Check out this post from our partner Women Thrive Worldwide about the importance of the GROWTH Act, which has reintroduced in the Senate this summer.
-Margaret McDonnell

People thought Alicia would never do anything more than sweep streets. After she had to drop out of school, they thought she would never go back. When she got married at 15 and had her first child, her fate was sealed in the eyes of her community – she would spend the rest of her life sweeping streets, struggling to earn enough to feed her children.

But Alicia had other plans.

The daughter of a desperately poor family in Colombia, Alicia del Socorro Meneses has spent her whole life overcoming what could easily have been crippling challenges.

When a bloody conflict unfolded in her village, she and her husband were forced to leave their home. They moved to a new city, Agua Blanca, and hand built a house from cardboard in the slums. Alicia struggled for five years, until she met a group of Catholic nuns who gave her a small micro-loan through one of their development programs. Alicia used the loan to start a small business selling food from her house. She called her business “Alicia’s Delicacies.” Soon she was making a profit. Her husband started treating her with more respect, she was able to buy her children more necessities, and her neighbors began to view her as a community leader – she was even elected for local office!


With her new success, Alicia enrolled in a university certificate program to study business development, cooperatives, and project management. Her new skills enabled her to grow her business and employ four new women. Today Alicia’s Delicacies is thriving and Alicia is working with the same nuns who helped her, to teach other women in the area how to start their own businesses.

Says Alicia, “Now I am able to train other women and I hope that they will be able to lift themselves from poverty just as I have.”

Alicia’s story is a testament to the power of micro-finance to transform women’s lives. Last year, Alicia traveled from Colombia to Washington, DC to convince lawmakers to pass the Global Resources and Opportunities for Women to Thrive Act (GROWTH), a bill now in the Senate that would give millions of women the opportunity Alicia had.

Walking through the halls of Congress with Women Thrive staff Alicia said, “I really want the U.S. Congress to pass the GROWTH Act because […] it would open the doors for women to benefit from micro-finance and invest in local organizations like mine – we are the key because we know best how to solve local women’s issues on the ground.”

Activists around the country are participating in a call-in effort to urge Congress to pass the GROWTH Act. We need your voice: Please call your Senators TODAY and ask them to support the GROWTH Act!

Here’s how to take action:

1. Call the Capitol switchboard at (202) 224-3121 and ask to be connected to your Senators’ offices.

2. When an office staffer answers the phone say, “As a constituent of Senator ______, I am calling to ask the Senator to highlight his/her commitment to ending global poverty and empowering women worldwide by co-sponsoring the Global Resources and Opportunities for Women to Thrive Act, S. 1425.”

Please take action for women like Alicia: Call your Senators today!

-Mckenzie Lock, Women Thrive Worldwide

Photo caption: Alicia and a Senate staffer outside the office of former Oregon Senator Gordon Smith

This week’s issue of the New York Times Magazine is devoted almost entirely to the topic of women’s issues around the globe. Featuring a cover story by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn called “The Women’s Crusade” the magazine also includes an interview with Secretary Clinton—who just wrapped up a trip to Africa—as well as a Q&A with President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf.

You can check out all of the articles here.

-Chris Scott

A couple weeks ago, the Tanzania Women’s Bank opened its doors for business in the Tanzanian capital, Dar es Salaam. According to the East African, the bank is the first of its kind in sub-Saharan Africa, where the World Bank estimates that women own 48 percent of enterprises but have the hardest time accessing finance.

Although anyone is welcome to open accounts at the new bank, it targets women who have inadequate capital to grow their businesses. While traditional banks require title deeds or other proof of wealth to open account, the Women’s Bank only asks for an ID and $2 in savings, making it much more accessible to women in a country where a third of the population earns less than $1.25 a day. There are also no monthly fees.
Bank officials say that the opening was the result of years of campaigning by women’s groups. From the East African:

“Women’s groups called for the establishment of this type of bank way back in 1999. They wanted a place where they would be listened to and where their needs would be taken into account,” said Ms Chacha [Margareth Mattabi Chacha, the bank’s executive director].

“It took them 10 years to collect the necessary funds. Their biggest challenge was to satisfy all the conditions needed to be recognised as a bank. So far, the initiative is a success,” she said.

Once the bank is firmly entrenched, the founders plan to expand regionally and, eventually, across the continent.

Although the bank is just a few days old, plans are at advanced stages to open branches in other Tanzanian towns.

“Many women live in the countryside,” said Ms Chacha. “Trips to ATM machines are long and costly. We will make banking available through mobile phones, a service provided by a number of banks in Africa,” she said.

Two weeks after it opened, the Women’s Bank now has over 500 customers, 70% of whom are women. In addition to helping women open accounts, bank staff also teach them basic business skills and money management. Officials hope that the availability of staff to walk women through the various steps and procedures will help make the process less intimidating for Tanzanian women, who like most African women are unlikely or unable to take advantage of formal banks. According to a 2006 World Bank survey, only 5% of Tanzanian women use banking services, compared to 11% of men.

Helping women overcome barriers to accessing credit and controlling their own finances is widely accepted as a key step in transforming communities in the world’s poorest countries. For years, microfinance institutions have targeted women as the recipients of small, low-interest loans on the premise that money invested in women is money invested in families and communities. A study in Brazil, for example, found that a child’s survival probability increases by about 20% when income is in the hands of the mother.

When matched with social and political opportunities, economic empowerment for women can have a multiplier effect on families and communities. So watch Tanzania over the next few years. It’s a country that has made significant progress in areas like health and education in the past decade, but this recent development might be the first step towards a new era.

-Nora Coghlan

On Sunday, an op-ed by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton appeared in the South African newspaper City Press. The article was written in honor of National Women’s Day, a holiday established to recognize the 20,000 South African women who marched in Pretoria on August 9, 1956 to protest apartheid laws.

In her op-ed, Clinton explained that she was traveling across Africa to highlight the continent’s promise and possibility. But as she noted, “empowering women is key to global progress and prosperity.”

Be sure to read the full op-ed here and stay tuned to the ONE blog for updates on the final days of Secretary Clinton’s Africa trip—visits to Nigeria, Liberia and Cape Verde.

-Pooja Gupta

A guest post from our friends at Women for Women International, an organization that provides women survivors of war, civil strife and other conflicts with the tools and resources to move from crisis and poverty to stability and self-sufficiency, thereby promoting viable civil societies.

U.S. Secretary of State Clinton’s visit to Goma offers promising signs that the epidemic of rape and sexualized violence directed against the women of Eastern Congo will at last become a central issue in the U.S. foreign policy agenda. It represents hope for the hundreds of thousands of women, like Honorata, who have been raped, tortured, and then rejected by their families. We appeal to Secretary Clinton to end this war on Congo’s women.

When Honorata was captured in 2002 (a 48-year old mother of six), her captors referred to her as “a meal.” Everybody who was hungry for sex could take her. After raping her, they would pick up a rag, put it on the end of their rifle, and insert it into her, saying that they were “wiping her clean.” We see so many women like Honorata in our work in Eastern Congo, women who are taken as sex slaves, subjected to barbaric torture and inconceivable violence, and then cast out by their families and communities due to the powerful stigma of rape.

When I met Honorata last fall, she told me about this stigma for rape survivors in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). After over a year of brutal torture, she managed to escape. But her ordeal was not over. Her husband refused to take her back, calling her “a disgrace to the family.” One day rebels attacked the town and she was taken again, along with two pregnant women. They were gang raped. Her front teeth were knocked out during ‘caresses’ they gave her with rifle butts. Her eyesight was impaired due to the severe beatings she endured, and her ring finger became stiff after they sawed off her wedding band.

But there is reason to hope. Secretary Clinton is visiting Goma to hear the stories of women like Honorata, women who are speaking out against rape and calling for justice. And people around the world are calling for action and taking action themselves, sponsoring women like Honorata and supporting them as they rebuild their lives and communities.

I now call Honorata a colleague. She participated in the Women for Women International program as a sponsored sister, receiving economic assistance and training that helped her rebuild her life, send her children to school and even build a house. She also became a staff member of our DRC chapter upon graduation, becoming a Women for Women International trainer in her own right and a community organizer encouraging fellow rape survivors to break the silence and demand justice.

Together we can bring a lasting peace to Congo. You can sponsor a Congolese woman like Honorata through our program. You can run for Congo Women. You can demand that the international community make a stand for Congo’s women. I think we can all hope that Secretary Clinton’s visit to Goma represents a first step in that direction.

-Lyric Thompson, Women for Women International

Later today, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will land in South Africa (the second stop of her 11-day trip to Africa) and meet with leaders to discuss the issue of HIV/AIDS, an epidemic that has hit South African particularly hard.

Approximately 6 million people are currently living with HIV in South Africa—more than any other country in the world. Women make up the largest number of those infected, but rates are high for children, too (nearly 300,000 children are infected). Tuberculosis (TB)—the leading cause of death in South Africa—is responsible an estimated 13 deaths every hour.

South Africa’s response to HIV/AIDS began early in the pandemic: the first AIDS Advisory Group was formed in 1985. And while the government has occasionally been criticized for its response to the epidemic, the past five years have seen consistent increases in HIV/AIDS funding. By 2011, domestic financing is scheduled to reach nearly $1 billion a year, but concerns linger over what effects the current recession (the first in 17 years) will have on the upcoming health budget. Observers remain cautiously optimistic that the new health minister, Dr. Aaron Motsoaledi, will follow in the strong footsteps of former health minister Barbara Hogan.

Donor financed health initiatives have played an important role in South Africa’s efforts to provide HIV prevention, care, and treatment services to its people. The country is one of the 15 focus countries for the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), receiving nearly $600 million in 2008. Looking ahead, Eric Goosby, the new head of PEPFAR, said that focus countries should expect to see a greater emphasis on prevention, country partnerships and strengthening health systems.

Since 2002, South Africa has also received $228.6 from the Global Fund for HIV/AIDS and TB—and this aid, combined with that from PEPFAR and other donors, appears to be working, as the number of people living with HIV under the age of 20 has dropped. But as the global financial crisis threatens to overturn this progress, continued U.S. support for these programs is critical.

Stay tuned to the ONE blog for further updates on Secretary Clinton’s travels through Africa.

-Lisa Fleisher

Our ONE Campus Challenge students are on the ground in Kenya. Melissa Boles reports back:

Today was spent learning a lot about youth, and visiting a number of facilities that reach out to youth ages 10-21 with HIV counseling and testing, STI treatment, and even male circumcision. The clinics have served over 12,000 women in their family planning program, which teaches parents how to talk with their children about sex and safe sex practices.

Some of the areas have women and children days, where the services, which are always free, focus on the women and children that come to the facilities. There are a number of support groups for single mothers, HIV-positive teens and young adults, and wives in the area.

I spoke to one woman today named Eunice Chacha. She is 22 years old, with two children, and found out she was HIV-positive three years ago. She was always very sick, and finally was tested. When she told her husband, he left her. She found herself alone and sick, with one child and a baby on the way. She attempted suicide twice before the Tuungane Youth Center stepped in and got her free assistance, as well as a support group to talk to. She is now very healthy and strong, and both of her children are HIV free.

I think every woman I met today reminded me that women are very powerful, no matter where they live or what challenges they face. I am eager to see what more I can learn about women in the next couple of days.

-Melissa Boles

Bob Geldof guest-edited Sunday’s edition of the Italian publication La Stampa. In the coming days we’ll be posting English language versions of the featured articles, including this one from Naomi Campbell:

It has been another extraordinary year for me not to mention my many trips to Italy for both work and pleasure. Bella Italia! I am honoured to share with you a project, which I have recently been dedicated to, and something I am deeply passionate about.

A year ago I visited Downing Street in London to meet with Sarah Brown, the prime minister’s wife. At the meeting Sarah spoke at length about The White Ribbon Alliance for Safe Motherhood (WRA), which she is a patron of, and their grassroots network which campaigns to stop women dying in childbirth around the world. That was the start of my work with the WRA right then and there. As Sarah spoke eloquently about her work with the charity, I was shocked at the extent of the problem, a problem I was completely unaware of at that point.

Millions of women are dying needlessly around the world. In the developing world a woman dies every minute giving birth, and almost always her baby will die too. In these places, women are often the breadwinners and leaders in the family. So, when a mother dies it affects not only her children but also her entire family, their livelihood and future.

There are solutions to this problem and they are immediately attainable. However, we must act quickly in support of this cause. By acting, we will help save half a million young women’s lives a year. It’s important for our global future; healthy families are vital to peace, stability and prosperity everywhere.

Last September I hosted with Sarah a catwalk show in aid of the WRA at London Fashion Week to raise funds and awareness of the cause. (more…)

Another on-the-ground post from the delegation traveling through Ethiopia and Ghana this week, this time from Maggie Williams. Learn more about the trip here.

There have been miracle days on this trip.  Yesterday, for me, most of the miracle took place at the Tema General Hospital in Tema, Ghana.  The hospital is a dynamic, living, breathing place, where women and their children are loved and taken care of.  Mothers with HIV find hope and help for both their lives and the lives of their children. Tema identifies women with HIV, gets them into treatment and helps them deliver and care for their healthy babies.  Maybe we just caught the Tema staff on a good day, but they make this very tough work look and feel like a labor of love.

Small simple counseling, testing, and treatment rooms line the hallways. Bigger rooms are used for waiting, dispensing medicine, and perhaps more importantly, for sharing the company of other women.

But particularly seared into my brain are the pictures of the Ghanaian women who are the nurses, doctors and technicians.  These professional women are master organizers.  They are customer service savvy, heavily invested in making things work for their clients.  They understand the emotional and economic challenges these families face.  They are the kind of women who post their goals along the walls and reach them.

I feel honored to have met them.

-Maggie Williams

Ritu speaking with a market vendor in Accra, Ghana

This week, Ritu Sharma, Women Thrive’s Co-founder and President, has been in Ghana and Burkina Faso, trying to learn about what life is like for women farmers, what their governments are doing to empower them, and what U.S. assistance programs can do to help. Accompanied by a team of Women Thrive staff, Ritu has met with local women’s organizations, such as their advocacy partner, Coordinator Coalition Burkinabe pour Le Droit du la Femmes (CBDF), a coalition of 15 women’s associations that educates Burkinabe women and helps them advocate for better economic rights. She has also met with individual women farmers, Burkina Faso government officials, and U.S. development agencies working in the country.
Read Ritu’s daily diaries and conversations with women farmers.

For most women in Burkina Faso, where almost half of the population lives below the poverty line, life is a daily struggle. Typically living in rural areas, most women have little access to ongoing education or potable water. Yet because they are the majority of farmers and are responsible for child care, Burkinabe women spend much of their day performing field work, growing food and crops for their families. However, despite this often grueling work, many Burkinabe women are not allowed to own the very land they farm, because customary often law excludes women from land ownership, preventing them from investing in the tools, irrigation, and seeds that would make their families better fed and their children better off. Learn more about women’s role in agriculture.

-McKenzie Lock, Women Thrive Worldwide