Women Empowerment
ISB-BISEW Computer Literacy Scholarship

The Bank recognizes that the participation of women in the socio-economic development process is necessary to achieve economic prosperity, poverty reduction, and comprehensive human development in its Member Countries.

To gain a better understanding and visibility of women issues within its Member Countries and to align with the global development discourse, the Bank formed the IsDB Women Advisory Panel in 2004. In 2005, the IsDB Prize for Women's Contribution to Development was instituted as a key recommendation from the Panel.

The Prize draws international attention to the vital role women play in contributing to the development of their communities and, hence, to the world at large. It has been recently changed into the IsDB Prize on Women and Girls' Empowerment in Education.

Programs & Projects

In pursuit of an inclusive and sustainable socio-economic development of the Member Countries, the IsDB funded innovative women's empowerment focused projects and programs to be implemented by NGOs and in collaboration with other entities of the IsDB Group, such as ITFC. In 2019, the Resilience and Social Development (RSD) Department supported six NGO grant operations benefitting women with a total amount of USD$ 1 million.

This includes grants to NGO's promoting girls' education in Pakistan, Burkina Faso, Senegal, and Togo for a total amount of USD$ 378,000. In support of entrepreneurship, microfinance and financial inclusion of women and youth, the WYE supported NGO projects in Azerbaijan, Indonesia, and Tajikistan with a total amount of USD$ 472,000.

In addition, collaboration and synergies among the Bank Group's entities were reinforced; WYE Division collaborated with ITFC under the She Trades program, with IsDB's contribution of USD$ 150,000, to support businesswomen in the food processing sector in Morocco to sustain and grow their businesses as well as connect women entrepreneurs with the global value chains.

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To mainstream women's needs in the Bank's operations and projects, the Bank through its RSD, developed Women Mainstreaming Guidelines with the aim to build the capacity of the Bank's staff, specifically staff based in the regional hubs (RHs); and held missions to the regional hubs to deliver mainstreaming trainings to the RH staff and meet with key stakeholders.

During these missions, the Division familiarized key stakeholders in the visited countries working on women issues, such as relevant line ministries, regional bodies, national and local entities, international organizations, NGOs and other relevant institutions on the Bank's new framework on integrating women's empowerment within its development assistance and explored opportunities for collaboration.

29 Gender Country Profiles were developed since 2018 with a special focus on priority sectors of the Bank, thereby identifying the most pressing needs and challenges they face and proposing recommendations to address these challenges. The Profiles are also essential tools to be used to inform the Member Country Partnership Strategy (MCPS) and Country Dialogue that impact the design of the IsDB's interventions in these countries, thus ensuring that women needs are addressed, and their participation is enhanced.

The RSD reviewed the Bank's operations in women's empowerment since the Women in Development Unit was established in 1998 to document the progress made, including highlighting the different modalities and instruments used by the IsDB. Fifty (50) project briefs were developed to showcase the Bank's support and contribution in this area and will be demonstrated as part of the IsDB Geomap of projects.

The NGO Program, established in 1997, was the main vehicle for supporting MCs' standalone women empowerment interventions through local NGOs. The Program supported initiatives/projects focusing on women's education, skills development, income generation and entrepreneurship development as well as improving maternal health, eradicating obstetric labor injuries, such as Obstetric Fistula, and supporting women in science, mathematics, and engineering, among others.

Local and international NGOs remain to be valuable partners in development, which help to promote the participation of the most marginalized women and contribute to poverty reduction, women's empowerment, and inclusive growth.

At the operations level, since 2018, the Bank has engaged in several initiatives with a special focus on women's economic empowerment, for instance, Women Entrepreneurs Finance Initiative (We-Fi). The Bank was awarded a grant funding of USD 60 million for the BRAVE-Women program that covers Yemen, Burkina Faso and Nigeria. It is worth mentioning that this was the first time IsDBG mobilizes grant financing for women's empowerment.

More recently, We-Fi has considered and approved a grant award of US $ 11.6 million to implement the Building Resilience Assistance for Value Adding Enterprises for Women program referred to as (BRAVE Women) 2.0 in Yemen and the Women in Sanitation Enterprises” (WISE) Project in Bangladesh.

The IsDB is already engaged in many strategic partnerships to reinforce and strengthen its women's empowerment role. IsDB is a member of the Multilateral Development Banks (MDBs) Working Group on Gender (MDB WGG), established in 2001; the IsDB joined as an observer in 2011 and later has been granted a full membership since 2017.

The IsDB proposed the establishment of the Arab Coordination Group Women Economic Empowerment Task Force (ACG-WEE) in January 2019. The initiative was supported by the ACG members. The Task Force compromises of the Arab Coordination Group members. It aims at harmonizing and coordinating their efforts in women and youth economic empowerment.

The Bank first-ever Women's Empowerment Policy, which was approved by the Board in February 2019, sets the direction for the Bank's work in empowering women and girls in IsDB Member Countries. The Policy has four pillars: improving access to resources and services, mainstreaming women's needs, promoting women's agency and participation, and fostering learning and capacity development.