Women Issues Are at the Heart of BARKA Foundation

Water and women are intricately linked in Africa. Making water accessible empowers women. Sanitation also has an empowering effect especially for school girls.  It has been proven that without gender-specific sanitation facilities girls will drop out of school once they begin menstruation.  Without an ability to take care of their needs, girls are ridiculed, shamed and drop out of school altogether.  Menstrual hygiene management (MHM) is a critical issue that cuts across sectors of sanitation, education & women’s empowerment.  In addition to water and sanitation initiatives, BARKA has established a micro-finance program for small, sustainable, women-owned businesses in Gourma Province through connecting individual women and women’s associations in the US directly with women’s groups in villages of Burkina. Read more about the micro-finance initiative created with the support of Women with Wings, an all women’s singing group in Bangor, Maine.

Women’s Rights

Political Representation

Rural women need advocates in Washington D.C. and within their local governments. They produce half the world’s food and in developing countries between 60%-80% of food crops yet own only 1% of farmland (CARE). Programs and policies are developed concerning food security in these countries without taking women into consideration.

Social Issues

The traditional practices of Female Genital Mutilation and Cutting (FGMC) and “arranged marriages” (giving young girls away as brides) are both illegal in Burkina Faso. Running up against these issues will be difficult and unavoidable. BARKA will consult with in-country experts trained in the field of sustainable social development to promote discussion, debate and work to facilitate positive social changes that are self-governed and autonomously defined.

40% of girls in rural Burkina still experience circumcision (down from 66% in 1998).

FGMC has recently been shown to increase problems during childbirth by as much as 70% and that babies are more likely to die.

As of 2004, 70% of circumcisions are carried out on girls under the age of 7 because it is harder for authorities to detect.

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