Women Empowerment

JNN Foundation is involved in promoting women’s economic security, health, education and leadership. Studies show that when women are supported and empowered, all of society benefits. Their families are healthier, more children go to school, agricultural productivity improves and incomes increase. Women bear almost all responsibility for meeting basic needs of the family, yet are systematically denied the resources, information and freedom of action they need to fulfill this responsibility. The vast majority of the world’s poor are women. Two-thirds of the world’s illiterates are female. Of the millions of school age children not in school, the majority are girls. And today, HIV/AIDS is rapidly becoming a woman’s disease. In several African countries, more than three-quarters of all young people living with HIV are women.

The current world food price crisis is having a severe impact on women. Around the world, millions of people eat two or three times a day, but a significant percentage of women eat only once. And, now, many women are denying themselves even that one meal to ensure that their children are fed. These women are already suffering the effects of even more severe malnutrition, which inevitably will be their children’s fate as well. The impact of this crisis will be with us for many years. JNN Foundation is teaming up with local organizations to invest in the efforts of African women who are engaged in innovative efforts to develop their communities, and to increase the amount of resources available to women’s self-help groups and to strengthen the capacity and infrastructure of women’s organizations.

Micro financing The critical missing link to end poverty and hunger in Africa is the economic empowerment of the most important but least supported food producers on the continent – Africa’s women. Microfinance is a proven, replicable, low-cost methodology for empowering the women of rural communities in Africa to be self-reliant. It provides women with easy access to credit, adequate training and instilling in them the importance of saving. JNN Foundation wants to enable and engage poor women in income-generating activities to increase their incomes and invest in their families and communities. (View More)

Education & Awareness In recent years, important steps have been made to bring HIV/AIDS treatment to impoverished people, yet not as much has been done to address child and maternal health and nutrition, issues that result in far more deaths. JNN Foundation is partnering with local organizations to establish comprehensive, women-centered solutions to improving health. JNN Foundation is committed to ensure that women living in conditions of hunger gain the opportunity to build lives of self-reliance and dignity. By improving educational opportunities for girls and women, JNN Foundation hopes to help women develop skills that allow them to make decisions and influence community change in key areas such women rights, health, nutrition, money matters, investments, HIV and AIDS. (View More)