DRC 2019 Chart page

Women’s ability to earn money is not only a fundamental economic right but also critical to improving their and their family’s wellbeing. Through our programme, women gain knowledge in small business management and in a vocational skill (e.g. tailoring) that can help them earn. 68% of women graduates of our programme in the DRC reported personal earnings of at least $1.90 a day, compared to 6% at enrolment.

Savings and assets are critical for women and households to cope with economic shocks, by providing a safety net for hard times. For women living in poverty, savings can be seen as an unaffordable luxury. In our programme, women learn how they can save even on a low income. 100% of graduates of our programme in the DRC reported saving a portion of their earnings, compared to 77% at enrolment.

Food security is a key indicator of wellbeing and decreasing poverty. Food security is not just about having access to enough food, but also nutritious food. Nutrition is a key part of our training, supporting women and their family’s health and wellbeing. Upon graduating from our year-long programme, 98% of women reported having sufficient food in the house in the last four weeks, compared to 53% of women at enrollment.

As well as supporting women to know their reproductive rights, our programme supports women to have greater decision-making power (which we see in Goal 5.6), access to referral services such as access to contraceptives and increase their self-efficacy (which we see in 5.1) – all of which contribute to the increase in women who practise family planning. Whilst this is a significant increase in the number of women practising family planning, the percentage of women is still low at graduation.

Our interpretation of this data is that contraceptive use in DRC is generally very low (demonstrated by the 8% datapoint at baseline), so for the women we serve (the most marginalised in the community), a 30% endline is considerably high.

Many of the women that we serve have never completed primary school due to discrimination in their communities that undervalues girls and blocks them from opportunities. Increases in girls accessing education is a positive sign of change that will continue to impact across generations. Women graduates of our programme in the DRC reported that 48% of girls were in school, compared with 42% at enrollment.

Women gaining confidence is central to their empowerment, believing in themselves and their abilities to participate, succeed, engage and create change for themselves, their facilities and communities. It is also a positive sign of recovery from trauma and isolation. Using a set of questions commonly used in women’s empowerment research studies, we present self-efficacy as a score on a scale of 0-1, where 1 indicates the highest possible level of self-efficacy.

The perceived self-efficacy of the women on our programme in the DRC has increased on graduation, from 0.39 on average to 0.70 on a scale of 0-1.

In the conservative communities where we work, women are denied influence over decision-making, including over their own bodies. Our data highlights an important shift in women’s voices being heard in decision-making which should also lead to positive changes in wellbeing. 80% of women graduates of our programme in the DRC reported being involved in decisions about having more children compared to 47% at enrolment.

Women face multiple barriers in accessing employment. For example, in the DRC, attitudes in communities favour men working with women expected to stay at home to cook, clean and look after the children. Yet women’s employment is critical to their economic opportunities.

On graduation of our programme, 93% of women reported employment across all occupation levels, compared to 61% at enrolment.

Conflict and poverty increase women’s vulnerability to all forms of violence, with violence acting as both a consequence and driver of discrimination with women surviving violence being more vulnerable to further abuse. 

Only 2% of graduates from our programme reported speaking out against abuse of women. Our interpretation of this data is that speaking out publicly on violence against women is extremely difficult for women in the DRC. This context means that even when women have the knowledge about the issue, they may continue to face challenges when speaking publicly. This is why we also focus on wider community level attitude, behaviour and social norm change to create an enabling environment for women’s rights.

Women’s engagement with groups in their community demonstrates women’s increasing participation. Informal networks are key for providing social and economic support as well as group decision-making skills through elections of committees to manage the group. For example, all of the women enrolled in our programme are active members of Village, Savings and Loan Associations (VSLA) groups. These groups not only provide women with the opportunity to save and build economic resilience, but also provide opportunities for emotional and practical support from other women. 

The percentage of women who were a member of a group outside our training had increased by the end of our year-long programme in the DRC, from 46% at enrolment to 70% at graduation.  

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