Giving This International Women's Day

FYI: This is an old post from an old blog I kept in uni

Happy International Women’s Day!

Today is a great chance to celebrate the women in your life – your mentors, mothers, inspirations, friends, colleagues, sisters, strangers…

It’s also an opportunity to acknowledge that the difficulties that come with womanhood are vastly varied across the planet, and that as women in the Global North we have the ability to enact real, effective, positive change in the lives of women across the globe.

As an individual, you can do more than you realise. I’ve compiled a list of places to which you might like to consider contributing today. You obviously don’t have to – it’s just something I hope you’ll think about. There are plenty of other worthwhile causes, of course; these are just a few that I know and support.

• Give directly to a woman in extreme poverty in Kenya or Uganda, so she can support her family as she thinks best. GiveDirectly is an initiative backed by GiveWell, Google, and pretty decent evidence.
• Support Women’s Learning Partnership, a UN-approved partnership of 20 autonomous organisations that promote women’s leadership and human rights in the Global South.
• Donate to, or volunteer at, one of Sydney’s many domestic violence shelters.
• An obstetric fistula is an injury that can occur in childbirth. It’s no longer an issue, for the most part, in developed countries, but due to poverty-related stunting and a lack of medical care, it’s still a huge problem in sub-Saharan Africa. Donations to The Fistula Foundation can provide access to a life-changing surgery to reverse the effects of fistula.
• The A21 Foundation works to eliminate sexual trafficking and slavery, and are always in need of support. It’s run by Christine Caine, whose passion for the cause is truly infectious.

You can find more information about high-impact giving at The Life You Can Save or GiveWell, among others.