At Opportunity International, we recognize the remarkable power of one woman to change the world. That’s why we founded the Women’s Opportunity Network, a community of dynamic trailblazers, corporate and government leaders, entrepreneurs and philanthropists committed to helping Opportunity International empower women to improve their lives, strengthen their families and enhance their communities. WON includes leaders like Opportunity Global Ambassador Carly Fiorina, Governor Chair and entrepreneur Karen Robinson Cope and Opportunity CEO Vicki Escarra, who share a commitment to empowering one woman at a time.

The fact is 70 percent of the 2.5 billion people living on less than $2 a day are women and girls. That’s a sobering statistic that demands action. Of the five million clients served by Opportunity International in 20 countries, 93 percent are women and 98 percent of their loans are repaid. Funds raised by WON benefit Opportunity International’s One Woman Initiative, which seeks to raise $50 million by 2015 to empower an additional two million women to work their way out of poverty through financial resources, education and training.

We’re motivated by women, like Felicitus Mmboge, an Opportunity International client who saved enough money to open a beauty products business then used a loan from Opportunity to purchase inventory. She also keeps chickens and sells the eggs to help pay school fees for her three children and an orphaned niece.

And then there is Betty Mulooki, a sugar cane farmer who would sell any extra food—a rare occurrence—in the nearby market for money to help support her family. When a sugar cane factory was established in her village, she signed on to cultivate three acres. With a small business loan from Opportunity, she has since expanded her operation to six acres. And Betty intends to expand further to generate a larger income and help her children finish school.

This Mother’s Day you can celebrate the special women in your life with something more meaningful. You can extend your mother’s love and compassion around the world with a donation to The One Woman Initiative in honor of her or your grandmother, sister, aunt or friend. Your Mother’s Day donation will transform the lives of hundreds of women and families across generations.

Please join us in helping mothers around the world make improve their life and strengthen their family and communities.

We’re proud to say that Opportunity is partnering with the growing Half the Sky movement as part of our commitment to invest in women. Ninety-three percent of our loans go to women, who consistently show inspiring resilience and determination to change their own world and the future of their children. Over the next few weeks, Half the Sky will be highlighting organizations that provide educational and economic empowerment solutions to gender inequality and the oppression of women. The movement is inspired by journalists Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn’s book, Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide.

Jayanthi, a loan officer at Opportunity India’s Saidapet branch, started as a Trust Group client. She’s pictured here with her two young daughters Lavanya and Abinaya.

Using video, websites, games, blogs and other educational tools, Half the Sky raises awareness of women’s issues, but also promotes concrete, market-based solutions—like microfinance—to fight these problems and empower women.

Learn more about our partnership at opportunity.org/halfthesky. Join the conversation about women’s empowerment on Facebook and Twitter.

If you’d like to invest in women, visit opportunity.org/give to empower a woman working her way out of poverty.

One of the 24 Global Opportunity Quilt patches that people could give on Mother’s Day as part of the Global Opportunity Quilt

We’re excited to share that our Global Opportunity Quilt in honor of Mother’s Day was selected as the regional winner for the Most Creative Fundraiser in the Classy Awards! This means that Opportunity’s quilt is one of the four fundraisers in the running to be named the national winner in this category. You can find the other regional finalists in all categories listed here.

Thank you so much to everyone who created a tribute patch for a woman in their life on the Global Opportunity Quilt, and a big thanks to everyone who voted for us in the semi-final voting over the last two weeks. Your votes helped name us the Midwest regional winner.

Now the panel of Classy judges will vote and we’ll hear the results announced at the fourth annual Classy Awards ceremony on September 22 in San Diego. Winning a Classy Award would earn us recognition and help gain more visibility for our life-changing work so wish us luck!

4th Annual Classy Awards

Click here to learn more about the awards and the panel of judges that will be selecting the national winners.

Thank you for supporting Opportunity and thanks for Staying Classy!

Trust Group treasurer Unayezu (left) and president Mubonjyamema (center), with another client at right, share their stories.

The “Those Who Trust Each Other” Trust Group started 11 years ago. The 14 members of the group receive microfinance loans to grow their businesses selling a variety of products including bananas, beans, veggies, and sorghum, and there’s even a butcher! They meet weekly in Ntunga with their Opportunity Rwanda loan officer, who travels out to advise them on their businesses, and to collect and process their loan repayments.

Meet Mubonjyamema Ephiphamie

Client Mubonjyamema is the president of the Trust Group. She provides for her family selling sorghum, ground nuts and beans, and with the income from her growing business she was able to build a long house with four front and back rooms with separate entrances that she rents out to four families. Each family operates a business out of their own front room, and then lives in the back. Mubonjyamema’s hard work is paying off and she proudly told us that she’s now able to send all five of her children to school.

Meet Unayezu Philomene

Unayezu is the treasurer of the group. She’s a widow whose husband was killed in the Rwandan Genocide in 1994. Unayezu’s three daughters are in school and one has even completed high school. She also has two sons currently in secondary school. Unayezu is on her second loan, which she’s using to grow her business selling green bananas. She was able to build a house after one year at her business and has now installed electricity. She’s working hard to provide a better life for her children, and she’s doing it all on her own!

Meet Mukamuhizi Alphonsine

Mukamuhizi Alphonsine shyly but proudly told us about her success selling salt, sugar and soap, and how she can now contribute to her family finances.

Mukamuhizi is a lovely, soft-spoken woman in a yellow and orange dress and a stunning headdress. She shared with us how her first microfinance loan has enabled her to buy salt and sugar to sell, and with her growing profits she’s now added soap to her inventory too. Mukamuhizi’s success enabled her to put a concrete floor in her home, make repairs, install electricity, and buy new furniture. She talked about how she can now provide for her family and even has a little left over to buy nice fabric for herself without having to burden her husband to buy it for her. She is obviously proud of her success–her family is better-off because of her.

Though the women in the group say they don’t celebrate Mother’s Day as we do in the U.S. and U.K., they did celebrate International Women’s Day on March 8th, which I thought was wonderful. I asked the entire group what qualities make a good mother. Here is what they told me:

• “A good mother is someone who can raise children with good values.”
• “A good mother respects herself.”
• “She can live in peace with her relatives.”
• “A good mother teaches her children to respect others and themselves.”

Their answers showed me that all mothers–no matter their life experiences, nationality or income–want similar things. This was affirmed when we spoke to the women in another Trust Group later that same day, who told us a good mother had love for her family and for God, and she looks for ways to promote family, self-advancement, progress and hospitality. Though I’ve now returned to the U.S., these women I met have stayed with me. Wherever they are this Sunday, I want to wish them all a wonderful and happy Mother’s Day! I pray for their continued success and that they will always be able to provide for themselves and their children.

Celebrate the mothers and women in your life by creating a tribute patch on the Global Opportunity Quilt at opportunity.org/honormom. Your gift will impact the lives of Opportunity’s women clients in Rwanda and all over the world who are working hard to provide for their families.

This was a private screening at the Gene Siskel Film Center hosted by suburban Chicago-based company Lifeway Foods, Inc. There was a post-film Q&A with Burns and Lifeway CEO Julie Smolyansky, moderated by Jane Saks, executive director of Columbia College Chicago’s Institute for the Study of Women and Gender in the Arts & Media. The event was attended by 200 local nonprofit and business leaders, and members of the media, interested in women’s issues.

Burns opens “No Woman, No Cry” with her recollections, and home video footage, of the complications from the birth of her first child several years ago. While she received care and recovered within a few days, left only with the emotional scars from those terrifying moments, she was shocked to learn that hundreds of thousands of women die each year during childbirth around the world—and that 90% of these deaths are preventable. Each of the four subsequent segments in the film featured women living in cultures or communities that presented their own unique barriers to better maternal health, whether they be cultural or financial.

In the slums of Dhaka, Bangladesh, Sabina Faiz Rashid Ph.D. of BRAC University says that maternal mortality and health is not always about facilities and lack of access. Sometimes it’s about the assumptions and attitudes that influence the health choices made by people in poverty. In the case of Monica, she insists on having her baby at home with an untrained mother’s aid instead of heeding the advice of her local BRAC health worker by going to the nearby, relatively well-equipped hospital. Monica makes this choice because of the social stigma of being seen in public in her condition, and because of the widely held belief in the slums that hospitals were dangerous and risky places, only to be braved if absolutely necessary. Indeed, when she had gone into the hospital for a sonogram in her ninth month, the male doctor admonishes her female health advocate from BRAC and ignores Monica completely while his nurses examines her.

In Tanzania, mother Janet has a different barrier. She has no qualms about going to the local clinic, and when she has strong pains that she thinks are labor, she goes on foot to get care. When these turn out to be false labor, she must make the arduous trek back home. Finally, when she comes in again and the nurse tells her she needs the facilities at Mt. Neru Hospital, she’s willing to go but has no money and no transportation. Burns and her film crew arrange a car to take her to Mt. Neru (in a breach of cinema verité and an intervention that wouldn’t please documentary purists, though it speaks to Burns’s compassion for her subjects).

The U.S. segment featured one couple’s sad personal story, but frankly, it shocked me as much for the statistics. The U.S. ranks at a deplorable 50th in maternal mortality in the world despite the fact that it spends more on healthcare per capita than any other nation in the world, and an astonishing two women per day die from pregnancy complications here. For the 20% of U.S. women without health insurance, even a healthy, uncomplicated pregnancy can cost thousands of dollars. The irony, Burns tells us as the narrator, is that though maternal healthcare is not readily available elsewhere in the world, if it can be accessed it’s often free. In the U.S., where quality healthcare is abundantly available, it is anything but.

Opportunity staff and supporters at the lunch reception before "No Woman, No Cry" screening and Q&A.

In Guatemala, Dr. Linda Valencia, who is herself eight months pregnant, is a compassionate caretaker, talking through family-planning options with her impoverished patients in an honest, open way that treats them as equal partners in their choices. In a country where abortions are controversial, she’s working to be sure women have the facts about the procedure, and to reduce complications should they choose to get one by offering good post-abortion care. Linda says, “I need to get rid of the authoritarianism and paternalism of a doctor who tells women what to do.”

In addition to the learnings from the film, the Q&A afterwards was thought-provoking. Smolyansky, the youngest female CEO of a publicly-traded company and a recent traveling companion with Burns to Bangladesh, discussed women’s issues with enthusiasm, laced with occasional indignation. Saks, a seasoned educator well-versed in these issues, mediated the discussion with control and wisdom. And Burns was remarkable not only for her passion but for her grace and poise on the panel. She seemed thoroughly unflappable, and though none of the questioners in the audience were remotely confrontational, I became convinced that even with less-civil audiences, she would be unruffled.

“No Woman, No Cry” is very well-done and raises critical questions about the needs for maternal health both at home and abroad. If you have the opportunity to see it, you should do so. After all, remarks Burns in the Q&A, maternal health is fifth on the list of Millennium Development Goals and as human beings, we have all been affected by childbirth at least once. This is an issue that affects us all.

1. “What if Mark Zuckerberg Were Born a Girl in Rwanda?” Huff Post‘s Global Motherhood series – In light of IWD celebrations this week on social media–especially on Facebook–Kate Roberts of Population Services International highlights the need for better education and health for women and girls by asking us to imagine what would happen if Mark Zuckerberg had been born a girl in the developing world. “Imagine,” she says, “if his inventive mind–rather than being given the opportunity to create, flourish, and ultimately change the world–had been squandered by poor health and inadequate education.” Roberts has found an imaginative way to frame an ever-present problem in the developing world.
2. “International Women’s Day 2012: Empowering Rural Women To End Hunger and Poverty,” Huffington Post - Education is the key to lifting rural women and girls out of poverty and UNESCO estimates that about 80% of the 67 million children not attending school live in rural areas, the majority of whom are girls.
3. “Giving Rural Women the Power to End Hunger and Poverty,” ONE Blog - It’s a guest post by Léontine Ayawovi Gbadégbégnon, the secretary-general of Togo’s Groupe de Réflexion et d’Action Femme, Démocratie and Développement (GF2D), a political action group focused on empowering women with a voice in decision-making processes.
4. “Tanzania Hailed on Women’s Welfare,” Tanzania’s Daily News - Featuring comments by John Hendra, Deputy Executive Director of Women, as well as the Dar es Salaam regional commissioner, Said Meck Sadick, who said that beyond the celebrations of IWD 2012, the day is also an opportunity to evaluate the progress in the “liberation of [Tanzanian] women.”
5. “World Bank Must Re-Evaluate Its Strategies to Cut Maternal Mortality,” Poverty Matters blog on The Guardian - This is a deeply critical review of the World Bank’s claim that it is a global leader in improving maternal and child health. Though it has earmarked $96 million for reproductive health projects in 2011, the blogger writes, ”the bank fails to mention that this total represents just 0.2% of its $43 billion budget” for 2011.
6. “Girls at Risk: Starting a Revolution for Teenage Mothers,” CNN’s African Voices series – Guest blogger Seri Wendoh of the International Planned Parenthood Foundation (IPPF) writes of the need for better reproductive health for women and teenagers, especially in Sierra Leone and Liberia, which have some of the world’s highest maternal mortality rates. Though, “it may seem to you to be the wrong message to be highlighting on [IWD], which should be celebratory,” but it is apropos considering the IWD theme, ‘Connecting girls, inspiring futures.’
7. “A Dream Deferred,” Huff Post Impact – A post by Malawi-born Esther Munthali, a fellow with the Adolescent Girls’ Advocacy and Leadership Initiative (AGALI), and program officer at the Foundation for Community Support Services (FOCUS), who discusses her difficult upbringing and her work today to improve the lives of adolescent girls and women in Malawi.
8. “Africa’s Girl Power,” The New York Times‘s Opinion Pages – Another call to educate Africa’s girls, as the key contributor to improving the economies of African nations in the long term.
9. “What I Learned from Meeting Women in Kenya,” Oxfam’s GROW blog - Oxfam’s celebrity Global Ambassador Helena Christensen reflects on her visit to drought-stricken northern Kenya, and the power and determination of the women she met along the way.
10. “Microloans, Greenhouses Help Women Cope with Climate Change,” Inter Press Service (IPS) News – Microfinance loans given to Kenyan women in a Trust Group format are enabling them to increase crop yields through irrigation and greenhouses, helping them to weather (no pun intended) the ill effects of global climate change.

Here are just a few of the women of Opportunity International.

1. Portfolios of the Poor: How the World’s Poor Live on $2 a Day
   Daryl Collins, Jonathan Morduch, Stuart Rutherford, & Orlanda Ruthven, 2010
   This book tackles the fundamental question of how people in poverty make ends meet. Over 250 families in Bangladesh, India, and South Africa participated in this unprecedented study of the financial practices of the world’s most impoverished people.
2. UnPoverty: Rich Lessons from the Working Poor
   Mark Lutz, 2010
   This book written by Opportunity’s former SVP of Global Philanthropy features stories of visiting those in extreme poverty and calls us to join an accelerating revolution to eradicate poverty during our lifetimes. Acute poverty has more to do with location than with laziness or lack of intelligence.
3. The Blue Sweater: Bridging the Gap Between Rich and Poor in an Interconnected World
   Jacqueline Novogratz, 2009
   The Blue Sweater is the inspiring personal memoir of Novogratz, who has spent her life on a quest to understand global poverty and to find new ways of tackling it. From her stumbling efforts as a young idealist to the creation of the trailblazing organization she runs today, she brings us a series of insightful stories and unforgettable characters.
4. Banker to the Poor: Micro-Lending and the Battle Against World Poverty
   Muhammad Yunus, 2003
   Yunus’s memoir describes the journey that led him to rethink the economic relationship between rich and poor and how he established Grameen, a bank devoted to providing the most impoverished people Bangladesh with microloans. This is the definitive history of microcredit direct from the man who conceived it.
5. Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide
   Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn, 2010
   Kristof and WuDunn make a passionate call to arms against the oppression of women in the developing world, pointing out that the greatest unexploited economic resource is women. Through stories of extraordinary women, they help us see that the key to economic progress lies in unleashing their potential.
6. Dead Aid: Why Aid Is Not Working and How There Is a Better Way for Africa
   Dambisa Moyo, 2010
   Moyo’s book offers proposals for developing countries to finance development without reliance on foreign aid. She illuminates the way in which overreliance on aid has trapped developing nations in a vicious circle of aid dependency, corruption, market distortion, and deepening poverty.
7. The Hole in Our Gospel
   Richard E. Stearns, 2010
   Stearns writes of his passionate call for Christians to change the world by actively living out their faith. Using his own journey as an example, he explores the hole that exists in our understanding of the Gospel; that it was always meant to be a world-changing social revolution, a revolution that begins with us.
8. One Hen: How One Small Loan Made a Big Difference
   Katie Smith Milway, 2008
   This children’s story, inspired by true events, is about Kojo, a boy from Ghana who turns one small loan into a livelihood for many. One Hen shows how a little help can make a big difference.

1. An Insightful Journey

Family Week travelers with the Amigos del Progreso Trust Group in Cartagena, Colombia

At Opportunity, we know it’s important to visit our field staff, meet our clients, and connect with the people and communities we serve. We also feel that our donors should have the opportunity to see this work firsthand through our Insight Trips. A life-changing experience, this year we saw the number and diversity of our Insight Trips grow. In March, a group celebrated the 100th anniversary of International Women’s Day in India, in June we hosted our Family Week trip to Colombia, and in July a group of YAO supporters visited Tanzania. We hope you were able to be a part of these great experiences and if not, we invite you to check out the opportunities this year to join us on a trip as we visit clients and staff in countries from Latin America to Africa to Asia.

2. From 18,000 Feet in the Air to the White House

In February, young professional Sarah jumped out of a plane for our clients in Tanzania.

• Jump for Opportunity showed how passionate and daring our YAO members are! On February 19, 2011, 29 adventurers, from YAO supporters to Opportunity staff, jumped out of a plane at 18,000 feet to raise support for our clients in Tanzania. The idea came from one YAO member, challenging others to risk jumping out of a plane in solidarity with our loan clients who take risks every day through their own business ventures. The event raised over $100,000 for our clients in Tanzania, and the unique approach also helped launch it to the final round of the Stay Classy Awards in their Most Creative Fundraiser category.
• A plane wasn’t the only place YAO celebrated young entrepreneurs’ work and support in sustainable development. YAO, along with Empact, spoke at the White House during the FEE (Future of Entrepreneurship Education) Summit in November. Empact presented their Empact 100, a list of the top 100 companies started by young entrepreneurs who encourage local investment in communities and social responsibility.

3. The 100th Anniversary of International Women’s Day

The image of Opportunity Kenya client Judith Godiah, and her children, featured in the special supplement of USA Today

This year was the centennial celebration of International Women’s Day, observed on March 8. In addition to Opportunity’s International Women’s Day Insight Trip to India, we also chose this important date to launch our 2011 Banking on Women initiative. The two-month campaign honored women worldwide and built awareness for the impact financial services have on their lives and families. USA Today also featured a special supplement in honor of IWD entitled “Investing in Women & Girls,” which included Opportunity’s work empowering women–who make up 84% of our client base—with small business loans, tools and services.

4. The Opportunity Family is growing

Vice Governor of Central Bank of Congo at Opportunity DRC's ribbon-cutting

We are always excited to be able to continue our microfinance work in new areas. On May 19, we were thrilled to open our doors in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Local and national government officials, as well as Opportunity country and international staff, joined the event alongside our new clients. Words cannot completely describe the tenor of the day, so please feel free to watch the video of dancing and celebration as Opportunity takes its first official steps in the DRC bringing financial services to a new entrepreneurs and communities.

5. Top 40 is Not Just for Ryan Seacrest…

The "Side by Side" gala at the International Market Square in Minneapolis.

• Devex, a leader in international development resources, named Richard Leftley, President and CEO of MicroEnsure, one of London’s top 40 development leaders under 40. Furthermore, in June, MicroEnsure won the FT/IFC Sustainable Finance Award, organized by the Financial Times and the International Finance Corporation, a member of the World Bank Group. The major award recognized MicroEnsure’s work in creating life insurance products in Ghana through mobile phone technology.
• Opportunity International also turned 40 this year! We celebrated this milestone at our conference in San Francisco in October, and at our gala events in Minneapolis in November, and Phoenix in December. The events captured the spirit of founder, Al Whittaker, to serve and equip those in poverty, highlighted the lives already touched by Opportunity over the years, and challenged all to continue that dream by raising funds and support for Opportunity.

This year we celebrated first steps, and anniversaries. We celebrated the role of women, and young professionals highlighted the work of our clients in unconventional ways. At Opportunity, we eagerly look forward to what 2012 will bring, and invite you to continue with us along the way.