Star Wars Director Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy — Symbolises A Litany of Firsts For Women

The announcement by Lucas film’s president, Kathleen Kennedy, about the upcoming three new live-action Star Wars films was enough for lawyer Maliha Zia to get euphoric.

Andean Indigenous Women’s Knowledge Combats Food Insecurity in Peru

Paulina Locumbe, a 42-year-old peasant farmer who lives in ​​the Andes highlands of southern Peru, learned as a child to harvest and dry crops, one of the ancestral practices with which she combats the food insecurity that affects millions in this Andean country.

International Women’s Day, 2023
Empower Her

On International Women’s Day, let us remind ourselves of the power of education. We have all benefited from an education that less than a century ago was not a given for a girl and which still remains a distant utopia for millions of young girls.

International Women’s Day, 2023

 

From the earliest days of computing to the present age of virtual reality and artificial intelligence… …women have made untold contributions to the digital world in which we increasingly live.

International Women’s Day, 2023
Five Sharp Questions on Female Empowerment

International Women's Day is right around the corner and it presents an obvious opportunity to dig into what female and empowerment means for different people.

Digital Gender Gap in Latin America Reflects Discrimination Against Women

The digital gender gap is multifactorial in Latin America and as long as countries fail to address discrimination against women, inequality will be reflected in the digital space, excluding them from access to opportunities and enjoyment of their rights.

Gender Central to Parliamentarians’ Programme of Action

The post-COVID-19 period has been a crucial one for members of parliament who have their work cut out to ensure that issues that arose during the pandemic are addressed, especially concerning the ICPD25 commitments and programmes of action for universal access to sexual and reproductive rights, gender-based violence and building peaceful, just and inclusive societies. Across the world, progress toward achieving the SDGs by 2030 was impacted during the pandemic.

Women Commuters Travel Safe in Innovative Bus Scheme in Pakistan

A bus rapid transport (BRT) system in Peshawar is benefiting female students and working women by providing a safe journey – something women passengers could not take for granted on regular public transport.

Reform Needed As Big Business, Not Vulnerable Communities Benefit from Post-Pandemic Support

Governments and international financial institutions must adopt new ways of providing post-pandemic support, say campaigners after a report found that in many poorer countries, big business benefitted most from Covid-19 recovery funds. At the same time, vulnerable communities have been “left behind.”

Women’s Financial Inclusion, Empowerment in Kenya

A two-year-old child cries hysterically as his mother attends to customers standing in front of her stall to buy vegetables on the outskirts of the Kenyan capital Nairobi. The mother, 25-year-old Esther, who refuses to give her surname for fear her husband will know that she has spoken to strangers about family issues, sells spinach, onion, tomato, garlic, and green pepper at a street corner to supplement her husband’s “meager” construction wage. It has been four years since she started the business, and she says it is beginning to feel like an eternity.

Africa Needs More Action, Fewer Words to Secure Food and Nutrition

For more than five years, Ritta Achevih was harvesting one bag of maize or less from her small plot each season. She could hardly provide enough healthy food for her big family.

Building Resilience in the Philippines Through Sustainable Livelihoods and Psychosocial Support

Elvie Gallo no longer hangs around her local grocery store, hoping for the odd job to put food on the table. Her hand-to-mouth life has been replaced by a viable chicken rearing and selling business in Iloilo province in the Philippines.

Biogas Production Awaits Greater Incentives in Cuba

Standing in front of a blue flame on her stove, getting ready to brew coffee, Mayra Rojas says the biodigester built in the backyard of her home in western Cuba has become a key part of her daily life and a pillar of her family's well-being.

Introducing Hope Over Fate: the Story of Sir Fazle Hasan Abed and BRAC

About seven years ago, I started working on a project with Sir Fazle Hasan Abed, the founder of BRAC. It was originally supposed to be a memoir: the story of Abed, the mild-mannered accountant who would rid the world of poverty, as told by the man himself. I was privileged to be Abed’s speechwriter for the last several years of his life, and I would sit for hours listening to stories from his remarkable life: of his boyhood in British India, his love life in London in the 1960s, his three marriages, and how, in 1972, with a few thousand pounds from the sale of his flat in Camden, he launched a small nonprofit organization to aid refugees, originally called the Bangladesh Rehabilitation Assistance Committee. Many people would go on to call BRAC, which Abed led until his death in 2019, the world’s most effective anti-poverty organization.

Frankincense and Myrrh Have New Economic Resonance for Women in Kenya’s Arid North

Clad in traditional regalia and necklaces of richly coloured beads that form magnificent patterns around their necks, an army of women from the pastoral Rendile community that resides at the heart of Marsabit, a county in Kenya’s arid north, is on a mission.

Will Apex Court Ruling Remove Stigma for Sex Workers in India?

Social activists, including Lucknow-based Tahira Hasan, have welcomed the Indian Supreme Court’s recent ruling recognising sex work as a profession.

Indigenous Women in Mexico Take United Stance Against Inequality

Every other Tuesday at 5:00 p.m. sharp, a group of 26 Mexican women meet for an hour to discuss the progress of their work and immediate tasks. Anyone who arrives late must pay a fine of about 25 cents on the dollar.

Women in Argentina Cultivate Dignity in Cooperative Vegetable Garden

The space consists of just 300 square meters full of green where there is an agro-ecological vegetable garden and nursery, which are the work and dream of 14 women. Behind it can be seen the imposing silhouettes of the high rises that are a symbol of the most modern and sought-after part of Argentina's capital city.

Black Women, the Most Oppressed and Exploited in Brazil

The Theater of the Oppressed helped her become aware of the triple discrimination suffered by black women in Brazil and the means to confront it, such as the Rio de Janeiro Domestic Workers Union, which she has chaired since 2018.

Al-Shamiya: When Adversity Becomes Inspiration

When Suhier Abed’s husband broke both legs after falling two floors while working in construction, the 32-year-old mother of five needed to support her family.