AFRICA

Nancy Benson (Mali)

Nancy Benson represented FEDEV at the meeting. She works with the Women and Development Program in Mali which is sponsored by the American Friends Service Committee.

The objective of the Women and Development Program in Mali is to improve the status of rural women and increase their income. The program provides locally- initiated cooperatives with organizational support, training, and start-up funds for income-producing activities. The aim is eventual self-sufficiency for these rural groupings and the establishment of a Malian NGO which will take over back-up support now provided by the AFSC.

Seventeen village groups are currently engaged in cooperative activities: cloth-dyeing, gardening, small animal raising, soap-making. There is also a store in the capital city which markets the dyed cloth, and a large rug-weaving workshop, which produces high-quality wool rugs.

Training programmes have been organized in management of cooperatives, construction of energy-saving wood stoves, installation and maintenance of hand pumps for wells, in addition to improved cloth-dyeing and soap-making techniques.

FEDEV (which stands for Women and Development in French) is co-directed by Madame Mariam Thiam, a Malian attached to the Ministry of Rural Development, and myself, Nancy Benson, the AFSC representative in Mali. In addition to general administrative work, and organization of training programs, they make village visits to discuss projects proposed by rural women and the progress and problems of existing projects.

Mrs Susan Kona (Zimbabwe)

Mrs Kona is the National Secretary of ORAP, the Organisation of Rural Association for Progress.

Women in Zimbabwe have worked very hard on development, both before and after the liberation of the country in 1980. During the war years life was particularly hard. Women in Zimbabwe are still 'secondary' people but there is now more acceptance that they should participate.

I work in rural areas among grass roots women. I am not educated but I think it is especially important that I should come to a meeting like this because women in rural areas are often forgotten.

My organisation, ORAP, was started four years ago. Its structure is based on village groups, formed by the villagers themselves. In one area there is an 'umbrella' for these groups which aims to coordinate the sharing of ideas. There is also a project committee. The aim of the organisation is to provide a wider forum which gives support to individual groups.

Communication in Zimbabwe is difficult since there is no TV or telephone in the rural areas. The roads are bad and few people even have radios. The major part of communication therefore takes place on a person to person level.

Eunice Mathu (Kenya)

Eunice Mathu works for the Women in Development Consultancy Services (WDCS) which has offices in Kenya and Uganda. She is also the editor of the Kenyan Consumer's Digest magazine.

WDCS was formed at the beginning of 1984 with an objective of action as a consultancy service for women's development projects related to media. WDCS is currently engaged in media productions such as newsletters, video programmes and also research in issues related to the media and participation of women in the media, women's role in agriculture, education etc. WDCS has a pool of resource women, who are experts in various issues of development, who can be called upon to carry out research and feasibility studies on women's projects and also research on women's involvement in the development of their respective countries. The services of WDCS will be made available to women's organisations. Development NGOs funding agencies, etc.

Mrs Lucy M.R. Mboma (Tanzania)

Mrs Mboma is a member of the Women Study Group of the Institute of Development Studies at the University of Dar Es Salaam.

I teach business at the Institute for Development Studies and I am particularly interested in women in business.

The Women Study Group draws its members from all disciplines at the Institute. Its activities include regular study sessions and participation in seminars. We are organising a special workshop in January 1985 to involve many ordinary women and get their views about the Decade.

 

ASIA

Anita Anand (India)

Anita Anand, has been involved in research, writing, speaking and organizing on issues of Women in Development for many years. Formerly with the United Methodist Board on Church and Society in the USA she is currently a consultant with Cine Contact, a women's film company, based in Canada, making films on women and women's issues. She is working on a series of six films entitled "Women and Development" on women in Japan, the United Arab Emirates, India, Brazil, China and Botswana. Themes include: impact of technology on women, reproductive choices, militarism, access to credit and women's affecting development and change in different societies. Anita Anand is the author of "Rethinking Women and Development" in the ISIS Women in Development: A Resource Guide for Organization and Action.

Devaki Jain (India)

Devaki Jain is a member of the executive committee of the Indian Association for Women's Studies and also a member of the Institute of Social Studies Trust, a voluntary non-profit research and educational organization which since 1975 concentrates on issues of women and development, particularly on women from poverty classes. Devaki was the editor of the 'India Women' of the Ministry of Information.

Sundari Ravindran (India)

Sundari Ravindran has been working intensively in the Tamil villages in South India using drama and role-playing as the primary means of communication and consciouseness-raising among illiterate women.

Ng Sock Nye (Malaysia)

Ng Sock Nye is currently coordinating the women's programme of Asian Cultural Forum and Development (ACFOD). She is also an active member of a community work group, called the Young Angry People, on women's issues. Her involvement in the women's issues has been for about one year, yet she finds herself more motivated and the Young Angry People work group has produced several videos on the struggle of Malaysian women.

Maria Villariba (Philippines)

Maria Villariba is the executive director of the Center for Women Resources, a resource center for women with progressive and feminist perspectives. The Center has been actively involved in mobilizing and organizing rural women and grass-roots women's groups in social, political and mass actions. The Center for Women Resources is a member of the newly founded women's coalition, GABRIELA, in the Philippines, contributing to the uplift of the status of Filipino women.

 

CARIBBEAN

Donna McFarlane Gregory (Jamaica)

Donna McFarlane Gregory is currently working as a consultant economist with a team of two sociologists to determine the social and economic conditions of food and dry-goods sellers (higglers) in the West Kingston area. This study looks at the critical role played by women in the distribution of food stuffs throughout the Kingston area. It is part of a wider study to determine the development needs of the entire West Kingston area.

Magaly Pineda (Dominican Republic)

Magaly Pineda is the founder and coordinator of CIPAF (Centro de Investigacion para la Accion Femenina). This Research Center for Women's Actions carries out studies on the situation of women in the Dominican Republic from a women's perspective. It aims to close the gap between research and action. Besides research CIPAF produces a series of booklets in cartoon style on women's work at home, the factory and the field. They also publish a bimonthly newsletter "Que Haceres" which brings news of their activities and about women around the world.

 

EUROPE

AnneMarie Beurlink (Netherlands)

AnneMarie Beurlink works for NOVIB, the Netherlands Organisation for International Development Cooperation. NOVIB is a private organisation that:

1. tries to support development organisations or grass-root organisations in the Third World and which strives to enable dispossessed groups, in material and non-material terms, to take the initiative for their development in their own hands;
2. tries to raise consciousness in the Dutch population on development issues, via development education activities;
3. tries to influence the decision-taking bodies (governments, EEC, UN, etc.) via political pressure whenever the violation on human rights makes this necessary.

In this organisation I am working as an officer for policy affairs, mainly for the project department. I dedicate part of my time to women's issues in NOVIB by means of:

1. raising the consciousness of NOVIB's project personnel and officers on the importance of paying extra attention to women's issues in development cooperation activities, i.e. by the organisation of a staff training on women and development, of an information day on the Women's conferences in Nairobi for NOVIB personnel and by improving the working documents and instruments on this matter;
2. stimulating and implementing activities to enhance the emancipation of women in NOVIB's work;
3. making sure that no activities be implemented which could have a negative effect on the position of women;
4. participating in NOVIB's coordinating women's group, in which women of all NOVIB's different departments take part;
5. participating in a Dutch network of women of different governmental and non-governmental development bodies (which is organizing at the moment a seminar on 'Women and Development' as a preparation for the Nairobi conference and Forum).

Ria Brouwers (Netherlands)

Ria Brouwers works for Vrouw - Kerk - Tweederde Wereld (VKW) which means Women - Church - Developing World.

VKW is a women's group, working in the field of development education and development action, specifically on women's issues. VKW was started in 1977 by women from a variety of Christian women's organisations. The motor of the movement is the fact that 'development', as it has taken place thus far, has deteriorating effects on the lives of many women all around the world. The basis for action is recognition of the need for changing power structures, political, economical, religious, patriarchal. Workshops, actions, publications, audio-visuals are the main methods by which a variety of issues are being touched upon. To name a few: prostitution and sex-tourism, development cooperation, women and liberation movements, migrant women in the Netherlands, women and work, solidarity actions with women under apartheid in South Africa and with women in Latin American countries suffering under military dictatorship.

Besides education and action VKW also tries to influence the policies of the government and the development agencies to be more dedicated towards women's participation and women's issues. For activities on this level VKW works together with others. To be named in the context is the Vrouwenberaad (Women's Council), an informal group bringing together women from development institutions, government and women's groups.

Ellen Clark (Switzerland)

Ellen Clark is the Communications Director for the World Young Women’s Christian Association.

Anna Foca (Italy)

Anna Foca has been the Secretary General and Director of MOLISV since 1982. Before this she was in charge of Cooperation Projects in the same NGO. MOLISV (Movimento Liberazione Sviluppo) is an Italian Voluntary NGO with projects especially in Africa.

Jane Goldsmith (Britain)

Jane Goldsmith is the Women's Campaign Officer for the World University Service UK office. She is also involved in the Women and Third World Working Group.

Jane Goldsmith is currently working on a Europe-Wide campaign entitled "A Woman's right to Learn". The campaign aims to develop a greater understanding among people in Europe about the crucial role that Third World women play in the development process, and the importance of promoting Third World women's education. She has made a slide-tape presentation called "Education for Liberation or Domestication".

The Women and Third World Working Group in association with Returned Volunteer Action (RVA) was established in 1981. It aims to facilitate cooperation and understanding between different groups concerned with women and the Third World. One way in which it does this is through seminars and conferences on a range of different issues.

Caterina Imbastari (Italy)

Caterina Imbastari is working with the Italian NGO, Terra Nuova, Centroi per il Volontariato. She participates in the "Coordinamento Femminile fra le ONG de Cooperazione allo Sviluppo". Terra Nuova works in the field of international cooperation with developing countries, developing projects in collaboration with local counterparts in the fields of agriculture, health, education, etc.

Ulli Lunacek (Austria)

Ulli Lunacek represented Frauensolidaritat, a women's solidarity movement in Austria.

The main activity of the Frauensolidaritat has been to found a centre for flower workers in Columbia. The centre, which has received funding from the Austrian government, includes health workshops, childcare facilities, legal help, handicrafts workshops and other activities.

The flower workers' job involves high health risks since the flowers are prepared for export using pesticides and fungicides, a third of which are banned in Austria. Furthermore the women wear no protective clothing.

Sanne Olsen (Denmark)

Sanne Olsen represented KULU Women in Development Organisation.

KULU was founded in 1976. It is an umbrella for 28 groups including women and development organisations in Denmark and women's groups within development organisations.

The aim of the organisation is one of development education and this is carried out in a variety of ways: booklets, seminars and study circles, campaigns to influence the development agencies, comments to the press on government policies. KULU is only able to support a very limited number of projects directly but it will forward applications to suitable sources.

I also work as information officer for the World University Service in Denmark where I focus on liberation movements in Southern Africa and Central America. Earlier I carried out research on women in Mozambique, Tanzania and Kenya and I have also been involved in carrying out training courses for development volunteers and experts.

Hilka Pietilla (Finland)

Hilka Pietilla is the Secretary General of the Finnish United Nations Association which is ICDA's contact point in Finland.

I emphasize especially in my work the involvement of women's issues in the UN. I also actively participate in the Women for Peace movement and the women's movement in general. I am a writer, lecturer and facilitator on women's issues. I have recently written a review of how women's issues have progressed in the UN in the last 40 years and also a substantive article on the essentials of an alternative development for the future from a feminist perspective.

 

LATIN AMERICA

Ana Maria Gomez (Chile)

Ana Maria Gomez is specialized in the areas of social work, youth work and administration. After studying social work at the University of Chile, she worked with urban industrial workers in Santiago until 1973. From 1974, she worked with NGO publications and Chilean youth in Europe and Latin America, joining the Rome office of ISIS in 1980. She was responsible for the administration and collaborated with the ISIS Women's International Bulletin in Spanish.

She returned to Chile in early 1984 to set up the Isis International office in Santiago. She is responsible for coordinating our programmes and publications in the region.

Esther Madrid-Buenrostro (Mexico)

Esther Madrid-Buenrostro has worked for a number of years with CIDHAL. She has skills in popular education and communication. She works especially with the urban poor putting into practice CIDHAL's programme. CIDHAL is an organization which works with women, especially the poor slum dwellers, peasants and workers, giving them information, support, training and solidarity in raising their consciousness as women and in the struggle to change this situation.

Cecilia Torres (Ecuador)

Cecilia Torres is the founder and coordinator of CAM (Centro Accion de Mujeres) in Guayaquil. The group's activities range from the organization of seminars and workshops, literacy campaigns, health care to the production of audiovisual material used in their courses. They also print a regular pamphlet called "Boticam" and in January 1984 opened a women's bookstore.

 

NORTH AMERICA

Saralee Hamilton (United States)

Saralee Hamilton coordinates the Nationwide Women's Program of the American Friends Service Committee in the USA. The Nationwide Women's Program provides information and resource materials for a wide network of women on issues ranging from peace, racism, violence against women to women's work and culture. The focus is on action-oriented resources and models for organizing. A quarterly AFSC Women's Newsletter carries reports of activities, news about women organizing around the world and resource listings. Each issue contains a special section on Women and Global Corporations, with reports about the expanding international network involved in research, education, support and direct organizing related to global industries where women are concentrated or targets of consumer culture, such as electronics, textile, agribusiness tourism, media and pharmaceuticals.

Molly Kane (Canada)

Molly Kane is a development education officer with the YMCA (Young Men's Christian Association) in Montreal. She is a representative on the French-speaking working group on Women in Development of the Canadian Council for International Cooperation (CCIC). CCIC is an umbrella group of development NGOs in Canada.

Liz Willick (Canada)

Liz Willick works for the South Saskatchewan Committee for World Development. At the meeting she represented the Women in Develpment group of CCIC, the Canadian umbrella for development NGOs. The focus of Liz Willick's work is development education among the rural farming communities. She was a resource person at a conference held in Ontario in summer 1984 on Women and Food Production, organised by CCIC Women in Development Group.

Joyce Yu (United States)

Joyce Yu works for the United Nations office of Church Women United in New York. She is also coordinating the work of the United Nations Non-Governmental Liaison Service in New York on the Decade for Women's activities. Her particular concerns are to promote international education for United States women and to encourage grass-roots women to organise themselves and to learn more about the goals and ideals of the Decade.

 

PACIFIC

Fau Mamea Care (Western Samoa)

Fau Mamea Care works with the YWCA (Young Women's Christian Association) of Western Samoa.

Wendy Poussard (Australia)

Wendy Poussard is the National Coordinator of the Women and Development network in Australia. The purpose of the network is to find real ways that women in Australia can work in solidarity with women's groups in other countries especially in the Third World. The network was started by women from the aid agencies who wanted to bring about changes in the policies of the government and the NGOs. They have had considerable success in doing this but now the challenge is to change the behaviour of the bureaucrats.

 

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