Today, the world will celebrate International Women’s Day, an annual opportunity to recommit to gender equality. This year’s observance comes at an important time for women’s rights, as global movements such as #MeToo and #TimesUp are refocusing attention on the discriminatory practices that women confront in their social and professional lives.
However, while women in the developed world are waging big battles over gender bias, women and girls in developing countries remain focused on smaller victories.
On this International Women’s Day, we must not forget that in the world’s poorest communities, poverty, hunger, domestic violence and discrimination remain endemic obstacles to gender parity.
I have studied gender and development in the global south for 15 years. My research, which has included thousands of interviews with women from India to Burkina Faso, has centered on one question: How can the international community improve the welfare of the world’s poorest women?
The answer, it turns out, is to help them do what they are already doing on their own.
One of the most effective ways to empower women anywhere, but especially in the developing world, is by promoting financial independence.
In many areas, that means supporting “informal savings groups,” networks of like-minded women who pay dues to build a shared pool of resources. This money can then be drawn on to fund any number of items, such as small business expenses, school fees, or healthcare costs.
Community-based savings groups — there are millions in Asia and Africa alone — are changing lives every day. I once met a woman in Burkina Faso whose son owes his life to the financial resources of a savings network.
One evening, when the boy was violently ill with diarrhea, his mother called a taxi to take him to the nearest clinic. However, taxis, like ambulances, must be paid for in advance and the woman had no money.
Fortunately, a neighbor who belonged to a savings group was able to contribute and pay the fare. That immediate access to cash very likely saved the boy’s life.
Most savings group loans are small. For example, in Benin the average loan size in one group is just US$9. However, in a country where the average annual income is less than US$800, small amounts can make a huge difference.
Unfortunately, many savings groups, as important as they are, do not scale; most operate in isolation from official services, which weakens their effectiveness. Women in poor communities must rely on one another, but they also need access to government and international agencies if they are ever to escape from hunger and poverty.
That is why my organization, the Grameen Foundation, is using digital technology and mobile phones to connect savings groups with other service providers.
One of our largest projects is in Burkina Faso, a desperately poor country in west Africa where an estimated 55 percent of the population is food insecure for at least a portion of the year.
Since 1993, we have worked with more than 73,000 women in nearly 3,300 savings groups, bringing services directly to the women who need them.
Our average participant is 40 years old, illiterate and earns just US$7 per week selling crops such as sesame and peanut.
When we began the program, only about half of the women we worked with said they felt empowered in their homes; many feared their husbands.
Today, those sentiments are slowly changing. By serving as a bridge between informal savings groups and banks, health centers, schools and agricultural extension services, we are helping women make better decisions about food use, nutritional practices and spending.
Our goal is to reduce poverty rates by strengthening asset management skills, which would give women a greater voice in their communities. “Gender dialogue sessions” that we host are also strengthening family bonds.
During each of my field visits, I have been amazed at how these efforts are affecting women’s lives. On one recent trip, I met Rasmata, a young mother who told me that thanks to the safety net of her savings group, she was managing to support her family, despite her husband’s emigration abroad, her father’s recent death and a lingering drought.
She was diversifying her income, managing her finances and even adopting climate-smart farming techniques. The best part was that she described herself as a “hard-working, respectful, rigorous and ambitious woman.”
Those are adjectives that women everywhere, regardless of their financial situation or education, deserve to ascribe to themselves. So this week, as the world celebrates the incredible progress that women have made on the long march to parity, I will be thinking about women like Rasmata, who have accomplished so much, despite having so little.
Bobbi Gray is research director at the Grameen Foundation, a global nonprofit dedicated to ending poverty and hunger.
Copyright: Project Syndicate
Recently, China launched another diplomatic offensive against Taiwan, improperly linking its “one China principle” with UN General Assembly Resolution 2758 to constrain Taiwan’s diplomatic space. After Taiwan’s presidential election on Jan. 13, China persuaded Nauru to sever diplomatic ties with Taiwan. Nauru cited Resolution 2758 in its declaration of the diplomatic break. Subsequently, during the WHO Executive Board meeting that month, Beijing rallied countries including Venezuela, Zimbabwe, Belarus, Egypt, Nicaragua, Sri Lanka, Laos, Russia, Syria and Pakistan to reiterate the “one China principle” in their statements, and assert that “Resolution 2758 has settled the status of Taiwan” to hinder Taiwan’s
Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s (李顯龍) decision to step down after 19 years and hand power to his deputy, Lawrence Wong (黃循財), on May 15 was expected — though, perhaps, not so soon. Most political analysts had been eyeing an end-of-year handover, to ensure more time for Wong to study and shadow the role, ahead of general elections that must be called by November next year. Wong — who is currently both deputy prime minister and minister of finance — would need a combination of fresh ideas, wisdom and experience as he writes the nation’s next chapter. The world that
Can US dialogue and cooperation with the communist dictatorship in Beijing help avert a Taiwan Strait crisis? Or is US President Joe Biden playing into Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) hands? With America preoccupied with the wars in Europe and the Middle East, Biden is seeking better relations with Xi’s regime. The goal is to responsibly manage US-China competition and prevent unintended conflict, thereby hoping to create greater space for the two countries to work together in areas where their interests align. The existing wars have already stretched US military resources thin, and the last thing Biden wants is yet another war.
Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, people have been asking if Taiwan is the next Ukraine. At a G7 meeting of national leaders in January, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida warned that Taiwan “could be the next Ukraine” if Chinese aggression is not checked. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg has said that if Russia is not defeated, then “today, it’s Ukraine, tomorrow it can be Taiwan.” China does not like this rhetoric. Its diplomats ask people to stop saying “Ukraine today, Taiwan tomorrow.” However, the rhetoric and stated ambition of Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) on Taiwan shows strong parallels with