We are already at the end of the first quarter of the year 2024, and our efforts are in full swing to accelerate progress to achieve transformative results in SAVING lives. In this quarter a major highlight is our Annual Planning Meeting for the 2024 financial year which we held in February 2024, where we reflected on how to use our resources for maximum impact and long-term sustainability in a region beset with many complex and overlapping challenges. As we continue to push forward in our efforts to change the lives of millions of people and hundreds of communities, we recognized the importance of collaboration enhancement and partnerships. By working together, we can leverage our collective expertise and resources to accelerate momentum and progress towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. Our annual planning meeting resolved that our efforts will be focused on achieving long-term sustainability and resilience, even in the face of complex challenges. With continued commitment and collaboration, we can make great strides towards a more just, equitable, and sustainable world for all.
International Women’s Day 2024: Invest in Women
This newsletter also highlights the International Women’s Day 2024 – a significant event as we advocate and pursue of a more equitable and just world. The International Women’s Day was a significant event for INERELA+ to look at the progress made in gender equality and women’s empowerment.
Women and girls make up over half of the 39 million people living with HIV globally. Despite the progress in reducing HIV infections and AIDS-related mortality, women living with HIV face a unique set of challenges that continue to threaten their health outcomes. These include a disproportionate risk of gender-based violence and other preventable and/or treatable medical conditions such as cervical cancer. Gender equality remains the greatest human rights challenge. Ending the HIV epidemic, a global public health goal, cannot be achieved without preventing GBV.
The COVID pandemic, geopolitical conflicts, climate disasters, and economic turmoil have pushed an extra 75 million people into severe poverty since 2020. This could lead more than 342 million women and girls living below the poverty datum line by 2030 making immediate action crucial. The current economic system exacerbates poverty, inequality and environmental degradation thereby disproportionately affecting women and marginalised groups. This gives us the reasons to consider climate and sustainability resolutions that we can make as individuals and that we can pursue through our work to promote mitigation, adaptation, and sustainability of our natural world.
Achieving gender equality and women’s well-being in all aspects of life is more crucial than ever if we want to create prosperous economies and a healthy planet. Investing in women is a human rights imperative and cornerstone for building inclusive societies because progress for women benefits us all. However, we are facing a key challenge: the alarming $360 billion annual deficit in gender-equality measures by 2030.
INERELA+ life changing work for women calls for coming together to transform these challenges into opportunities and shape a better future for all! Empowerment and change begin with us through spreading hope to every woman everywhere.
Let’s be the change, Let’s be the hope.
I hope you will enjoy reading what we have in this newsletter about our programme work. If you have suggestions about what we can include or improvements that we should consider for our newsletter, do not hesitate to drop us a line.
We hope you enjoy reading this edition.!!!!
Gratefully yours,
Munya Mandipaza
Executive Director