year of operations of UN Women. With austerity measures, budget cuts and political changes impacting women’s lives, worldwide, Ms. Bachelet outlined the action agenda of the organization in her first press conference of 2012. Read more...
Melinda Gates and Nick Kristof Answer Your Questions, Part II
January 12th, 2012
By: Melinda French Gates
Originally posted by: the Impatient Optimists
Melinda Gates and Nick Kristof recently returned from a three-day trip to Bangladesh. To highlight the corresponding development issues, they agreed to answer reader's questions. This is the second installment of their three-part Q&A session.
Q. COSIMA BARLETT: My comments do not in any way detract from the profound admiration I have for you and your Foundation but a simple question: why do you not concentrate more of your efforts on American children who are so lacking in so many important areas as statistics now show? Read more...
Mediaplanet to Release Call-To-Action Campaign to Invest in Women and Girls Globally
January 6th, 2012
NEW YORK, Jan. 5, 2012 /PRNewswire/ — Mediaplanet Publishing, the global leader in theme media, announced the release of the fourth installment of their "Investing in Women & Girls" publication series to hit newsstands on March 2-4, 2012. In alignment with International Women’s Day, the publication will raise awareness of the potential women and girls have as the world’s greatest untapped resource, highlighting the idea that investing in women and girls is crucial in achieving global economic progress, political stability and greater prosperity for women and men around the world. Read more...
Corporate Buzz: Maternal Health Supplies Survey, Share Your Voice
December 15th, 2011
Our colleagues at PATH are spearheading an in-depth analysis of maternal health supplies to better understand the barriers, challenges, and needs of women and health providers around the world. If you haven’t participated already, please share your experience and thoughts in the mapping survey, which PATH describes as follows:
PATH recognizes the challenges to the delivery of quality MH services and reduction in maternal mortality and morbidity are myriad and complex. The intent of this landscaping is to inform recent efforts by the broader maternal and reproductive health communities to advance maternal health supplies advocacy by building upon the lessons learned and structures created by the reproductive health supplies movement. Their specific focus on overcoming the financial, logistical, and policy-related barriers to ensuring contraceptive supplies has helped to mobilize global support for and increase access to family planning overall. Read more...
Celebrate Solutions: Safe Sex, HIV/AIDS, & Reproductive Health Programs Empower Kibera’s Youth
December 12th, 2011
By: Lindsey Taylor Wood, Communications Associate
Found just five kilometers southwest of Kenya’s capital city, Nairobi, Kibera is one of the most densely populated urban settlements in the world. Of the nearly one million impoverished people inhabiting this rural area, it is estimated that 50% are under the age of fifteen, and 10-25% are infected with HIV/AIDS. To address the district’s economic instability and promote participatory development, the not-for-profit Carolina for Kibera (CFK) provides youth leadership and ethnic and gender cooperation through sports, young women's empowerment, and community development. Read on...
The UN Trust Fund to End Violence Against Women Announces the 2011 Call for Proposals
December 8th, 2011
The United Nations Trust Fund in Support of Actions to Eliminate Violence against Women is accepting applications for its 16th grant cycle (2011) from government authorities, civil society organizations and networks — including non-governmental, women’s and community-based organizations and coalitions, and operational research institutions — and UN Country Teams (in partnership with governments and civil society organizations). Read more...
Corporate Buzz: Partnering for Healthy Girls, Women and Economies
December 8th, 2011
By: Madeline Taskier, Strategic Partnerships Associate at Women Deliver
In November 2010, GBCHealth (formerly the Global Business Coalition) launched a cross-sectoral initiative, Healthy Women, Healthy Economies (HHWE), to highlight the importance of investing in the health of girls and women in order to promote economic sustainability and growth. Each HHWE corporation works to strengthen their programs while also collaborating with other partners to learn ways in which they can invest better in girls and women through the development of best practices and strategic innovations.
The partnership between GBCHealth, the U.S. State Department Office of Global Women’s Issues, and companies including Coca Cola and Chevron (among many others) guides corporate investment to areas where companies can have the most impact: improving health systems, bolstering the health of the female workforce, and supporting girls’ education. Read more...
Celebrate Solutions: New Hotline for Women with Obstetric Fistula in Sierra Leone
November 28th, 2011
By: Madeline Taskier, Strategic Partnerships Associate at Women Deliver
This fall, the Aberdeen Women’s Centre in Freetown, Sierra Leone is bringing hope to thousands of women affected by obstetric fistula. In October, the centre, which provides a variety of maternal and child health services, began offering a free phone hotline, follow up services, and surgery for women suffering from this debilitating condition.
Obstetric fistula, like maternal mortality, is an almost entirely preventable condition experienced by at least 2 million women in Africa, the Middle East, and Asia every year. When a woman has obstructed labor delaying delivery of her baby, a hole can form in the tissue between her bladder, vagina, and rectum causing uncontrollable leakage of feces or urine and can result in a stillborn birth. Performing surgery to repair the fistula is successful 90 percent of the time, but many women in these regions often do not have access to trained surgeons and have little knowledge of existing treatments. Read more...
16 Days Campaign Challenges MIlitarism And Violence Against Women
November 25th, 2011
New Brunswick, New Jersey -- On November 25, 2011, the Center for Women’s Global Leadership (CWGL) will launch the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence Campaign. Hundreds of events by organizations worldwide are planned to campaign against gender-based violence, which is experienced by up to 70% of women in their lifetime, according to the United Nations. It is estimated that worldwide, one in five women will experience rape or attempted rape. Women aged 15-44 are more at risk from rape and domestic violence than from cancer, car accidents, war, and malaria. Read more...
Celebrate Solutions: Bringing Light and Improved Economic Livelihoods to Rajasthan
October 17th, 2011
By: Madeline Taskier, Strategic Partnerships Associate at Women Deliver
At only 12 years old, Kavita* stopped attending school to help her family with housework. By 15, she was married to a man from a village in the Ajmer District of Rajasthan, a western state in India. In this new village, she taught young children during the day and attended classes at night to improve her literacy. It was through this local literacy program, Kavita was approached by leaders of The Barefoot College; a new initiative trying to develop a cohort of female solar engineers. Read more...
Financing for Development: Invest in Women – It Pays
October 14th, 2011
By: Jill Sheffield, President of Women Deliver; originally published in the Commonwealth Finance Ministers Reference Report 2011
Improving maternal health gives a high return on investment. The loss of a woman’s life or health is not just a loss to her family, but it is also a loss to the community and the nation as a whole. While nations need to keep building towards the ultimate goal of strengthening health systems, there are investments that can be made today, right now, to decrease maternal death and injury. Most of these solutions are low-cost, highly effective, and can begin to show results almost immediately. Read more...
UN Resolution on Maternal Mortality and Morbidity Adopted
October 4th, 2011
By: Joanna Hoffman, Special Projects Manager
Last week on September 28th, the United Nations Human Rights Council adopted a resolution reaffirming the importance of addressing maternal mortality and morbidity, and calling for direct action to save mothers’ lives. Specifically, the resolution calls for the development of practical guidance, through an expert workshop, to assist States, the United Nations system and all stakeholders in applying human-rights based frameworks to programs and policies aimed at preventing maternal death and disability. Read more...
Celebrate Solutions: Dairy Cooperative Empowers Tanzania’s HIV Population
October 3rd, 2011
By: Lindsey Taylor Wood, Communications Associate at Women Deliver
Nearly 730,000 women are living with HIV in Tanzania. Among them is 61-year old Faith. One of 1,600 women and men participating in the “Start and Improve Your Business (SIYB)” training program, Faith now has access to the entrepreneurial skills-building and HIV awareness-raising activities the program provides.
“I learnt that you need money or a business to generate enough income to be able to travel to town for regular check-ups and to collect antiretroviral drugs. We do not have these services at our village dispensary,” said Faith. Read more...
World Contraception Day: Silence is Damaging
September 29th, 2011
Get Involved: Add Your Own Perspectives At The Conversations For A Better World Blog Series
By: Hasinihaja Tsiaro Barijaona Raharison, one of the Women Deliver 100 Young Leaders and an Oxfam Action Partner
In Madagascar, there remains a lack of information about contraception. Myths and misconceptions surrounding contraceptive use are common among young people, and confusion and ignorance has led to incorrect or low use of modern contraceptive methods and high amounts of concern about contraceptive side effects. Myths persist, including stories that modern contraceptive methods are responsible for infertility and that taking a bath or shower after sex, rinsing a woman’s vagina with soda, or taking inappropriate pills after sex are effective at stopping unwanted pregnancies. Read more...
Corporate Buzz: A Thousand Tiny Knots - On the Way to One Million Health Care Workers
September 29th, 2011
By: Joy Marini, Director Corporate Contributions, Johnson & Johnson
A few months ago, I was sitting in a room full of “dai-moms” -- lay midwives in Dhaka, Bangladesh. These women are amazing. One of the most intriguing things about them is how they keep track of their activities. They use knotted ropes that they tuck carefully into their waistbands. Many of these midwives cannot read or write, so they keep an account of all births that they attend with the rope of tiny knots. Every knot represents a birth. Every knot represents a life. The dai-moms even remember who is represented by each knot and return to the families for newborn checks. Our partners -- Narigrantha Prabartana and the Global Fund for Women -- support these dai-moms with education, camaraderie and motivation, all of which are in short supply in the harsh, remote environments where the dai-moms work. Read more...
World Contraception Day: “Hombres y mujeres jóvenes y el acceso a anticonceptivos”?
September 28th, 2011
Get Involved: Add Your Own Perspectives At The Conversations For A Better World Blog Series
What Is The Difference Between How Young Women And Men Learn About And Access Birth Control Methods? And Why?
By: Yunuén Flores, Director of the Gender Program
I’m a young female activist and even more importantly, I live in a Latin American country: Mexico. I come from a culture that is patriarchal, machista, religious and full of taboos. Ah, and I already told you that I’m a woman! So I have lived my life with different rules than the men in my community, typecast by social norms that we ourselves have created. Read more...
World Contraception Day: Young Girls Don’t Ask “Improper” Questions
September 27th, 2011
Get Involved: Add Your Own Perspectives At The Conversations For A Better World Blog Series
By: Dalia Al-Eryani, one of the Women Deliver 100 Young Leaders
A little over a year ago, I was working to raise awareness regarding the safe age of marriage in a small rural village in the mountains of Yemen. One of our biggest supporters was, Fatima, an old woman from the community who hosted our team meetings in her home every month with her family. Fatima couldn’t have been that old really, but the hardship she had endured in her life left her looking like a fragile old woman with sun-kissed cracked brown skin, tired eyes and a big heart. One morning our meeting ended early and she sat down to talk to us. She hugged her legs to her chest and began telling us why she believed in what we were doing. Read more...
Today is World Contraception Day: Live Your Life and Know Your Rights
September 26th, 2011
Get Involved: Add Your Own Perspectives At The Conversations For A Better World Blog Series
By: Janna Oberdorf, Director of Communications and Outreach at Women Deliver
Happy World Contraception Day! If you haven’t heard of World Contraception Day, welcome, get excited, and tune in. The theme this year is “Live your life, know your rights. Learn about contraception.” It’s a pretty simple slogan but it has a powerful implication.
Young people have the right to access accurate and unbiased information about contraception and safe sex, which they need to prevent unwanted pregnancies, STIs, and improve their lives in a number of ways. But they don’t often know that, or they can’t realize those rights. We are trying to change that. Read more...
Young People Report High Levels Of Unprotected Sex and Barriers Affecting Their Rights
September 26th, 2011
London, 26th September 2011: The third annual multi-national survey, exploring young people’s attitudes to sex and contraception, has been launched today to mark World Contraception Day (WCD) 2011, which takes place every year on 26th September. The survey, entitled ‘Clueless or Clued Up: Your Right to be informed about contraception,’ has shown alarmingly high levels of unprotected sex amongst young people as well as poor knowledge of effective contraceptive options. Furthermore, respondents are avoiding asking healthcare professionals about contraception through embarrassment and many cannot rely on their schools to provide comprehensive sex education. Read more...