Cate Urban 1/15/25 Cate Urban 1/15/25

USAID's Women, Peace, and Security Implementation Plan 2024

As outlined in the Women, Peace, and Security Act of 2017, women and girls are disproportionately impacted by conflict. The status of women and the stability of nations are inextricably linked - higher levels of gender equality make countries more prosperous, secure, and democratic;3 and peace agreements are 35% more likely to last 15 years or more when women meaningfully participate4 in peace processes. Thus, the WPS Agenda is critical to USAID’s development efforts.

Cate Urban 6/10/24 Cate Urban 6/10/24

Case Study: Increased Economic Engagement Of Women In Northern Kenya’s Livestock Sector Through Grants

Deeply ingrained gender norms around livestock ownership and management have historically limited women's participation and decision-making in northern Kenya’s livestock sector, which has been traditionally dominated by men,

Cate Urban 6/10/24 Cate Urban 6/10/24

Case Study: Inclusive Design and Implementation of Grant Portfolio

USAID LMS had a specific objective of promoting gender equity and women's empowerment by supporting vulnerable women and girls in building incomes and social capital to enhance resilience to shocks.

Cate Urban 6/5/24 Cate Urban 6/5/24

Leveraging Opportunities for Systemic Change

This brief presents baseline learnings to inform stakeholders and activities striving towards more inclusive and equitable agricultural market systems.

Cate Urban 4/29/24 Cate Urban 4/29/24

Closing the Gap: A Synthesis Report on the Cases for the ROI of Women’s Inclusion

This synthesis report encourages USAID, other donors, and managers of private sector investment funds to further develop evidence on the financial return of women-inclusive investments.

Cate Urban 4/17/24 Cate Urban 4/17/24

Women Inclusive Return on Investment: Delivering financial returns for SMEs through gender equality

Cate Urban 3/25/24 Cate Urban 3/25/24

Learning Note: Navigating Firm Selection for Women-Inclusive ROI

This learning note provides key insights gained from the process of vetting and selecting companies. It is targeted toward implementing partners that are managing portfolios of firms and want to select SMEs for WI-ROI calculations or social impact.

Cate Urban 3/20/24 Cate Urban 3/20/24

Workplace Innovation: Okeba’s Return on Investment in Childcare

This case study focuses on Okeba in Uganda. It examines how providing onsite childcare helped create a women-inclusive workplace while delivering financial returns for the SME. Comparing the original business model (without childcare services) to this women-centric approach shows how the latter reduces labor costs while increasing profitability for Okeba.

Cate Urban 3/14/24 Cate Urban 3/14/24

Improved Activity Cost-Effectiveness (ImpAct) Review: Women's Agricultural Income

This ImpAct Review was conducted to inform missions seeking to integrate gender into Feed the Future programs, and summarizes impact evidence on which interventions have the greatest impact on women’s agricultural income.

Cate Urban 1/31/24 Cate Urban 1/31/24

Integrating Conflict Sensitivity into Food Security Programs

This brief assesses prevailing practices, successes, challenges, lessons learned, and recommendations around integrating conflict sensitivity into food security programs. Ultimately, conflict sensitivity is not only about managing and mitigating risk, but also about seeking opportunities to promote peace. In this respect, this learning brief can contribute to USAID’s calls for greater coherence in humanitarian, development, and peace programming by supporting aid actors to “champion conflict integration and opportunities for enabling or building peace where possible.”

Cate Urban 1/11/24 Cate Urban 1/11/24

Strategic Inclusion: Grean World’s Financial Returns of Targeting Women in The Last Mile

This particular case study focuses on Grean World, an SME in Ethiopia. It examines how applying a women-centered approach to marketing and sales addresses the energy needs of female consumers in rural and remote areas in Ethiopia, while delivering financial returns for Grean World.

Cate Urban 7/15/23 Cate Urban 7/15/23

Gender Equality and Women's Empowerment in Rwanda

Rwanda is recognized as a leader in gender equality and women’s empowerment. Women hold positions making up 61 percent of the Rwandan Parliament, and 50 percent of the President’s cabinet. While these efforts are so important, challenges still remain, specifically when it comes to achieving socio-economic equality and cultural change at the community level.

Cate Urban 6/25/23 Cate Urban 6/25/23

Climate Strategy Year 1 Review

Over the past year, USAID has launched a wide variety of initiatives, partnerships, and internal and interagency processes to implement the Strategy and set the foundation for achieving the goals over the eight years of the Strategy timeline.

Cate Urban 6/12/23 Cate Urban 6/12/23

USAID Climate Ready Lessons Learned Report

USAID Climate Ready is focused on achieving its Strategic Objective of capacity of PICs increased to adapt to negative impacts of climate change.

Cate Urban 3/31/23 Cate Urban 3/31/23

USAID Global Health Research and Development Strategy 2023-2028

This strategy describes USAID’s renewed commitment to research and development (R&D) and use of new, innovative health products and technologies; the implementation and scale-up of real world, evidence-based research and learning to improve health outcomes globally; and the strengthening of both local health research and development capacity and global research and development partnerships.

Cate Urban 3/21/23 Cate Urban 3/21/23

2023 Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment Policy

This policy provides the vision for USAID’s work to advance gender equality and women’s empowerment around the world—establishing our strategic objectives and driving investments across our operations and programs in order to achieve these aims.

Cate Urban 11/30/22 Cate Urban 11/30/22

Review of Disability Inclusive Education in USAID Asia Education Programming

This report presents findings from both a desk review (consisting of a review of activity documentation and surveys of USAID Missions and ongoing activities) of 26 basic education activities across 11 countries in Asia and three case studies conducted in Tajikistan, the Philippines, and Bangladesh. The primary objective of the case studies was to gain a better understanding of the collaboration on disability-inclusive education between USAID Missions, host governments, implementing partners, and other educational stakeholders within each country. Furthermore, the case studies provided an opportunity to explore how past basic education activities and education systems within each country have influenced the development and implementation of new basic education activities as they relate to disability inclusion.

Cate Urban 10/28/22 Cate Urban 10/28/22

Women-Inclusive Return on Investment (WI-ROI) Framework

This paper introduces the Women-Inclusive Return on Investment (WI-ROI) Framework, which builds on an existing body of evidence and research around the business case for investing in women’s inclusion. Rather than serve as a how-to guide, the WI-ROI Framework reflects the industry outlook on women’s inclusion at the firm level.

Cate Urban 10/17/22 Cate Urban 10/17/22

U.S. Government Global Food Security Research Strategy, FY22-26

This Global Food Security Research Strategy outlines the U.S. Government’s science-based, convergent, demand-led, and inclusive approach to addressing food-security challenges.

Cate Urban 8/19/22 Cate Urban 8/19/22

USAID Climate Risk Analysis for Pacific Island Countries Assessment Report

Recognizing the risks associated with climate change, several PIC have developed ambitious plans to mitigate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and to address adaptation needs.