Camfed writes:
As people around the globe declare their allegiance to #GenerationEquality, we mark the 25th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action - a progressive roadmap for female empowerment.
Collectively, we are taking stock, at a time when not a single country has achieved gender equality, with only 10 years to go to meet the Sustainable Development Goals to make the world a healthier, safer, more equal and more prosperous place. It all starts with education, and with women and girls being valued equally, with the same opportunities and rights as their male counterparts.
“Equality starts with education. Education paves the way for financial independence and leadership. When a woman is financially independent, she has a voice; she has agency; she can resist exploitation and make decisions about her body and her future,” says CAMFED’s Fiona Mavhinga, Executive Adviser and founding member of the CAMFED Association of women leaders educated with CAMFED support. “A financially independent woman has the capacity to reach out to others, to lift them up. She can be that role model, that entrepreneur, that policy maker, using her own experience to help others go further, quicker.”
CAMFED, which supports girls in sub-Saharan Africa to learn, thrive and lead change, has created a model that radically improves girls’ prospects of becoming independent, influential women. Its International Women’s Day appeal focuses on the impact of supporting vulnerable young women from marginalized communities beyond the classroom, to lead change as experts in sustainable business, including in climate-smart agriculture.
“Women continue to face a lot of barriers - they still don’t have the same educational opportunities, land, capital, or support networks as men. But we are showing that when you remove those barriers, women’s contributions create an incredible multiplier, making the world a better place for all of us,” Fiona Mavhinga adds.
In 2019, an analysis by the Boston Consulting Group showed what this would look like on the macro level: “If women and men participated equally as entrepreneurs, global GDP could rise by approximately 3% to 6%, boosting the global economy by $2.5 trillion to $5 trillion.”
On the micro level, the figures are just as persuasive: The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations has shown that “an increase to a woman’s income of $10 achieves the same improvements in children’s nutrition and health as an increase to a man’s income of $110.”
CAMFED, which invests in young women in and beyond the classroom, now has a 150,000-strong network of educated women leaders, whose activism underscores these statistics. Women like Mwanaisha from rural Tanzania, a climate-smart farmer who has already trained 1,200 community members, and offers jobs to 15 workers. She supports students with life skills sessions, and donates food to her local school.
Mwanaisha says, “I would like to create a supportive environment to ensure girls can access school easily, can perform well, and understand the consequences of early pregnancies and marriages, and of dropping out of school.” As a successful businesswoman, she not only develops her community, but is a realistic role model for other girls. She is part of #GenerationEquality, a generation CAMFED is seeking to grow as a matter of urgency.
More on CAMFED’s International Women’s Day campaign>>>
- CAMFED was recognized with the 2019 UN Global Climate Action Award for young women’s grassroots action on climate change in rural sub-Saharan Africa.
- The International Women’s Day campaign is supported by key partners, including the The Hon Julia Gillard AO, Patron of CAMFED and 27th Prime Minister of Australia, and The Queen’s Commonwealth Trust, which supports CAMFED Association leaders’ philanthropic activities in Africa.
- CAMFED is a key member of the UN Girls’ Education Initiative (UNGEI), which has just released a new research report and policy note -Transformative political leadership to promote 12 years of quality education for all girls in partnership with the REAL Centre at the Faculty of Education of the University of Cambridge, whose research has also underscored the cost-effectiveness of CAMFED’s programmes.
- Writing in Forbes in February 2020, Kim Starkey Jonker, CEO of King Philanthropies, highlighted the self-generated activism of the CAMFED Association and CAMFED’s emphasis on “pay-it-forward-scaling”.
About CAMFED
Learn, thrive and lead change
CAMFED is a pan-African movement, revolutionising how girls’ education is delivered. Through a gold-standard system of accountability to the young people and communities we serve, we have created a model that radically improves girls’ prospects of becoming independent, influential women. Our impact increases exponentially through the Association of young women educated with CAMFED’s support. Together, we multiply the number of girls in school, and accelerate their transition to secure livelihoods and leadership.
Through the CAMFED Association, women are leading action on the big challenges their countries face - from child marriage, and girls’ exclusion from education, to climate change. This unique pan-African network of lawyers, doctors, educators, and entrepreneurs now numbers more than 150,000 and is growing exponentially as more girls complete school and join them.
Our collective efforts have already supported more than 3.3 million children to go to school across Ghana, Malawi, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe, and nearly 5.7 million students have benefited from an improved educational environment.
For more information visit camfed.org or contact comms@camfed.org. Follow us across social media: @camfed.