The Global Fund supports efforts that enable women to achieve greater economic and social equality. Over the last five years, the Global Fund for Women has awarded 615 grants totaling nearly $6.4 million to women’s groups supporting economic development programs like these:

Grantee: Mahila Ekata Sangathan (Women Unity Organization)

Location: Kathmandu, Nepal

Situation: With 40 percent of its population living below the poverty line, many of Nepal’s women turn to sex work as their only option for survival. They face discrimination, violence and abuse every day. Most are unaware of their rights, are illiterate, and lack self-esteem.

Program: The only organization of sex workers in Nepal, Women Unity Organization, offers women a variety of services including legal rights education, psychological counseling, health education, conflict resolution services, and human rights awareness training. The group provides loans to sex workers to seek alternative careers, and scholarships so their daughters can attend school.

Total GFW Grants: $8,000

Grantee: Center for Women and Children Empowerment (CEWCE)

Location: Monrovia, Liberia

Situation: Women and children experienced trauma and displacement in a decades-long civil war, which left Liberia one of the poorest countries in Africa. However, President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, elected in 2005, has made it a national priority to promote gender equality and empower women.

Program: Working in both urban and rural communities, CEWCE helps women and children reintegrate in the post-civil-war country. Its Skills Training Program offers daily classes for women who are in need of knowledge that will help them develop businesses and self-reliance. The group will use its recent GFW grant to provide organizational management and women’s rights training for thirty women’s groups in rural communities, and train fifty leaders to conduct legal rights education on anti-violence and inheritance legislation.

Total GFW Grants: $9,000

Grantee: Coopérative Takku Liguéey

Location: Nouakchott, Mauritania

Situation: Whereas earlier the situation for women’s rights in Mauritania was showing improvement due to the approval of the quota system and the high rate of women’s participation in parliament and other elected positions, the future remains highly volatile and unpredictable since the last coup in 2008.

Program: The Coopérative aims to improve the conditions of economically disadvantaged women in Mauritanian society by educating them about their rights, and providing them with skills to help them achieve economic independence by organizing training workshops on sewing, embroidery and dyeing. It also focuses on techniques and information to help women improve the productivity and success of their micro projects.

Total GFW Grants: $5,000