Standard Chartered at FICCI

Last week, Standard Chartered representatives attended an event in India hosted by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI), the British Council and Magic Bus.

And the subject under discussion? Using sports programmes as a tool of empowerment in local communities!

A panel talk at the event discussed how large corporates can use sports programmes to promote Corporate Social Responsibility in their markets and bring about social change for the better.

On the panel was Sophie Beauvais, Director of International Relations at the Australian Sports Commission who highlighted our Goal programme as an excellent example of how corporates can facilitate girls' empowerment through netball. Thanks for the shout out!

It's great to see more corporates engaging with sports empowerment programmes and coming together in this way with NGOs and government organisations to discuss the opportunities and challenges in this field.

Collaboration across the public and private sector is something we encourage and here at Goal, we value the relationships we've built with our NGO partners who do an amazing job at teaching the Goal programme to underprivileged girls.

Let's hope we see loads more sports empowerment programmes spring up in India in the near future!

Spotlight on Colombianitos

In the past, we've featured profiles of organisations that help children in post-conflict countries, but what about children living in countries where conflict is a part of their everyday lives? How can sport help and empower these children?

Colombianitos is one such organisation that works in Colombia with both boys and girls between the ages of 6 and 18. These children, often from impoverished communities, have felt the effects of Colombia's lengthy internal conflict in many different ways. Some children have fought as soldiers, others are victims of violence and landmines or are forced to leave their homes as a result of the conflict. Many end up living in overcrowded urban slums which are usually dangerous places to live. It is very common for children not to go to school and slide into a life filled with drugs and crime.

Colombianitos provides a safe space for these children to come together and learn skills and values like self-control, decision-making, conflict resolution and confidence through the medium of football. The children learn to be ambitious again, to aspire and hope for new and better things out of life.

Around 4,000 girls and boys are currently enrolled in Colombianitos's programmes which also incorporate learning through recreational activities like music.

Thinking of setting up your own girls' empowerment organisation?

If so, then click here to read and download the excellent guidelines provided by Women Win. The guidelines have been written by experts and practitioners who have put in all that they know about setting up and running an organisation that empowers girls through sport.

Happy reading!

Goal in 2011

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"Gender equality must become a lived reality"

Agreed! This is Michelle Bachelet's motto, the Executive Director of UN Women.

UN Women is a new arm of the United Nations- it's less than a year old but we're hoping that this UN agency can achieve great things and deliver on the third Millennium Development Goal (MDG): to promote gender equality and empower women by 2015.

Here at Goal, we're actively contributing towards fulfilling MDG 3 and the establishment of UN Women is a step in the right direction to ensure that gender equality and women's and girls' rights go to the top of the agenda.

UN Women has also identified five key priorities:

• expanding women’s voice, leadership and participation
• ending violence against women
• ensuring women’s full participation in conflict resolution
• enhancing women’s economic empowerment
• setting gender equality priorities central to national, local and sectoral planning and budgeting.

Let's hope that we see some real change in the coming years in these areas.

In the meantime for some of our New Delhi residents, UN Women is supporting a seminar on Gender and Governance on 11th February at the India International Conference Centre- sign up if you can!

http://www.unwomen.org/news-events/events-calendar

Plus, the UN Commission on the Status of Women will begin on 22nd February and run until 4th March in New York City. Lot's of important issues will be discussed, so we'll keep you updated on the results of this conference.