“Women know what they want and need”

We recently attended the United Nation’s 60th Commission on the Status of Women (CSW). CSW is a body that monitors and reviews progress on women’s rights. During its annual two-week session, representatives of UN Member States, civil society organisations and UN entities gather in New York to discuss progress and gaps on women’s rights. 

“Women’s rights organisations are not only having to stretch pennies, they are facing violence”

Our first event ‘Investing in women’s rights organisations and movements to achieve transformational change’ was delivered in partnership with ActionAid UK. We were grateful for an exceptional panel of speakers and excited to have a packed out room.

Our first speaker was Baroness Verma, the UK Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for International Development and Ministerial Champion for Tackling Violence Against Women & Girls Overseas. Baroness Verma told the audience “I am deeply inspired by women’s rights organisations” and went on to say we must ensure funding reaches these organisations.

Bandana Rana, Director of our partner in Nepal, Saathi, followed and asked why donors continue to invest in INGOs instead of women’s rights organisations. She said it is women’s civil society who has the credibility and legitimacy to work at the local level. Dr. Musimbi Kanyoro, President of the Global Fund for Women, spoke next about the important role of women’s funds in channelling money to women’s rights organisations. She said that donors need to trust the funding mechanisms that women have created (i.e. women’s funds) and that “women know what we want and need”.

Aldijana Sisic, the Chief for the UN Trust Fund to End Violence Against Women, was next to address the audience and raised the importance of core funding and the vital role of small women’s rights organisations. Our final speaker, Lydia Alpízar Durán, Executive Director for the Association of Women in Development, reinforced that women’s rights organisations are struggling for survival in the current funding context. She went onto to say “women’s rights organisations are not only having to stretch pennies, they are facing violence.”

Our second event ‘Putting women’s rights organisations up front: lessons learned in building support and partnership for social transformation’ was delivered in partnership with the Global Fund for Women and CARE. This event was designed to be an interactive space – bringing together grassroots and national women’s rights organisations, INGOs and donors to collectively strategise on how we can tackle some of the major challenges facing women’s rights organisations and movements in sub-Saharan Africa.

We were thrilled to have over seventy participants. We started with speeches and a panel discussion with representatives from, among others, the African Women’s Development Fund, Shibuye Community Health Workers, WARDC, Akina Mama, Urgent Action Fund Africa and the UN Trust Fund.

Compelling words came from Violet Shivustse who said: “grassroots organisations do not work for numbers, we work for transformational change” and Ndana Bofu-Tawamba, telling the audience: “the women’s movement needs to educate itself and come together to politicise the funding architecture.” Following the speeches and panel discussion, we broke out into small groups to develop recommendations for all actors to increase financial and non-financial support to women’s rights organisations.

We are currently writing a report with the Global Fund for Women and CARE to fully capture the recommendations from the event – so watch this space.

We will also continue our call to ensure quality funding reaches women’s rights organisations. If you want to join us, please sign up to our newsletter.