NoVo Foundation joins Global Fund for Women and Laudes Foundation (formerly C&A Foundation) collaborative to end gender-based violence in the garment industry

APRIL 5, 2017–Global Fund for Women is pleased to announce a new partnership with the NoVo Foundation to join its multi-year initiative with Laudes Foundation (formerly C&A Foundation) and Gender at Work to eradicate gender-based violence and empower women garment workers in Asia.

NoVo Foundation will invest $1 Million over four years for the multi-year learning collaborative with women’s rights organizations to advance gender justice in the apparel industry. This is in addition to the 1.5 Million Euro C&A Foundation will invest, announced in December 2016 for the creation of the initiative.

The collaboration will find, fund, and strengthen organizations working to end gender-based violence against women workers in South Asia, with a focus on major apparel sourcing countries including Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, Myanmar, and Vietnam. The initiative will support women garment workers to learn about their rights, realize their own power to secure these rights, and become leaders to create systemic change, which is critical to preventing violence.

“We’re excited that the NoVo Foundation, one of our longtime supporters and partners, is joining our initiative to end gender-based violence in the garment industry and empower women workers,” says Musimbi Kanyoro, President and CEO of Global Fund for Women. “Together with NoVo Foundation and our other partners, Laudes Foundation (formerly C&A Foundation) and Gender at Work, we are confident in carrying this initiative forward to make a lasting impact for women workers.”

NoVo Foundation’s investment, which will be focused on grantmaking for the initiative, comes as Global Fund for Women, Laudes Foundation (formerly C&A Foundation), and Gender at Work are closing the initial phase of the application review process. The initiative plans to award initial grants to initiative partners in June 2017.

With a long-term focus on stronger partnerships, systemic workplace and community change, and learning and evaluation, this initiative will significantly build upon NoVo Foundation, Global Fund for Women, Gender at Work, and Laudes Foundation’s (formerly C&A Foundation) work to end gender-based violence and drive women’s human rights.

About Global Fund for Women

Global Fund for Women is one of the world’s leading foundations for gender equality, standing up for the human rights of women and girls. It campaigns for zero violence, economic and political empowerment, and sexual and reproductive health and rights.

Global Fund for Women uses its powerful network to rally advocates, raise money, and get support to where it’s most urgently needed. It funds and partners with women-led groups who are courageously fighting for justice in their own communities. This rights-based approach gets to the root of gender inequality and is the most effective way to create permanent social change.

Since 1987, Global Fund for Women has invested in nearly 5,000 grassroots groups in 175 countries, helping to win rights for millions of women and girls.

About NoVo Foundation

The NoVo Foundation is dedicated to building a more just and balanced world. Created in 2006 by Jennifer and Peter Buffett, NoVo has become one of the largest private foundations in the world to support initiatives focused explicitly on girls and women. It also works to advance social and emotional learning, support Indigenous communities in North America, and promote local living economies. Learn more at www.novofoundation.org.

About Laudes Foundation (formerly C&A Foundation)

Laudes Foundation is an independent foundation joining the growing movement to accelerate the transition to a just and regenerative economy. Responding to the dual crises of climate breakdown and inequality, Laudes supports brave action that will inspire and challenge industry to harness its power for good.

Part of the Brenninkmeijer family enterprise and learning from six generations of entrepreneurship and philanthropy, Laudes Foundation advances the work of C&A Foundation to work collaboratively and persistently to both influence capital and transform industry, starting with the built environment and fashion industries.

About Gender at Work

Gender at Work is a transnational network of individuals and organizations that build knowledge and practice to end discrimination against women and advance cultures of equality. We focus on building individual capacity, collective capacities and consciousness, and a robust field that bridges knowledge and theory from multiple locations and contexts to deepen and strengthen efforts to uncover and change informal norms and rules. We work with a wide range of organizations, networks, and movements to help them make visible, challenge, and change these norms embedded in their foundations, to build internal cultures of equality and contribute to transformation of cultural norms that support the achievement of gender equality and social justice. We do this through knowledge building and capacity development, gender action learning, strategic evaluation and learning, and by building partnerships that bring the development world and other sectors (academia, women’s networks, private sector, etc.) together.

Press Contacts

Anna Tenuta
Senior Campaigns and Communications Manager, Global Fund for Women
[email protected], 1 212 419 4467
www.globalfundforwomen.org

Stephanie Klotz
Senior Communications Manager, C&A Foundation
[email protected], +49 211 9872 4557
www.candafoundation.org