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2011–2012 Grantees | 2009–2010 Grantees
2011–2012 Grantees
In the first phase of its 2011–2012 grantmaking cycle, UN Women’s Fund for Gender Equality delivered more than USD 4.8 million to 15 innovative programmes in the Arab States that focus on women’s economic empowerment and political empowerment at local, national and regional levels. (See the list of Arab State grantees in Arabic.)
Economic Empowerment Grant Recipients
Akhiam Association
Title: Capacity Building of Women in the Eastern High Atlas, for its Economic and Social Empowerment
Programme Country: Morocco
Amount: USD $260,000
Description:
In the Eastern High Atlas Mountain region of Morocco, women are on the frontline of key productive sectors, such as agriculture, that are particularly vulnerable to the impacts of environmental and social changes, including global warming, the global economic crisis, geographic marginalization and unsustainable demographic growth. The programme intends to empower over 400 marginalized or low-income rural women through entrepreneurship and capacity building initiatives, such as adult learning classes, income-generating workshops, household management skill sessions, and gender-responsive budgeting discussions with local and national stakeholders. It seeks to achieve its objectives by employing advocacy, media outreach, and awareness raising strategies in addition to forming a core group of rural women to advocate for women’s civil and political rights, building on existing partnerships with state Ministries and non-governmental organizations in Morocco.
Amel Association
Title: Promoting Access of Rural and Refugee Women to the Labor Market and Livelihood Opportunities
Programme Country: Lebanon
Amount: USD $325,000
Description:
In Lebanon, Iraqi and Sudanese women refugees carry the burden of economic responsibility for their families and children under severe financial and material constraints, as they are often subject to a high degree of economic insecurity which is compounded by discrimination, a lack of employment opportunities and the rising cost of living. In addition, marginalized rural women in Southern Lebanon face some of the same difficulties in terms of employment and access to markets. The programme seeks to contribute to the economic empowerment of refugee and marginalized rural women by improving their status within Lebanese society. It seeks to increase the employability of 460 refugee and rural women through vocational and educational training in managerial skills, marketing strategies, and computer/information technology, in addition to developing specific work opportunities and income-generating activities that will encourage the growth and the long-term viability of women’s activities.
Association of Solidarity and Fight against Poverty and Exclusion, EL GHAITH
Title: Promotion of Equality between Men and Women in the Rural Area of Bordj Bou Arreridj for Human, Social and Economic Development
Programme Country: Algeria
Amount: USD $200,000
Description:
Rural women in Algeria face serious challenges related to unemployment, social exclusion and lack of respect for their fundamental human rights that stem from patriarchal interpretations of customs and practices. In addition, the incidence of early marriages deprives young women of opportunities to obtain an education and find proper employment. The programme’s strategic approach integrates technical and financial support, local partnerships, media mobilization, gender sensitization and awareness raising campaigns and will target local authorities, religious groups and NGOs to help foster a more respectful environment for rural women. It will build upon existing partnerships between civil society and government institutions, as it aims to further the economic empowerment of 500 rural women through income-generating agricultural activities and small manufacturing units.
Ministry of Social Solidarity and Justice
Title: The Family Cash Allowance
Programme Country: Egypt
Amount: USD $400,000
Description:
In Egypt, the demand for social justice, inclusion, and equality were major drivers of the January 25th Revolution. The development of a Conditional Cash Transfer programme from the Ministry of Social Solidarity and Justice aims at increasing women’s control over economic resources as it seeks to restore state accountability to its citizens and empower economically disadvantaged women and their families through the use of cash transfers. The proposal envisages holistic empowerment strategies, including mainstreaming gender into social protection policies, service provision, and capacity building. The programme’s beneficiaries include 85,000 women and girls and more than 200 trained social workers whom will implement and monitor the programme.
National Institution for Solidarity with Women in Difficulty, INSAF
Title: Training, Personal Development and Socio-professional Integration of Single Mothers
Programme Country: Morocco
Amount: USD $545,000
Description:
In Morocco, the plight of young single mothers and their children born outside of marriage has become a public concern over the past three decades. Despite the progress achieved, single mothers suffer from discrimination as well as social, legal, and economic exclusion. The programme aims at re-integrating single mothers and their children into their communities and at creating a more respectful environment which will foster their social stability and economic empowerment. INSAF, which has a track-record of leadership on this highly taboo topic, aims to address this issue through holistic empowerment strategies, including awareness raising, advocacy, vocational training and capacity building, to directly impact the lives of more than 2,000 single mothers and their children in Casablanca, in addition to 27,200 indirect beneficiaries throughout Morocco.
Society for the Protection of Nature in Lebanon
Title: Promoting Hima Women Empowerment for Conservation and Livelihood
Programme Country: Lebanon
Amount: USD $280,000
Description:
In Lebanon, enabling rural and marginalized women to gain access to natural resources and empowering them to have a greater sense of ownership on resource management will reduce poverty levels and will improve women’s well-being, including by supporting their access to food, medicinal plants, wood, and clean water. The programme represents an innovative approach that combines a community conservation focus with poverty alleviation and economic development initiatives for local women. It specifically focuses on the preservation of ecological systems, through traditional land designation and natural resource protection structures, called Himas. The programme’s strategies include capacity building, awareness raising and sustainable management of natural resources as a tool for improving the livelihoods of 6,000 women in the 6 established Himas in Lebanon.
Political Empowerment Grantee Recipients
Anabta Women Welfare Society
Title: Women’s Political Empowerment
Programme Country: Occupied Palestinian Territory
Amount: USD $200,000
Description:
In the Occupied Palestinian Territory, women face many challenges that prevent them from participating in public life and decision making. The programme represents an innovative approach, which seeks to encourage women’s political participation and social involvement through theatre, drawing, arts, and craft techniques. Through the establishment of House of Women, a cultural center for gender-based solidarity, the implementing organization aims to increase women’s visibility and create a space for the cultivation of their self-expression, which is intended to ultimately lead to more active political empowerment. The initiative employs a set of strategies, which encompass informal education, specifically music, arts and drama, as well as training and capacity building, advocacy and lobbying. More than 200 women and girls in Anabta village, Tulkarem district, West Bank will benefit from its implementation.
Association of Women Committees for Social Work
Title: Enhancing Palestinian Women’s Participation in Public and Political Life
Programme Country: Occupied Palestinian Territory
Amount: USD $450,000
Description:
This programme seeks to increase women’s political representation at the community level to galvanize new spaces for Palestinian women’s political empowerment. Working with young women activists as promoters of social and policy changes, it seeks to ensure that new quota measures of women’s representation are translated into tangible results for Palestinian women. The programme employs a holistic approach that encompasses improving networking among women’s NGOs, raising awareness of 15,000 rural women, building the capacity of female local officials and women activists, and making local government more responsive to gender issues including promotion of gender responsive budgeting of these local councils.
Dalia Association
Title: Women Supporting Women
Programme Country: Occupied Palestinian Territory
Amount: USD $200,000
Description:
Palestinian women have a strong history of political and social activism, which is often challenged by the gender-differentiated impact of the male-centered development aid system. An innovative initiative, called community-controlled grant-making, proposes that women take a leadership role in determining how development resources should be used to benefit their communities. It focuses on building the capacity of women’s organizations to run projects successfully and transparently, while also facilitating their access community resources. The programme will benefit 45 different women’s groups that will be selected by their peers to receive grants. These groups will implement their individual projects based entirely on peer support, providing and receiving advice and assistance on budgeting, procurement and contracting, financial reporting, community decision-making, self-monitoring, and resource mobilization.
Egyptian Center for Women’s Rights
Title: A Wave of Women’s Voices – 1,000 and Counting…
Programme Country: Egypt
Amount: USD $545,000
Description:
The programme’s objective is to mobilize women from all governorates, who can form a “wave of women’s voices” and take on leadership roles. The initiative seeks to mobilize a minimum of 1,000 women across Egypt in a one-year period, in order to create a snowball effect that will encourage additional women to join throughout the programme duration and beyond. To attain its main objective – enhancing women’s political empowerment – the grantee organization will employ a series of strategies, including network building, lobbying, advocacy, capacity development and targeted trainings for young women activists.
Karama
Title: Inclusive Democracy: Ensuring Women’s Political Rights in Libya, Yemen, and Egypt throughout the Arab Spring
Programme Country: Egypt, Libya and Yemen
Amount: $565,000
Description:
In Egypt, Libya, and Yemen, women are active political citizens, who have demanded social change during the transitions occurring in the region. The programme explores the impact of these transitions on women and aims to increase their leadership and voice in the political sphere, ultimately advancing gender equality. Working at a regional level, the implementing organization will train, support, and strengthen the capacity of 30 local women’s NGOs and 150 women activists and political leaders in the three targeted countries – Egypt, Libya, and Yemen. The programme utilizes a comprehensive set of strategies, including networking and alliance building, training and capacity building, and advocacy campaigns in addition to hosting regional consultations as tools to enhance women’s political empowerment.
Palestinian Centre for Peace and Democracy and the Jerusalem Centre for Women
Title: Towards a Democratic Constitution that Grants Equal Rights to Women
Programme Country: Occupied Palestinian Territory
Amount: USD $200,000
Description:
In the Occupied Palestinian Territory, the text of a permanent constitution is yet to be drafted. The available proposals only vaguely reflect women’s human rights as they fail to advocate for gender equality in concrete terms. Moreover, Palestinian women have neither access to the constitution drafting processes, nor have they yet attained widespread levels of political participation. The programme intends to influence the constitution drafting process through lobbying, advocacy and awareness raising strategies in order to ensure that gender equality is embedded in the new Palestinian Constitution and that the document emphasizes democratic and political reforms, tolerance, gender equality and the participation of all Palestinian citizens. 240 women beneficiaries will participate in leadership trainings on journalism, media, law and lobbying in this regard and overall 10,000 Palestinian women in Gaza and the West Bank are expected to be impacted by the programme implementation.
Stars of Hope Society
Title: Our Voice Counts
Programme Country: Egypt, Jordan, the Occupied Palestinian Territory and Yemen
Amount: USD $265,000
Description:
Women with disabilities in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Egypt, Jordan, and Yemen face multiple challenges, including social stigmatization, socio-economic exclusion, and double discrimination (on the basis of gender and disability). The programme’s main objective is to promote the rights of women with disabilities as stipulated by CEDAW and the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities by increasing their capacity and knowledge and ensuring that technical and financial support is allocated to their priorities through local and national level policies. It seeks to improve the capacity of 800 women with disabilities in the four implementing countries to actively participate in local and national advocacy campaigns with emphasis on women’s political rights. The strategies proposed include advocacy and media campaigns, fostering partnerships, coalitions, networks and strengthening regional coordination among women with disabilities.
The Women and Memory Forum
Title: Documentation and Empowerment: The Creation of an Archive of Women’s Voices in Egypt
Programme Country: Egypt
Amount: USD $200,000
Description:
The Women and Memory Forum is concerned with the negative representations and perceptions of Egyptian women that exist in the cultural sphere. A scarcity of disseminated knowledge about the role of women in history, as well as in contemporary cultural and political life forms a challenging obstacle. This initiative seeks to advance the cause of women’s political empowerment and leadership in Egypt by assembling an archive that documents and highlights the role of women as leaders, activists, and participants in major movements for change in Egypt. Through a set of strategies, which include data collection and analysis, information dissemination, networking, and awareness raising, the programme will compile women’s narratives, confronting traditional cultural stereotypes and prejudices to provide an example of women’s crucial role in formal and informal political life in Egypt. This archive will be made accessible through publications, social media and a website for use by women activists, human rights groups, university students, youth leaders and the general public.
Women Empowerment Organization
Title: Gender Training for Iraqi Academics & Researchers
Programme Country: Iraq
Amount: USD $215,000
Description:
In Iraq, the armed conflict has had a severe impact upon Iraq’s academic community. Iraqi women in academia are in a precarious situation as they face poverty, unemployment, discrimination, gender-based violence, restrictions in movement and have limited opportunities for professional development. Implementation of this programme through trainings, seminars, conferences and workshops, will aim to support the capacity of female academics and researchers in Iraq to promote women’s rights and gender studies initiatives. It also focuses on strengthening the exchange of information and experiences among national, regional and international human rights movements and on fostering non-traditional alliances. The programme intends to directly benefit 40 female Iraqi academics and researchers. In addition, it is also expected that civil society organizations and women’s rights activists will be able to increase their gender-sensitive research capacities as well as their abilities to conduct gender equality campaigns.
2009–2010 Grantees
In its first grantmaking cycle (2009–2010), the UN Women–managed Fund for Gender Equality delivered more than USD 37.5 million to 40 innovative programmes around the world that focus on women’s economic and/or political empowerment at local and national levels. In January 2010, the Fund announced the allocation of Catalytic Grants totalling more than USD 9 million to 27 initiatives in 26 countries. In July 2010, the Fund announced Implementation Grants totalling more than USD 27.5 million to recipients in 13 countries.
Catalytic Grant Recipients
The UN Women–managed Fund for Gender Equality announced in January 2010 its initial allocation of more than USD 9 million to 27 initiatives in 26 countries. The grants fall into the Fund’s Catalytic Grant category — one of two types of grants aimed to accelerate the efforts of initiatives on the ground. (View all grantee profiles.)
Africa (6) | Americas & the Caribbean (6) | Arab States (4) | Asia & the Pacific (7) | Europe and Central Asia (4)
Africa
Forum for Women in Democracy (FOWODE)
Project Title: Gender Budget Program (view profile)
Country: Uganda
Description: A recent decision by the Government of Uganda to introduce gender budgeting requires all government entities to demonstrate how resources allocated to them will address gender issues. The Gender Budget Program (GBP) intends to advance gender accountability within the government by introducing gender analysis and audits to the Parliamentary Budget Office (PBO) and legislatures. The proposal builds on past GBP efforts and provides new strategies for engagement with parliamentary actors.
Alliance Nationale Contre le Sida (ANCS) in partnership with SWAA SENEGAL
Project Title: Economic and Political Independence of Women Living with HIV in the Draft Legislation Dedicated to HIV (view profile)
Country: Senegal
Description: The project aims at the integration of provisions to augment the political and economic autonomy of HIV-positive women into national legislation on HIV and AIDS in Senegal, taking especially into account women sex workers. The implementing organizations are well known in the region as powerful agents of change and, through this programme, will undertake advocacy, establish coalitions, and generate accountability mechanisms that can serve as a model in the region and beyond.
ABANTU for Development in partnership with Ghana Gender and Climate Change Coalition
Project Title: Building Capacities to Influence Climate Change Policies from a Gender Perspective (view profile)
Country: Ghana
Description: In Ghana, women are on the frontline in key productive sectors such as agriculture that are particularly vulnerable to the impacts of global warming. The project seeks to tackle the gender-differentiated impact of climate change through innovative and precedent-setting advances in policy-making, mitigation and adaptation measures. It will contribute to a growing body of knowledge on climate change as a development issue with gender implications that cut across all sectors.
Horizons Femmes in partnership with Nouveaux Droits de l’Homme (NDH)
Project Title: The Socio-Judicial Revaluation of Domestic Employment in Cameroon (view profile)
Country: Cameroon
Description: The project seeks to improve the conditions of domestic workers, who often endure systematic and socially-accepted abuse, exploitation and stigmatization. Through empowerment, mobilization, awareness-raising and legislative advocacy, the project aims for stronger legal protections for this particularly marginalized group of women, who as a more unified and mobilized force will be better positioned to claim their rights and advocate on their own behalf.
BAOBAB in partnership with Kudirat Initiative for Democracy (KIND)
Project Title: Capacity Building and Empowerment through Political Education for Nigerian Women (view profile)
Country: Nigeria
Description: Considering that in the 2007 Nigerian elections, women were only able to claim 6 percent of state and federal legislative seats, the project seeks to increase women’s political participation in Nigeria by training and mentoring young women with political aspiration to be competitive candidates in future elections. A cadre of young, politically informed candidates for political office will be developed — women who will be part of a supportive political network and therefore better able to negotiate the world of male-dominated political processes.
MUGEDE – Mulher, Gênero e Desenvolvimento
Project Title: Fighting for Women’s Rights (view profile)
Country: Mozambique
Description: The project aims to improve the living standards of approximately 30,000 rural women by enhancing their capacity to capitalize on recent legislative advances that promote gender equality. In so doing, it aspires to increase the involvement and participation of women, and rural women in particular, in political processes.
Americas & the Caribbean
Fundacion Waaponi in partnership with Municipalidad de Cuenca
Project Title: Governability and Institutionalization of a Focus on Equity and Gender in the Cuenca District (view profile)
Country: Ecuador
Description: In order to promote gender equality standards within decision-making bodies, particularly within rural governing boards, the project builds upon existing social networks linked to rural communities to disseminate information and catalyze momentum for progress towards gender equality.
Asociación Nacional de Empresas Comercializadoras de Productores/as del Campo, A.C.
Project Title: Empowering Rural Women for Gender Equality (view profile)
Country: Mexico
Description: The project aims to leverage its broad network of civil society and government partners in 18 Mexican states to increase rural and particularly indigenous women’s economic opportunities. Towards this end, ANEC has and will continue to develop strategies and activities designed to level the playing field for women’s economic activities, particularly in the agricultural sector.
Asociación de Mujeres por la Dignidad y la Vida. Las Dignas in partnership with Asociación Movimiento de Mujeres Melida Anaya Montes LAS MELIDAS
Project Title: Strengthening Public Institutions in favor of Equality and to Combat Discrimination (view profile)
Country: El Salvador
Description: The primary objective is to catalyze the passage of a national gender equality law that enables public institutions to improve their gender sensitivity and practices. This project proposes support for legislation that mandates the integration of gender specific considerations and provisions in all public policies, as a step towards securing further, more specific rights.
Corporación Sisma Mujer
Project Title: Political Empowerment for Women Displaced by War to Hold the Government Accountable (view profile)
Country: Colombia
Description:The project focuses on empowering female internally displaced people (IDPs) in the districts of Bolivar, Chocó, Cundinamarca, Tolima, and Valle del Cauca to strengthen their agency in holding the national government to account regarding the incorporation of gender-sensitive frameworks into public policy. It seeks to catalyze support for measures to prevent further internal displacement for Colombians and to generate better provisioning for existing IDPs.
International Indigenous Women’s Forum/Foro Internacional de Mujeres Indígenas
Project Title: Strengthening Governance Systems and Indigenous Women’s Networks (view profile)
Regions: Latin America, Africa and Asia
Description: The primary objective is to engage relevant stakeholders in a process of dialogue, consultation and advocacy in order to infuse gender equality perspectives into the work of the indigenous people’s movement and indigenous governance systems. Through the strengthening of indigenous women’s networks, the project will increase indigenous women’s participation, visibility and leadership capacity at the local, regional and international level.
Centro de Investigación para la Acción Femenina (CIPAF)
Project Title: Genderizing the National Strategy for the Information Society in the Dominican Republic: e-dominicana (view profile)
Country: Dominican Republic
Description: The primary objective is to increase women’s participation in the Dominican Republic’s Information Society, as outlined in the National Strategy: e-dominicana (2007-2010), a policy currently under revision and review for extension. The strategy has the potential to redress several gender-specific dimensions of the digital divide, and to augment the potential of information technologies to ameliorate women’s economic and socio-political exclusion.
Arab States
Bisan Center for Research and Development
Project Title: Enhancing Palestinian Women Opportunities (view profile)
Country: Occupied Palestinian Territory
Description: The project seeks to consider the specific restrictions and conditions faced by Palestinian women living under occupation and develop a model cooperative specifically designed to use economic empowerment as a tool for their political and social empowerment.
Al-Shehab Organization for Comprehensive Development in partnership with Egyptian Society for Economic and Social Rights
Project Title: Promotion of General Policies to Protect the Rights of Domestic Workers in Egypt (view profile)
Country: Egypt
Description: The objective is to empower and improve the socio-economic conditions of domestic workers in two disadvantaged zones of metropolitan Cairo. Given the high levels of physical abuse and legal exploitation to which domestic workers are subjected, the organizations will establish relationships of cooperation with service providers (NGOs and the Ministry of Manpower) to offer referral services to these girls and women, including pyschological counseling, medical care, and legal services.
Palestinian Human Rights Organization – PHRO
Project Title: Advancing Palestinian Refugee Women in Lebanon Gender Equality (view profile)
Country: Lebanon
Description: A recent study of semi-permanent Palestinian refugee settlements revealed that female Palestinian refugees feel “buried alive,” facing double discrimination based on gender and refugee status. The project is an innovative effort to carve political space for these women to claim leadership positions and promote a women’s rights agenda in the camps.
Agence du Sud
Project Title:The Strengthening of Women’s Role in Local Governance through Community Development Plans (view profile)
Country: Morocco
Description: The primary objective of this programme is to support 13 rural and urban communities in the Guelmim-Es Smara region in drafting Community Development Plans, in order to improve the role and status of women in community planning processes and include provisions for the socio-economic empowerment of women.
Asia & the Pacific
Women and Media Collective
Project Title: Changing Minds: Nominations and Votes for Women (view profile)
Country: Sri Lanka
Description: The project will work to increase political parties’ nominations of women across political party lines from 2 percent (the lowest in South Asia) to 20 percent in the 2011 Local Council elections, giving particular attention to women from minority Tamil and Muslim communities. This project will not only contribute directly to women’s political empowerment in general, but by focusing on minority women candidates, it will also play a role in fostering political stability in Sri Lanka.
Rajasthan Network for People Living with HIV and AIDS in partnership with IMPACT Partners in Social Development
Project Title: Ensuring Specific Rights of Women Living with HIV (view profile)
Country: India
Description: The project seeks to build support for, draft and submit a policy document to the Government of Rajasthan that would establish a package of services and protections for women living with HIV and AIDS, taking into account the multiple levels of discrimination and vulnerabilities they face.
HomeNet Southeast Asia
Project Title: Women in the Informal Economy Advocating for Right-Based Policies Amidst the Crises (view profile)
Country: Philippines
Description: The project works to advance the advocacy initiatives of women home-based workers and other informal workers, whose livelihoods are increasingly threatened by the changing global employment system, economic and financial crisis, and devastating disasters caused by global warming. It will make use of the opportunity provided by the upcoming 2010 national election campaign to expand the advocacy agenda.
Gender at Work in partnership with DSS project of the Mitra Service Society
Project Title: The Dalit Women’s Livelihoods Accountability Initiative (view profile)
Country: India
Description: Dalit women, the poorest of the Indian poor, are subject to the triple discrimination of class, caste and gender. The project aims to build a strategic network between Dalit women’s organizations and organizations that work for Dalit women’s rights in two states, to bring Dalit women’s voices and perspectives into social accountability mechanisms and right to food advocacy.
Women and Children Legal Research Foundation
Project Title: Access to the Right to Property, Inheritance, and Land for Women (view profile)
Country: Afghanistan
Description: While extensive attention has been paid to violence against women in Afghanistan, the denial of women’s economic rights — and particularly women’s property, inheritance, and land rights — has been largely ignored, in spite of the strong linkages that exist between violence against women and insecure economic rights. As part of a holistic approach to women’s rights, the project seeks to strengthen their rights in those areas, which, in spite of certain legal protections under Sharia, are denied by traditional practice and customs.
Association of Community Radio Broadcasters Nepal
Project Title: Promoting Gender Equality in and through Community Radio of Nepal (view profile)
Country: Nepal
Description: Recognizing the transformative power and broad reach of radio broadcasting in Nepal, and accepting the social responsibility of such influence, the project aims to strengthen awareness of women’s rights through institutionalizing a gender-sensitive policy in all 164 member community radio stations and the production and broadcasting of special radio programmes.
Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat
Project Title: The Catalytic Fund for Gender Equality in Small Island States (view profile)
Countries: Cook Islands, Kiribati, Niue, Nauru, Republic of Marshall Islands and Tuvalu
Description: The project is based on the understanding that in small island states, strategic action plans for gender equality face extra implementation difficulties due to limited capacity and vulnerable environments. The project will therefore provide special assistance to the participating countries to develop and implement an action plan for advancing women’s political and economic empowerment, to complement their respective National Strategic Development Plans.
Europe & Central Asia
KULT Assocation in partnership with BH Experts Association (BHXP)
Project Title: Strengthening Women Youth Leaders in Youth Associations & their Role as Civil Society Players (view profile)
Country: Bosnia and Herzegovina
Description: The project will focus on empowering young women from underdeveloped municipalities in Bosnia and Herzegovina to play an active role in creating and implementing youth strategies at the local governmental level. It has the potential to empower a critical mass of young women leaders to influence public issues, develop their local communities and emerge as full-fledged partners in political decision making processes at the local and national levels.
Regional Public Organization Center for Migration Studies in partnership with Fund Tajikistan, Information and Legal Center “Migration and Law”
Project Title: Strategic Partnership in the Promotion of Rights and Enhancing Opportunities for Migrant Women in Russia (view profile)
Country:Tajikistan
Description: The project aims to improve the conditions of migrant women, especially those who migrate with children and those working in informal/domestic services. In contrast to the overwhelming attention that has been focused on male migration, this programme offers an opportunity to address the specific needs of migrant women from Central Asia, often excluded on the basis of race and ethnicity in Russia’s society.
All Ukrainian Network of People Living with HIV
Project Title: Gender and HIV: from Paternalism towards Active Participation (view profile)
Country: Ukraine
Description: The project seeks to incorporate gender sensitive approaches in HIV programmes at the local, regional, and national levels, as well as take into account the needs and voices of women living with HIV in the drafting and implementing of policies that affect them. In addition, the proposal focuses on ensuring gender equality by facilitating access to education, medical, social, psychological, legal services.
Women’s Space in partnership with Bibija
Project Title: Roma Decade – Equal Opportunities for Roma Women and Men (view profile)
Country: Serbia
Description: The project aims to support the creation of five Local Action Plans in five different Serbian cities that will support systematic solutions for the improvement of the status of Roma women. It focuses specifically on the intersections between CEDAW and the Serbian Roma Decade Framework, and seeks to address the specific needs of Roma women, who are subject to discrimination on the basis of both ethnicity and gender.
Implementation Grant Recipients
The UN Women–managed Fund for Gender Equality announced in July 2010 its allocation of more than USD 27.5 million to recipients in 13 countries, with grant amounts of up to USD 3 million each. The grants fall under the Fund’s Implementation Grant category, which aims to fast track action on national laws and policies to advance gender equality. (View all grantee profiles.)
Africa (3) | Americas & the Caribbean (4) | Arab States (1) | Asia & the Pacific (3) | Europe and Central Asia (2)
Africa
RCN Justice et Democratie and HAGURUKA Association for the Defence of Women and Children’s Rights
Programme Title: Beyond Raising Awareness: Shifting the Social Power Balance to Enable Women to Access Land (view profile)
Country: Rwanda
Amount: USD 2,000,000
Additional Partners: The Gender Monitoring Office and AVEGA
Description: In post-genocide Rwanda, this programme supports women’s right to land in customary and formal local-level justice systems. These two leading organizations address widespread social resistance to women’s land ownership through an elaborate mobile paralegal network that will support 100,000 claimants and through active engagement and dialogue with men and traditional leaders. The programme will equip community leaders in 840 villages with the tools and resources to support women’s effective claims to land, inheritance and economic participation at formal and informal levels. In addition, it will build accountability and input mechanisms so that local legislation and sector-level development plans reflect, incorporate and address specific challenges, such as discriminatory customary practices surrounding marriage and land inheritance, faced by rural women.
Ellen Johnson Sirleaf Market Women’s Fund
Programme Title: SMWF Markets Program (view profile)
Country: Liberia
Amount: USD 3,000,000
Additional Partners: Ministries of Public Works, Gender and Development, Health and Education; Liberia Marketing Association
Description: Throughout Africa, market women, many of whom are also farmers, form the basis of national economies, yet face pervasive constraints to economic advancement. In Liberia, 18 markets destroyed and damaged by war will be restored or constructed into expanded and improved facilities that also respond to market women’s most pressing priorities, including health care, development of business skills, literacy, early childhood education and care for their children. While the condition of markets in Liberia are extreme, market women and traders throughout Africa face similar situations and challenges; this programme will directly impact 9,000 market women and their families and will develop a high-profile market prototype with potential for replication throughout the region.
Zimbabwe Women’s Resource Centre and Network (ZWRCN)
Programme Title: Gender Budgeting and Women’s Empowerment Programme (view profile)
Country: Zimbabwe
Amount: USD 1,680,939
Additional Partners: Ministries of Women Affairs, Gender and Community Development; Finance, Economic Planning and Investment Promotion; consumer council of Zimbabwe, other CSOs
Description: This programme approaches gender-responsive budgeting (GRB) simultaneously “from above” and “from below,” by providing skills training for government officials on GRB, lobbying for increased budget allocations to finance women’s priorities in 32 selected sector ministries and working with civil society organizations to enact gender-budget monitoring and accountability mechanisms. Under Zimbabwe’s fragile political conditions, the programme will equip targeted ministries with the tools and strategies necessary to directly address the needs of 15,000 women living in poverty. Moreover, through community and local-level meetings and platforms, the programme will advocate for the adoption of laws to significantly increase the number of women in decision-making positions related to budgets and budgeting policies.
Americas and the Caribbean
Secretaría Especial de Políticas para las Mujeres – SPM (Special Secretariat for Women’s Policies) and SOS Corpo – Instituto Feminista para la Democracia (Feminist Institute for Democracy)
Programme Title: More Rights and More Power for Brazilian Women (view profile)
Country: Brazil
Additional Partners: National Association of NGOs for Women’s Policies, National Council on Women’s Rights; Instituto de la Mujer Negra, Gélèdes, and other CSOs
Amount: USD 3,000,000
Description: This strategic partnership between government and diverse women’s rights organizations works to ensure gender and racial equality, social protections and access to the labour market by women, particularly by Afro-Brazilian domestic workers — 76 percent of whom work without legal contracts. The programme creates a channel for Afro-Brazilian women to insert their priorities directly into governmental processes, increase public investment in women’s policies by 20 percent, promote policies on welfare protection for women in the informal sector and establish budget monitoring mechanisms that will ultimately affect the lives of forty-three million Brazilian women.
Equidad de Género: Ciudadanía, Trabajo y Familia (Gender Equality: Citizenship, Work and Family)
Programme Title: Strengthening Women’s Political Participation and Promoting an Economic Empowerment Agenda (view profile)
Country: Mexico
Additional Partners: The National Women’s Institute; Simone de Beauvoir Institute, Mujeres Trabajadoras Unidas, and other CSOs.
Amount: USD 2,295,000
Description: In Mexico, Equidad de Género will increase the number of women in decision-making positions across 10 states. In coordination with the government and the private sector, and building on existing networks of women’s organizations, more than 6,000 women politicians and young and Indigenous women will form municipal and state networks, where they will be coached and mentored in advocacy for gender-sensitive governance agendas. Coupled with a strategic communications and public outreach campaign, the programme aims for a 25-percent increase in the number of women in states’ congresses and high-level state offices and establishes a cohort of 1,700 women politicians to actively initiate economic policies favourable for women, including better salaries, working conditions and recognition of care work.
Asociación Coordinadora de la Mujer (Women’s Coordination Office)
Programme Title: Bolivian Women in the Process of Change: a Policy Framework with Gender Equality (view profile)
Country: Bolivia
Additional Partners: Consejo Nacional de Ayllus y Marqas del Qollasuyu CONAMAQ, Confederación Nacional de Mujeres, Indigenas y Originarias Bartolina Sisa, Federación departamental de Cooperativas Mineras de La Paz, Centro Afro Boliviano para el Desarrollo Integral, Asociación de Organización de Productores Agroecologicos de Bolivia AOPEB, Vice Ministry for Equal Opportunities (within the Ministry of Justice), and other CSOs
Amount: USD 2,474,134
Description: At a moment of societal transformation following the election of the Bolivia’s first Indigenous president, diverse women’s organizations will coordinate a joint political platform to bolster the rights of Bolivian women, including Indigenous, rural, urban, Afro-descendent and self-employed women, domestic workers and miners in the midst of wide-spread legal reform. With a multicultural lens, an alliance of 19 women’s organizations will work with the National Assembly to press for updates to seven national laws and propose 20 gender-specific laws to anchor women’s empowerment in the new legal framework. This precedent-setting alliance across sectors will engage 200,000 women directly and, through legal advocacy and multi-lingual (Aymara, Quechua and Spanish) radio programmes, will indirectly impact three million Bolivian women and their communities.
Bureau of Women’s Affairs and the Dispute Resolution Foundation
Programme Title: Jamaican Women’s Economic and Political Empowerment: The Way Out (view profile)
Country: Jamaica
Additional Partners: CSOs including Sistren Theater Collaborative and research institutes
Amount: USD 1,729,537
Description: This programme builds a broad-based initiative to institutionalize gender mainstreaming within government ministries, public organizations and the non-profit sector, with a strong focus on gender justice, conflict resolution and peacemaking. The government-NGO partnership brings innovative strategies to bear on public and private sectors that aims to result in at least 90 percent of participating government ministries and half of private companies and organizations adopting gender-sensitive policies. By facilitating leadership training, mentorship programmes, and the creation of professional associations for informal workers, the programme will generate greater economic security for more than 10,000 women workers, boost the number of women running for political office by 20 percent and reach out to 50,000 women and girls.
Arab States
Ministry of Manpower and Emigration and The Social Research Center- The American University in Cairo
Programme Title: Salheya Initiative for Women’s Economic Empowerment (view profile)
Country: Egypt
Amount: USD 2,400,000
Additional Partners: Ministry of Investment; other CSOs
Description: In Egypt, the government will expand its engagement with women in the workforce by testing a model to increase women’s entrepreneurial and career opportunities: the Gender Equity Seal, a voluntary certification for businesses that adhere to standards for hiring, training and promoting women. This programme also establishes data monitoring systems to promote targeted social protections for 13,000 working women, proactively support young women graduates to respond to the needs of the labour market and strengthen labour-related legislation. Ultimately, the programme will facilitate large-scale replication of the Strategy for Supporting and Empowering the Egyptian Working Woman and the institutionalization of the Gender Equity Seal as the gender auditing tool for private and public firms at the national level.
Asia and the Pacific
All-China Women’s Federation (ACWF)
Programme Title: Equal Political Participation for Chinese Women (view profile)
Country: China
Additional Partners: National Working Committee on Children and Women (NWCCW), Organization Department of the CPC Central Committee, Ministry of Civil Affairs (MOCA), Central Party School (CPS) under the CPC, among others.
Amount: USD 2,456,934
Description: China’s programme directly targets more than 5,300 individual policymakers, village committee members, civil servants and members of civil society and the media to increase the number and effectiveness of women in political power. Legislative advocacy and training will win the support of strategic legislators and senior government officials for gender equality laws and policies, such as establishment of quotas and equal retirement age for men and women. Working in four provinces and one municipality, the programme builds women’s capacity to participate in and influence legislative bodies and village committees, and equips women’s machineries at all levels to evaluate the status of women’s political participation and rights. If successful, this programme has the potential to inform the Chinese Government’s upcoming 2011–2020 Programme for the Development of Chinese Women.
Cambodia Health Education Media Services (CHEMS) and Cambodian HIV/AIDS Education and Care (CHEC)
Programme Title: Strengthening Economic Livelihood Opportunities for Poor Women and 1300 HIV Positive Women (view profile)
Country: Cambodia
Additional Partners: Governors office, Departments of Health, Women’s Affairs; local women’s CBOs
Amount: USD 1,171,745
Description: With HIV rates among the highest in Asia, Cambodia’s programme merges health-focused, multi-media outreach and public education with economic and leadership-development opportunities for HIV-positive women. Together, CHEMS and CHEC aim to secure access to employment through skills building in micro-enterprise development, while providing counselling, referrals and rights-based education on gender and HIV. The programme will empower more than 2,000 poor and HIV-positive women to lead project activities and undertake advocacy. It also develops the capacities of local NGOs and CBOs to expand their livelihood, credit and HIV advocacy programmes, further amplifying the role of HIV-positive women within economic empowerment processes.
Professional Assistance for Development Action (PRADAN) and JAGORI
Programme Title: Facilitating Women in Poverty Regions in India Access Actualize and Sustain Mandated Goal of the NPEW (view profile)
Country: India
Additional Partners: National Institute of Rural Development
Amount: USD 2,549,974
Description: Building on the limited economic gains of large-scale governmental employment and credit programmes for poor and marginalized women, PRADAN and JAGORI insert a missing empowerment element to these efforts, working in endemic pockets of poverty among Dalit and tribal communities in 30 districts to raise awareness of 300,000 women of their rights, increase their participation in local governance structures and support young leaders to resist and challenge discrimination and violations. The programme further increases access to livelihood opportunities by developing capacities of local government and bank officials to respond to these women’s demands for legally-mandated entitlements. The programme will result in a new integrated model for economic and political empowerment for women, with potential to place women’s lives at the centre of large-scale government programmes.
Europe and Central Asia
Gender Center of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and SNV Netherlands Development Organisation, BiH Office
Programme Title: Localizing Gender (view profile)
Country: Bosnia and Herzegovina
Additional Partners: Municipal councils, commissions, and mayor’s departments; CSO partnerships
Amount: USD 1,472,340
Description: This programme will develop a highly coordinated framework to put into action gender-based needs assessments and secure the implementation of the national Women’s Empowerment Action Plan in 10 rural and urban municipalities. The programme will increase the number of Municipal Gender Commissioners equipped to “engender” municipal policies and operating procedures and hold Multi-Stakeholder Platforms, composed of representatives from public, business and civil society sectors in each municipality. It will also establish an effective coordination mechanism for more than 25,000 women (including Roma, displaced and young women) to participate in the audit of existing legislation and in the subsequent formulation of local policies to enhance women’s political and economic rights in areas such as land use, transportation planning, gender-responsive budgeting and provisions for physical security.
Women Support Center (WSC) and Women-Entrepreneurs Support Association (WESA)
Programme Title: Accountability of Government and Involvement of the Women’s Movement for Women’s Political and Economic Empowerment (view profile)
Country: Kyrgyzstan
Additional Partners: CSOs included Rural Development Centre “RDC-Elet,” Amazona, New Wave (young women leaders)
Amount: USD 1,290,991
Description: In Kyrgyzstan, with the women’s right movement facing major hurdles in the context of political upheaval and ethnic conflict, this programme will address the need for strengthening the participation of civil society organizations in monitoring the fulfilment of gender equality commitments in the country. The programme, which directly impacts more than 40,000 internally displaced women, community leaders, local government representatives, civil society activists and community members, will also advocate for gender-sensitive legislation to promote women’s political participation and sustainable livelihoods, particularly in response to increased violence against women in the midst of conflict.
