Fearless Females: The Power of Women to Change the World

Season 1, episode 3

Fearless Females: The Power of Women to Change the World

Meet a few female superheroes come to life and learn how they’re improving the world for women and girls.

Producer: Victoria Ptashnick

Episode Transcript 

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[00:00:05.67] Hello, I'm David Morley, president and CEO of UNICEF Canada, and the host of our UNICEF Canada Podcast. Thank you for listening. March 8 is International Women's Day, and this episode is dedicated to what women are doing to make the world a better place for other women and girls. So although I love to host, I think it's far more appropriate to have a woman telling these stories. I'll be back with you in next month's episode, and I'm going to be handing it over now to our chief program officer and host for this episode, Rowena Pinto. Bye for now.

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[00:00:43.00] Welcome to this month's podcast. As David mentioned, I'm Rowena Pinto, chief program officer here at UNICEF Canada. I'm also a mom of two twin girls, and that means I've spent a lot of time getting up close and personal with all the movies and books you can imagine that are marketed to girls. So many of these stories feature female heroes, such as Hermione Granger in the Harry Potter series, or Elsa in Disney's Frozen.

[00:01:11.53] But what about real-life role models? Those inspiring females that set an impressive social and moral example by making the world a better, fairer, and more equitable place for girls and women. I'm proud to say that in my role at UNICEF Canada, I can tell my girls that these real-life superheroes exist, and I've even met some of them.

[00:01:33.58] In today's episode, I want to introduce you to some of these women. We'll hear from a courageous UNICEF field worker who is helping girls and women overcome gender based violence in the Middle East. We will also speak with a UNICEF donor whose perspective has been transformed by her experiences in the fields supporting mothers with their neonatal health. We'll also take you to a tiny village in northern Uganda, where you'll meet a determined girl who refuses to let enormous challenges stop her from becoming educated.

[00:02:05.92] She'll walk us through a UNICEF program that helps her and other girls stay in school all thanks to learning how to make a menstrual pad. Our guests come from different regions of the world and face unique challenges, but they share an unwavering resolve to fight for the rights of girls and women in their communities. So keep listening and get to real-life female heroes that put even the bravest fictional characters to shame.

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[00:02:37.58] There is no doubt that in many parts of the world women have made significant strides in the last century in terms of their rights and freedoms. In some cases, advances have led to more equitable treatment of girls and women, but many regions of the world have seen little progress.

[00:02:56.27] In some cultures, gender based violence is still a perilous threat to the safety and well-being of many girls and women. To tell us more about that and what UNICEF is doing to help, I'd like to introduce you to Ivana Hapchikova, a gender based violence specialist for UNICEF. Ivana has helped girls and women overcome violence in many regions from Liberia to Iraq where she currently works.

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[00:03:28.58] Hello, Ivana.

[00:03:30.32] Hi, Rowena.

[00:03:31.73] So can you start by explaining what gender based violence is?

[00:03:37.07] Gender based violence is probably the most pervasive, and at the same time, least visible form of human rights violation in the world today. Gender based violence constitutes any harmful act that is perpetrated against the persons will and that is based on basically on socially ascribed differences between males and females.

[00:04:05.12] It is rooted in patriarchal system that keeps women in subordinated positions that can include domestic violence or intimate partner violence, sexual assault, and rape, harassment, emotional abuse, as well as restriction or denial of one's movement or access to services, whether it be health care or education.

[00:04:32.63] The thing is that GBV can also happen and take place not just in a private sphere such as one's privacy of their home, but also in the public sphere. It can include exclusion of women from political participation or workforce, employment discrimination, and other forms within the public life or public sphere.

[00:05:00.09] So, Ivana, how does this affect girls and women in general?

[00:05:05.24] Actually, GBV in many countries and by many people is often called or referred to as violence against women and girls. Why? Because the primary survivors of GBV globally are women and girls. At least one in three females-- and that is over 1 billion women worldwide-- will experience some form of physical or sexual violence in their lifetime simply because of their gender, because they're women, they're female.

[00:05:44.90] This number or this estimate does not include the other undocumented, for example, or unreported incidents of GBV against women and girls and/or less maybe recognized or lesser known types of GBV such as child marriage or trafficking for the purposes of sexual exploitation and abuse.

[00:06:13.59] So what regions of the world does this tend to happen in?

[00:06:18.62] One of the characteristics of GBV is that it is known to transcend basically all boundaries. It knows no social or economic boundaries and affects women and girls across the globe of all socioeconomic backgrounds. It is not an issue that affects a specific or a particular age group or a religion or culture or socioeconomic status or class. And during emergencies, GBV is exacerbated. It really breaks down the protective social mechanisms and norms that have regulated behavior before the emergency struck.

[00:07:07.37] So what are some of the long-term repercussions of some of these actions against women and girls around the world?

[00:07:15.29] Well, GBV has a really significant and important health and social consequences for the survivors themselves but also for their families and larger communities. It hinders, for example, their ability to earn a living, go to school, and get an education, take part in their communities' social and political life. It can also trap the girls and their families in a cycle of poverty.

[00:07:49.35] For example, if girls who are married early are not able to complete their education, and then they are less likely to fulfill their full potential, earn a safe and adequate income. They may not have access to jobs. I want to underscore that GBV can have a really life threatening consequences for women and girls.

[00:08:17.28] How does UNICEF help girls and women who have been affected by gender based violence?

[00:08:21.96] UNICEF vision and UNICEF approach to eliminating gender based violence in emergencies is grounded in three core outcomes. The first is to ensure and provide support for survivors, to access comprehensive and quality multisectoral services. That includes health, legal services, and psychosocial support.

[00:08:50.82] The second outcome is to mitigate, basically, the risks of gender based violence across other programs and sectors. Water and sanitation or within education sector and nutrition and health sector to ensure that these services and access to services for women and girls is enabled, and they can safely access these services.

[00:09:17.67] Third is to prevent GBV by addressing its underlying causes and conditions through the work with communities and also engaging men and voice in the prevention of GBV and strengthening legal frameworks. So as an example, we, here in Iraq, engage with men and boys through awareness raising activities where the discussion is around the status of women and girls in their society to break down some of the harmful thinking or harmful behaviors around womens' and girls' status in these socially ascribed norms.

[00:10:04.89] Can you tell us a story that has stuck with you about a particular girl or a woman that you came across and helped or supported and how she overcame the violence she experienced?

[00:10:17.97] There's many, but I just recently visited one of UNICEF's partners working in a location here in Iraq where many families fled to during the conflict and fighting in Mosul. And there, I met a young woman who was in her early 20s and already was a widow, and she used to live in Mosul. And when the heavy fighting erupted, a bomb hit her house and killed her husband and all of her children and how she was forced to run literally with nothing but clothes on her back. And she made it to safety.

[00:11:05.37] She had family living in this location, and basically, stayed with her extended family. And she told me how she was prevented, really, from leaving the house because of the social norms and expectations that as a single woman, because she was a widow, she should not be going outside of the house on her own. She was suffering, obviously, dealing with huge loss and grief in her life. And on top of that, she also felt extremely socially isolated.

[00:11:46.20] Eventually, she managed to convince a family member to allow her to attend a women's center, a space where women and girls from the community could gather together in a safe space that was exclusively for women and girls where they had an opportunity to engage. Basically, a space to socialize with other girls and women, participate in different social, recreational activities, as well as access services.

[00:12:18.39] She really wanted me to hear and talk about how she found her new family and a community in this space and what it meant for her to be able to go outside of her house and meet with other girls, many of them in a similar situation. This story really, really touched me. But, again, it is not, unfortunately, unique in a sense that many women and girls here often experience this when they have to flee, and they live in displacement where there's a lot more restrictions.

[00:13:03.01] So, Ivana, obviously your work is so important, and you're making such a difference as part of UNICEF. But it's very difficult work, and it must be really hard some days. So what inspires you to keep going?

[00:13:17.09] The work is-- or can be really challenging. But at the same time, it is extremely inspiring work. It really gives me new energy when we can through the programs and through our partners create safe space and have some impact on the girls or women's lives. For me, a major source of inspiration and what gives me-- gives me energy and drive to move forward are the women and girls in my life starting with my mother, my sister, and my niece.

[00:13:57.55] And then also, other women that I have met during my work. My female colleagues and my female role models, as well as the women and girls themselves that participate in UNICEF's programs. And the stories are not with suffering only, but primarily, their stories of resilience and how they managed to overcome and go on with their lives.

[00:14:30.26] And that is just an incredible experience to be in some small way a part of that and know that we have maybe enabled or supported a girl to have a social-- an opportunity to have a social life or to have an education. So it's the woman and the girls themselves really.

[00:14:59.47] That's amazing.

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[00:15:05.63] Schools are so important to me because I want to get educated, and I want to be the one to pay my younger sister's school fees in future.

[00:15:16.41] That voice you just heard was a 14-year-old, Irene, a girl living in a village in northern Uganda. This past fall, several of my UNICEF colleagues and donors traveled to Irene's village to see the results of a program that we are running there. It is changing the lives of girls in the region by dramatically reducing school dropout rates. Here to talk to you about meeting Irene is my colleague Victoria [? Petashnik. ?] Hi, Victoria.

[00:15:44.67] Hello, Rowena.

[00:15:46.08] So tell me about the region of Uganda you were in.

[00:15:48.51] I was in the village of Adjumani in northern Uganda quite close to the border with South Sudan, and it's a very beautiful place where, despite the people facing so much poverty, I saw so much community from the very beginning. It's a very disadvantaged area of Uganda, and girls are dropping out of school.

[00:16:12.90] It's especially terrible because, really, the best investment to break these intergenerational cycles of poverty and discrimination is access to quality education. Better educated women are healthier, participate more in the formal labor markets. They earn a higher income. They tend to marry at a later age, and they give birth to fewer and healthier children and provide better health care and education to their children.

[00:16:44.73] So Irene was one of those girls who met. Can you tell me more about her?

[00:16:49.35] Yeah, so I met Irene on my second day in Uganda, and she was very bright academically and committed and her teachers had a lot of faith in her. And you know, I was more blown away. She took me to where her family lives in a little hut near the school, and she told me the reason she wants to work so hard in school is to provide education for her little sisters because she's aware that without education, she and her sisters wouldn't be able to thrive.

[00:17:22.06] And I asked her, what happens to women and girls here if they don't go to school? And her answer was simple, and she said, they dig for yams, and they have babies. That's what I know happens to girls here who don't go to school, and Irene made it clear she wanted something else for herself.

[00:17:40.26] So what did you see UNICEF doing to help girls like Irene? I'll give you the short answer for Irene and then the big picture for most girls. So in terms of Irene, her life was utterly changed by something so simple, and that was a menstruation pad. So prior to Irene joining a wash club that UNICEF runs at her school that teaches girls and boys about menstruation and how to actually make a pad, Irene as bright as she was-- and she is bright-- was falling behind in school.

[00:18:14.74] And that's because every month when she'd have her period, she'd have to miss a week of school because you couldn't afford pads, and she didn't want to go to school without them because that-- she would risk being teased. And I'll that Irene tell you about that part because she knows it best. So here's Irene.

[00:18:34.11] [? Girls ?] used to experience when they were menstruating, at times, boy laugh at them, and they go back home. They stay home. They drop out of school, and they don't want school. That leads to early marriage and early pregnancy, which is affecting most girls in [INAUDIBLE].

[00:18:53.07] When I was there, I actually joined a wash club meeting with Irene and watched her make this pad. It took her about 30 minutes to make one, and here's what Irene had to say about how this has changed her life.

[00:19:09.12] The [? chance ?] now girls don't fear menstruation. Whenever it starts [INAUDIBLE] at school, they go to the [INAUDIBLE] teacher. They change their pads, and they put on clean pants, and they become comfortable in their class.

[00:19:23.89] So the wash club is just a part of what UNICEF is doing to help girls like Irene. UNICEF is active in most countries in sub-Saharan Africa offering girls crucial services and programming. But, Rowena, the particular project I went to document is a UNICEF Canada program called Undaunted, and it's an investment that will address barriers that adolescent girls, like Irene, face in sub-Saharan Africa reaching more than 500,000 girls and their communities.

[00:19:56.11] So Uganda is one of the areas the program is focusing on, but there are other areas as well. And those include Tanzania, Ghana, and South Africa. Because the barriers adolescent girls face in those regions are different, the investment will work to remove the specific barriers that exist in each of those regions. So in Uganda, the focus is very much on building water systems and schools to provide quality, safe water and constructing gender-segregated washrooms allowing girls to manage their menstruation in a dignified way.

[00:20:32.74] In tangent, the program is supporting adolescent school clubs where specially-trained teachers actually facilitate a welcoming space and provide that advice to students on how to manage critical barriers that keep girls from attending school, including early marriage, sexual violence, and how to manage one's period while at school. And that's the wash club that you heard there from Irene, so just very impressive stuff to get to see first hand. And it was really just such a privilege to spend time with Irene and witness how UNICEF support is truly changing her life and the lives of so many girls like Irene in places like Uganda.

[00:21:19.60] It's amazing how what sounds like a simple concept like a wash club could change the life of a girl like Irene. What I found so interesting about your story-- I know when you were telling me about it-- was that boys are part of this wash club.

[00:21:34.03] Yeah, you're absolutely right. When I was there, there was about an equal amount of boys to girls in that wash club and not only were the boys helping the girls make these pads. Their attitudes were so supportive, and if some girls started giggling in the middle when I was talking to them about it, I heard so many boys say while I was there, don't be embarrassed. Don't be ashamed. It's just a fact of life. Nothing to be embarrassed about. It was quite impressive. Their attitudes were just so incredibly supportive, and I know that is thanks to things like the wash club that are changing those attitudes for boys.

[00:22:15.46] Thank you, Victoria.

[00:22:16.75] You're welcome.

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[00:22:21.28] Up next, you will hear from [? Hanida ?] Simard, one of our many passionate donors. Four years ago, she joined a group of 60 female donors at UNICEF Canada who formed what became known as The 25th Team. Together, these women set out to save the lives of the world's most vulnerable children. Their journey took them to see lifesaving projects in Cambodia, Ethiopia, Indonesia, Namibia, and Peru.

[00:22:49.42] Their efforts helped build capacity in communities and with governments to save children's lives and model approaches to reach the most vulnerable with life saving services saving the lives of 3.8 million women and children in the process. To tell us more about how her journey with The 25th Team has changed her perspective on feminism and supporting girls and women, I'd now like to introduce [? Hanida ?] Simard. So, [? Hanida, ?] what inspired you to join The 25th Team?

[00:23:21.88] I'm a mother of two girls, and I feel like my daughters have really every opportunity that is available to them, and it's their job to-- my job to maybe show them what that is, and then they can maximize it. And so as we know, there are so many more women in the world who don't have those opportunities, I always say that as a Canadian woman living in this time, we are the luckiest women of all time anywhere in the world.

[00:23:53.73] And so with that comes, I feel, a big responsibility. And so the opportunity to help women who don't have those advantages and privileges, as I said, it's a responsibility that I take really seriously. And so with The 25th Team having five very specific projects focused on mothers and children, it seemed like an excellent fit because I think this is often an area that is overlooked.

[00:24:21.34] Women's work, as we know, is often undervalued, dismissed, devalued, and so to actually put a lens on it, to focus on it, and to know that it was actually going to make a huge difference in those mothers lives and the lives of those children and then in the community and, hopefully, long term as the project grows and develops in that country is-- it felt like an excellent fit for how our family works and how we like to operate.

[00:24:55.60] So I know that you and your family had an opportunity to go visit the field, and at that time, you had a number of experiences and had an opportunity to see UNICEF's impact on the field. Is there a story that really had a huge impact on you and/or your family?

[00:25:13.14] Yes, indeed. My family of four got to go to the Central Highlands in Vietnam, a very remote area. And on this particular day, we arrived in the morning, and things were already under way at this commune. And the women and children and, I guess, retired men. Maybe the dads were already out in the fields farming, and so you have this older man and older women along with younger women and children.

[00:25:41.82] And there was a facilitator there, and he was talking to this village in such an engaging way about wash programs. So water, sanitation, and hygiene programs, and this is such a basic. But it makes a huge difference in the health of the community, and there was-- I mean, it went on for several hours, and it was compelling from start to finish.

[00:26:07.98] But there was a particular moment that was really riveting and has really stuck in my mind. So at one point, the whole village, along with my little family, we trot up to this latrine. And the facilitator opens up a brand new bottle of water that is sealed, and he takes a drink from it, and he offers it to a woman elder in the village, and she takes a drink from it.

[00:26:28.83] And everybody agrees that this bottle of water is clean. Then, he asks the young girl for a strand of her hair-- she had very long hair-- and he dipped it into the latrine. He pulls it out, and then he dipped it into the bottle of clean water. Now, the water did not change color. We couldn't see anything, but he asked if anyone would now want to drink from this bottle of water. No one wanted to. It was such an effective way to demonstrate how you can't see bacteria in your water.

[00:27:04.50] They knew because he had put the bacteria in there that the water was not clean, and so he used this to say how important it was that they build latrines, that they build them away from their water sources, and to have a bigger discussion about water and sanitation and hygiene issues. It was an incredible program and so well executed, and I know it made an impact on me. And it looked like it really made an impact on the members of the community.

[00:27:34.99] So what was an unexpected thing that you learned during your experience with The 25th Team?

[00:27:40.92] I realized that I-- who feel like a very normal person. You know, I clean my own house. I'm driving my kids to school in my pajamas. I'm a woman of color. If I don't say I'm a philanthropist, if I don't speak about this to my friends, to people in the world, how-- and certainly to my daughters-- how would anybody else know that they can be a philanthropist or they can be an activist or they can be whatever.

[00:28:10.89] Because you have these very-- I don't know-- stiff mental images. Like, when I think of a philanthropist, I think of Bill Gates. I don't necessarily think of my neighbor down the street. So I think that is one of the biggest gifts that has come out of The 25th Team is the importance of speaking about women's issues.

[00:28:34.94] [CHILDREN CHEERING]

[00:28:42.15] That brings us to the end of our International Women's Day podcast episode. If you found yourself moved or inspired by any of the stories you heard about in the last half an hour, consider supporting the work that UNICEF does, become a monthly donor, or give a one time gift through our website, unicef.ca. If you're already a donor, thank you. We couldn't do the lifesaving work we do without your help. Thank you for listening, and David will be back here next month with a brand new episode.

[00:29:15.57] [SINGING]