March 8 is International Women’s Day (IWD), a global day celebrating the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women. The day also marks a call to action for accelerating gender parity, with the theme #BreaktheBias. IWD has occurred for well over a century, and for the past decade, St. Paul based World Encounter celebrates and honors IWD – every day!

World Encounter tirelessly works to empower women and decrease the opportunity gap found globally, but especially prevalent in third world countries.

World Encounter, a St. Paul based NGO, provides microloans, coaching and support to women entrepreneurs in Tanzania, Africa. This microloan program is setup a bit differently than many microloan services. In order to receive a microloan, participating women form a lending-circle of ten women entrepreneurs who agree to run their separate businesses while supporting each other over a three-year lending period.

At the end of 2020, the World Bank announced that developing countries, like Tanzania, had been economically yanked backwards by 25 years because of the impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic. So any family who was lifted out of poverty in 2019, fell right back into poverty in 2020.

In February 2020, World Encounter distributed 720 microloans. Then a month later, we started to watch the global pandemic disrupt our proven success model. We had a 100% repayment rate until the pandemic and then faced 100% default on our loans resulting in a loss of about $70,000. The economic disruption and supply chain shortages caused by the global pandemic forced our participants to choose between feeding their families or paying back the loan. A decision no one should have to make. So World Encounter decided to forgive the repayment of all microloans.

We launched the Power of WE Campaign to restore the capital of 720 microloans and stabilize the businesses of the women we serve. All donations are currently being matched dollar for dollar, up to $20,000! Help us rebuild today by clicking here and making a donation.

After returning from a trip to Tanzania, Emily Conroy stated, “Seeing first-hand the economic impact these women have made on their villages was impressive. We toured new homes, businesses and schools, all built from profits of businesses started during the microloan program. We also met healthy and happy families who can afford school tuition, food, clothes, shoes, solar panels and medical care. But while photographing these women, it was the confidence, happiness and positive self-esteem I witnessed that made me wholeheartedly believe that World Encounter is truly empowering these women and changing lives.”

World Encounter believes that we need to work together to share knowledge and resources to empower women locally and globally. Women create change by investing their business profits back into their family and their communities. And as people across the world celebrate International Women’s Day, World Encounter will continue to fight for women and empower women in not only Tanzania, but Minnesota and globally as well. We ask you to consider getting involved with World Encounter or another organization serving women, because together, we can thrive and create a better tomorrow for our future female leaders.