The facts
Facts do exist.
We rely on them to enlighten our worldviews, to check our opinions, to inform our decisions, to measure our impact. We seek reputable, evidence-based sources of information. We strive to measure impact objectively, leveraging hard data where available.
In our quest to contribute to the empowerment of girls and women globally, we have chosen to focus our efforts in the realms of education, healthcare and entrepreneurship. The facts on the global inequities in these areas for girls and women are compelling.
Education
The World Bank cites myriad reasons why girls’ education is a strategic development priority. Better educated women tend to be healthier, participate more in the formal labor market, earn higher incomes, have fewer children, marry at a later age, and enable better health care and education for their children, should they choose to become mothers.
All these factors combined can help lift households, communities, and nations out of poverty. Massive inequities persist: the facts below are published by the UNESCO Institute for Statistics.
38% of countries
have achieved gender parity in secondary education
31 million
girls of primary-school age are excluded from learning
3 million
children's lives would be saved every day if women in low and lower income countries completed secondary education
A child born to a mother who can read is
50%
more likely to survive past age 5
Healthcare
Every two minutes, a woman dies in pregnancy or childbirth - and the majority of these deaths are preventable.
(UNFPA)
1 in 3 people are malnourished, yet every dollar spent on scaling-up nutrition interventions for pregnant women and children yields $16 in return.
(WHO GNP)
Two-thirds of new adolescent HIV infections are among girls, and cervical cancer due to HPV infection is the second most common type of cancer in women.
(WHO Women's Health)
Entrepreneurship
17% of venture-backed startups
have a female founder
(TechCrunch Crunchbase, 2017)
24% of senior roles
in business globally are held by women
(Grant Thornton International Business Report, 2016)