Today is International Women’s Day. Why is International Women’s Day so important? Why should we be supporting women around the world. How can we support them from so far away?

Why is International Women’s Day so important?
Women around the world are still considered property or second class citizen’s in many countries. They are not allowed to control their own destinies or contribute to the well being of their own communities. They may not make decisions that affect themselves; they do not have the freedom to earn income or even socialize or seek medical attention without consent of another human being. Women all over the world deserve the right to control their own destinies. They deserve dignity.

Why should we be supporting women around the world?
Women deserve dignity. They deserve to have all the rights and responsibilities of every other human being on the planet. Apart from that, it is a well known fact that in many countries, women are responsible for the health, well-being and education of their children. When women are doing well, their children are doing well. Women who control their own destinies have fewer children and the children that they do have, are healthy, better educated and go on to improve the lives of generations to come.

How can we support them from so far away?
First and foremost, as consumers we can buy products that are made by people who choose to work rather than being forced to work, and who earn enough money to supply the basic necessities to their family. Looking good isn’t worth the suffering of another human being.

We are supporting women this month by asking Canadians to lend $25.00 U.S. to a women entrepreneur through Team Ethical Consumer at Kiva. To learn more about our efforts, check out

Supporting Women Entrepreneurs

Next Monday is International Women’s Day. Ethical Consumer would like to celebrate International Women’s Day all month long by offering loans to women all over the world through Kiva.

Kiva is an organization that connects people - like you and me - who are willing to lend money to people who need small loans in order to start or grow a small business. So for example, Edith has a shoe business and wants to expand but can’t because she doesn’t have the capital. She has more orders than she can fill. She asks for a loan through an agency in her hometown. The agency uses Kiva to raise the money for her. People like me - and you - loan her money. I gave $25 (US) to Edith through Kiva. She asked for a total of $700.00 (US) and received all of it from a total of 25 lenders. She will now pay that money back over eight months. Could she default? Yes, but Kiva has a repayment rate of 98.37%, which is far better than any Canadian bank!

So once she repays the money, her lenders can
- loan the money out to someone else
- withdraw it and walk away, or
- donate it to Kiva for more good works

I have always believed that the best way to alleviate poverty is to allow people to control their own destiny. We are all intelligent and creative beings. This in essence is what International Women’s Day is all about; allowing women to control their own destiny.

Join Team Ethical Consumer at Kiva and loan $25.00 (US) to a women entrepreneur that has a story that speaks to you. Or if you have a business and would like to advertise through the Ethical Consumer directory, purchase a listing for one year for $100.00 (CDN) and we will loan $25.00 (US) to an women entrepreneur for you. Please select ‘Team EC @ Kiva’ when purchasing the listing.

I chose to lend money to a women in Peru because I lived there for four years and Peru will always hold a place in my heart. Why Edith? The day before I left to come back to Canada, I went through all my old shoes figuring I’d buy new ones when I arrived home. I put together a box of shoes I was not going to take with me and walked down to the curb and dropped the box there. I walked back up the two flights to my apartment, looked out the window and the shoes were gone. You have no idea how important shoes are until you go without.

I just finished watching Flow and would recommend it to anyone who gets up in the morning, stumbles out of bed and in the first hour uses water: flushes a toilet, makes breakfast, brews a cup of coffee. Try getting up tomorrow morning and not using any water. Grab a bucket, bottle, or anything you can get your hands on, leave your home and go in search of clean potable water. Only when you find a source of water can you come back and wash your face or have a drink. I know I wouldn’t find any clean potable water unless I begged from a neighbour and that would be cheating. 1.1 billion people each day do not have access to clean potable water.

For centuries animals - including humans - have come to the river or local watering hole to access water. Water is our collective life blood. Today most of that water around the world is polluted. Polluted by large corporate interests. This has lead to the need to find new solutions to water distribution. The large corporations like to invest billions in dams and pipes and then pass that cost on to people, often those who make less than $1 a day.

They don’t understand why the people continue to go to the river rather than pay for the service. As Basil Bolt, Managing Director of Invensys Metering Systems was quoted as saying, “You’ve actually changed the thinking of the culture of the people to understand that they should pay. We shouldn’t have to force them to pay; they should want to pay.”

I have no answers but I do have a few questions to ponder on the topic. So if I understand correctly Mr. Bolt believes that after centuries of access to water, people should now accept the loss of clean water and they should be happy to pay for a resource that has been a community shared resource without cost for centuries. Mr. Bolt says it is so, but I just don’t get his logic.

I’d like Mr. Bolt to explain where a woman earning less than $1 a day who can’t cover basic health, shelter, food and education for her and her children will find the extra money to now pay for water.

Maybe Mr. Bolt could explain how non-humans, such as zebras, lions and elephants will find the work they need to pay for the water they need now that their water supply has either dried up due to corporate greed or is contaminated and is contributing to their slow demise. And once the zebra has the money, where should it go to buy the appropriate token to access the water?

Corporate culture and ideas are simplistic and based on revenue rather than longevity and wellness of the entire planet.  Clean potable water is a right and should not be treated as a commodity. It has been a public resource for millennium and that should not change. We should be investing in old traditions that have allowed communities to secure water in the past. There are many old technologies to rely on. We should support small solutions developed by each community based on their needs and collective wisdom, instead of large scale multimillion dollar projects that often cause more harm than good.

The PlayPump is one of my favourite solutions for communities seeking outside guidance. Water and play, often combined, are two of my favourite childhood memories.