Josee Ntabahungu, Head of Gender and Women’s Economic Empowerment at CARE Burundi, at the United Nations
CARE has welcomed the first report from the UN High-Level Panel on Women’s Economic Empowerment, Leave no-one behind - particularly since it draws on a lot of CARE’s work as a model for the way forward for accelerating women’s economic empowerment.
At the report presentation to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon at the United Nations Headquarters in New York yesterday (22 September 2016), Josee Ntabahungu, Head of Gender and Women’s Economic Empowerment at CARE Burundi, spoke on behalf of CARE in welcoming the report.
Josee said:
CARE fully supports the UN High Level Panel’s report, ‘Leave no-one behind’.
We welcome this call to action, because women globally still face a long list of economic and gender barriers stopping them from realising their full potential.
We need action in every country to tackle inequality, but it is the hardest to reach women and girls who must not be forgotten in favour of easier wins.
For decades CARE has worked to strengthen women’s role as producers, workers, entrepreneurs and consumers.
And we will continue to do so. As part of our long-term commitment, CARE pledges to ensure that 30 million women have greater access to and control over economic resources by 2020.
Fiona was formerly Senior Policy and Advocacy Advisor - Financial Inclusion for CARE International. She describes her role below:
I support CARE’s work to enable women and girls to have equal and increased control over their financial resources and access to financial services. My role is to ensure institutions like banks and governments adopt policies to bring women living in poverty into the realm of financial inclusion. Since joining CARE I've been leading the development of CARE’s global financial inclusion multiplying impact strategy, and have worked with CARE offices in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa to influence financial inclusion policies and practices in these regions. I'm a member of Women Advancing Microfinance, GADN’s Women’s Economic Justice working group, and SEEP’s Savings Led working group.
I have previously lived and worked in remote Australian aboriginal communities to address the barriers families face through financial exclusion and generational poverty. I've also worked with banks to strengthen their ability to link with poor rural customers and I was an advisor for the Permanent Mission of New Zealand to the United Nations. I have an MA in International Development with a specialisation in development economics from the University of Newcastle, Australia, and a journalism qualification from the University of Canterbury, New Zealand.
One good thing I’ve read
Radical Hope by Noel Pearson. Noel is the chief architect behind a radical new approach for social change and development for disadvantaged indigenous Australians. Having worked with him for years he is equally as brilliant and inspiring as he is controversial. In this book he turns his thinking to education with new ideas for transforming the lives of the disadvantaged to ‘raise up the many’ and ensure ‘no child is left behind’.
Email: Jarden@careinternational.org
Twitter: @FiJarden
