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HOPE International Development Agency is helping women and girls improve their lives through education, skills training, health programs, community organization, microfinance, and nutritional awareness.

Women and Gender

Women in the developing world often shoulder an unequal share of life's everyday chores and burdens. Family finances are usually controlled by men alone as the women are often excluded from income generating activities.

In most rural regions of developing countries, women collect firewood, provide water and food, cook, clean, dress family members, provide emotional care, and more. They also do unpaid agricultural work. All of these tasks are time and energy intensive, especially collecting water, since walking to and from the water source and waiting in line can take up to four hours each day.

Making sure girls and young women don't miss out on opportunities to improve their lives.

To cope with their heavy work load, mothers often rely on their daughters for help. Because of this the girls cannot attend school. Without an education they don't have the knowledge they need to make decisions about family planning and are not involved in making decisions about things outside of the household. Without an education, these women are more likely to remain poor with no motivation to demand their rights. Our programs are helping ensure that girls and young women receive the education, knowledge and experience they need in order to create a better future for themselves and their communities.

Giving women the opportunity to further support herself and her family.

By addressing cultural constraints that limit women’s access to natural resources, land, credit and decision making at all levels of government we can improve the lives of families in developing countries. When given the opportunity to generate income, women gain a sense of autonomy and invest their earnings in their families helping ease the poverty they all feel. When given greater access and control over resources like clean water, women have hours more time for meaningful activities.

Education breaks the cycle of poverty.

We enable motivated women in developing countries to use their own creativity and determination to move out of poverty by providing them with access to resources like credit and education.