"Investing in girls is the right thing to do"

"Investing in girls is the right thing to do.
It is also the smart thing to do."
— Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Managing Director, World Bank

In many parts of the world, women are routinely beaten, raped or sold into prostitution. They are denied access to medical care and education. Sadly, only 43 per cent of girls in developing regions attend secondary school and in sub-Saharan Africa only 83 girls are enrolled in school for every 100 boys.

According to the World Bank, an extra year of school can increase a girl's future earnings by 10 to 20 per cent and girls who attend secondary school have the power to make $2000 more per year than those who only attend primary school – now multiply that by all of the out of school girls and the impact on development is enormous.

GirlsandWomen.com is home to the G(irls)20 Summit and a movement for empowering girls and women around the world.

Founded in 2008, The Belinda Stronach Foundation (TBSF) along with over 70 partners are working with the private sector and a number of national and international organizations to encourage G8 and G20 leaders to elevate the importance of political empowerment and economic freedom for girls and women in developed and developing nations. At the Clinton Global Initiative in September of 2009, TBSF made a commitment to Promoting Development in the G8/G20 Summit Process. TBSF committed to create a platform that aims to provide greater coordination of global advocacy efforts for the 2010 G8/G20 Summits and to promote and educate the Canadian public on development issues. As an engaged Canadian charitable organization with a track record on global development issues and a strong capacity in policy management and public communications, we are working with strategic partners to champion key issues affecting girls and women and provide opportunities for the public to lend their support to their advancement worldwide.

"The health of adolescent girls is everyone's business. We all need to step up to the plate to embrace this ambitious agenda."
— Melinda Gates

"Women and girls are not the problem; they are the solution."
— Nicholas Kristof & Sheryl WuDunn

"If young women had better access to farming land, fertilizers, credit and agricultural training there would be more food available for more people, and the nutritional status of children would improve. When women receive the same levels of education, experience and farm inputs as men they can increase yields of some crops by 22%."
— International Labour Organization, 2009

"Out of the world's 130 million out-of-school youth, 70 percent are girls."
— UN Foundation

"Adolescent pregnancies cost Kenya's economy US $500 million per year, while investing in girls would potentially add US $3.2 billion to the economy."
— NIKE Foundation, 2009, Girl Effect

"There's a growing recognition among everyone from the World Bank to the U.S. military's Joint Chiefs of Staff to aid organizations like CARE that focusing on women and girls is the most effective way to fight global poverty and extremism."
— Education Economics

"An extra year of secondary schooling has been demonstrated to increase women's future wages by 10-20 percent."
— Amazing Women Rock Website

"Female education is a key source of support for long-term economic growth. It has been linked to higher productivity; higher returns to investment; higher agricultural yields; and a more favourable demographic structure."
— Goldman Sachs, 2008

"Countries with the lowest number of girls in education lie at the bottom of the human development tables."
— OECD

Information above is from www.GirlsAndWomen.com