I spent last Saturday, International Women’s Day, painting a Soulful Sisterhood painting. I painted for the circles of women in my life and I painted for the:
- For the women who have been physically or sexually abused (60% of women)
- For the women that produce half of the world’s food, but own less than one percent of the world’s property.
- For the 300,000 women who suffer a preventable death every year during pregnancy and childbirth.
- For the girls that are denied primary education (two-thirds of the children denied primary education are girls)
- For the women and girls that make up ninety-eight percent of trafficking victims.
- For the women who make up 65 percent of the nearly 1 billion people who cannot read or write.
- For the 1 billion women who will be victims of violence in their lifetime.
- For the 1 in 9 girls who are forced into marriage before her 15th birthday.
- And for the girls in the developing world that face overwhelming odds from the day they are born.
Roughly one billion people in the world live in extreme poverty; the majority of them are women. Without access to clean drinking water, sanitation, medical care, equal rights, education and decent employment, poverty continues to intensify. When mothers lack the means to thrive, their children suffer, as well. No single charity is large enough to combat these challenges alone.
ORGANIZATIONS WORLDWIDE ARE UNITING
Organizations worldwide are uniting to provide resources and front-line delivery of services on a global scale, including: access to education, job skills training, prenatal and early childhood care, micro-lending opportunities, safe drinking water, protection from violence and rehabilitation for those who have been victimized, vaccinations and lifesaving drugs, school enrollment and attendance programs.
The Global Impact Women & Girls Fund is Part of the Solution!
The Women & Girls Fund brings Global Impact together with CARE, World Vision, Plan USA and ICRW to raise funds for programs impacting women and girls. This fund helps to provide education, protection and rehabilitation from violence and exploitation, job training, healthcare, safe drinking water and a host of other services to women and girls around the world. Contributions to this fund go directly to supporting real and meaningful work to improve the lives of women and girls.
About Global Impact
Global Impact is a leader in growing global philanthropy. The organization raises funds to meet critical humanitarian needs around the world. In partnership with nearly 100 major corporations and more than 300 public sector entities, Global Impact provides funding to more than 100 U.S.-based international charities through innovative partnerships and employee giving programs. Since 1956, Global Impact has generated more than $1.6 billion to help the world’s most vulnerable people. The organization and its charity partners help an estimated 400 million people each year.
About CARE
In more than 80 countries, CARE addresses not only the consequences of gender inequality, but also the root causes. CARE works to increase women’s and girls’ ability to determine their own futures through improved education, increased economic power and more decision – making authority in their homes and communities. At the same time, CARE engages with fellow community members, social and religious leaders, politicians and local organizations to shift attitudes and behaviors that marginalize women and girls. This involves working closely with men and boys to promote equitable roles, responsibilities and policies, as well as respectful attitudes and behaviors, and mutually beneficial relationships.About World Vision
World Vision is a Christian humanitarian organization dedicated to working with children, families, and their communities worldwide to reach their full potential by tackling the causes of poverty and injustice. World Vision is the largest international non-governmental organization in the world, working in nearly 100 countries with 45,000 staff serving millions of people in need.The organization’s Strong Women, Strong World initiative highlights the organization’s projects that empower, protect, educate, and nurture girls and women, providing them with equal rights and opportunities. Programming engages men and women, boys and girls, collaboratively, to build equitable, just and sustainable communities. Programs address sex trafficking, health, education, economic development and empowerment. Objectives include empowering women, unlocking women’s potential, achieving gender equity, protection, health, and education.
About Plan USA
Investing in a girl and her future, gives her the ability to lift herself out of poverty, altering the economic condition of her family, her community, and ultimately her country. Decades of experience and in-depth research have proven it. Yet even today, a girl in the developing world still faces overwhelming odds from the day she’s born.Through sustainable development projects, Plan reaches out to the most marginalized and vulnerable populations of girls around the world, rigorously measuring their impact every step of the way. Objectives include creating sustainable projects in developing countries to give girls access to the most basic of human rights: clean water, food, health care, education, financial security, and protection from violence and exploitation.
About International Center for Research on Women (ICRW)
ICRW research identifies women’s contributions to their communities and the barriers — like HIV, violence, lack of education — that prevent them from being economically stable and able to fully participate in society. ICRW provides a path that creates the conditions under which not just one woman, but millions of women can benefit. Objectives include empowering women, advancing gender equality and fighting poverty in the developing world.
HOW YOU CAN HELP!
Together we can help change the world by investing in women and girls. Together we can help women and girls everywhere live healthy lives. Together we can help women and girls everywhere be protected, respected, educated and empowered to reach their potential. By investing in a girl, she can lift herself out of poverty and abuse, altering the condition of her family, her community and, ultimately, the world.
Will you help us EMPOWER women and girls around the world? Contributions go directly to supporting real and meaningful work to improve the lives of women and girls around the world. Visit www.togetherforwomen.org to donate any amount to help women and girls and to learn more about the Global Impact Women & Girls Fund.
This post is a part of a sponsored awareness program that seeks to help women and girls everywhere live healthy lives wherein they are protected, respected, educated and empowered to reach their potential. Visit www.togetherforwomen.org.
I wrote this post as part of The Global Team of 200, a highly specialized group of members of Mom Bloggers for Social Good that concentrates on issues involving women and girls, children, world hunger and maternal health. Our Motto: Individually we are all powerful. Together we can change the world. We believe in the power of collective action to help others and believe in ourselves to make this world a better place for our children and the world’s children.
Follow the Global Team of 200 on Tumblr, on Twitter, Pinterest, and Facebook.