Project profile — Women's Voice and Leadership - Benin

The expected outcomes for this project include: (1) the integration of innovative approaches and the improvement of the management and sustainability of local women's rights organizations in Benin; (2) improving the performance of programming and advocacy, as well as the delivery of quality programmes and services by women's rights organizations to advance gender equality in Benin, including through innovative approaches; and (3) improving the effectiveness of national and subnational women's rights platforms, networks and alliances to change gender policies and contribute to their implementation in Benin.

Among the results obtained as of March 2021: 1) launch of reactive funds for the benefit of 10 women's rights organizations in year two in order to deal with the consequences of COVID-19 impacting women's rights in Burkina Faso; 2) funding of 14 women's rights organizations, six of which were emerging and eight established in the first quarter of year two in Benin after the implementation of a reactive fund; 3) the value of investments in support to women's rights organizations and women's networks at the local level amounted to $ 461,181 ($ 196,862 in Benin and $ 378,240 in Burkina Faso). From this amount, $ 82,941 was allocated to reactive funds and $ 378,240 to multi-year funds; 4) in total, 25 women's rights organizations (10 in Benin and 15 in Burkina Faso) promote women's rights, gender equality and have gained support for their programming and/or their institutional strengthening; 5) 18 administrators from selected women's rights organizations benefited from program support during the ownership workshop and webinars organized in Benin and 30 in Burkina Faso.