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Women & Poverty

Insight into Women & Poverty

 

Kofi Annan - Ghanaian diplomat, seventh secretary-general of the United Nations, 2001 Nobel Peace Prize.

"..there is no tool for development more effective than the empowerment of women. No other policy is as likely to raise economic productivity, or to reduce infant and maternal mortality. No other policy is as sure to improve nutrition and promote health - including the prevention of HIV/AIDS. No other policy is as powerful in increasing the chances of education for the next generation. And I would also venture that no policy is more important in preventing conflict, or in achieving reconciliation after a conflict has ended.”

“When women thrive, all of society benefits, and succeeding generations are given a better start in life.”

"Gender equality is more than a goal in itself. It is a precondition for meeting the challenge of reducing poverty, promoting sustainable development and building good governance."
 

Wangari Maathai - (1 April 1940 – 25 September 2011) was a Kenyan environmental and political activist.

“African women in general need to know that it's OK for them to be the way they are - to see the way they are as a strength, and to be liberated from fear and from silence.”
 

Muhammad Yunus - Banker to the Poor: Micro-Lending and the Battle Against World Poverty.

“UN studies conducted in more than forty developing countries show that the birth rate falls as women gain equality... I believe income-earning opportunities that empower poor women ... will have more impact on curbing population growth that the current system of "encouraging" family planning practices through intimidation tactics. Family planning should be left to the family."

"The poor themselves can create a poverty-free world. All we have to do is to free them from the chains that we have put around them!"
 

Leymah Roberta Gbowee - Liberian peace activist responsible for leading a women's peace movement that helped bring an end to the Second Liberian Civil War in 2003.

“We go into rural communities, and all we do — like has been done in this room [at TED] — is create the space. When these girls sit … you unlock great leaders."
 

Christopher Hitchens - Author and journalist

“We already know the cure to poverty...it's quite simply, the empowerment of women."
 

Michelle Obama - Wife of the 44th and current President of the United States, Barack Obama, and the first African-American First Lady of the United States.

“Communities and countries and ultimately the world are only as strong as the health of their women."
 

Hillary Clinton - an American politician who was the 67th United States Secretary of State from 2009 to 2013.

"Women's issues are human rights issues, and human right issues are everyone's issues." (Paraphrased)
 

Barber Benjamin Conable, Jr. - (November 2, 1922 – November 30, 2003) was a U.S. Congressman from New York and president of the World Bank.

“Women do two thirds of the world's work. Yet they earn only one tenth of the world's income and own less than one percent of the world's property. They are among the poorest of the world's poor."
 

Dalia Mogahed - Executive Director of the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies

“Human development, not secularization, is what's key to women's empowerment in the transforming Middle East."
 

Melinda French Gates - Businesswoman and philanthropist

“Birth control has almost completely and totally disappeared from the global health agenda, and the victims of this paralysis are the people of Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia."
 

Muhammad Ali - former professional boxer, philanthropist and social activist.

“Wars of nations are fought to change maps. But wars of poverty are fought to map change."
 

Zoé Charlotte de Gamond - (11 February 1806 – 28 February 1854) was a Belgian educator and feminist.

“The most direct cause of women's misfortune is poverty; demanding their freedom means above all demanding reform in the economy of society which will eradicate poverty and give everyone an education, a minimum standard of living, and the right to work.”
 

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