Gates Foundation CEO Sue Desmond-Hellman: Let women do what they want

Refugees
from the Democratic Republic of Congo cook food in the Kagoma
reception centre within the Kyangwali settlement on April 10,
2018 in Kyangwali, Uganda.
Jack
Taylor/Getty Images

 

Bill Gates likes to tout himself as a pretty sunny guy. He
regularly asserts that the world is getting better every day, in
spite of the fact that the price of a loaf of bread is
climbing, many people can no longer afford to
buy a place to live, and free
and fair elections are consistently under
threat. 

Gates remains undeterred. 
“Overall, I’m
quite optimistic,” he told a crowd of Harvard students in
April. 

He uses hard numbers to back up this persistently cheery
outlook, pointing out that since the $50 billion-plus
Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation began in 2000,
the number of extremely poor people around the world has fallen
sharply.

Since then, over one billion previously impoverished people
have busted out of a so-called “extreme poverty” income bracket
to live on more than $1.90 a day. In practical terms,
this means there are fewer and fewer people getting
around on two bare feet, cooking over a flame, and sleeping on
the ground. 

In 2017, the Gates Foundation launched its first annual
Goalkeepers report, checking in on the UN Sustainable
Development Goals to see how far we have come in the fight
against infectious disease and poverty.

That first report asserted that the world is gradually
getting better on those measures. Now the Gates Foundation is
sounding the alarm, warning in its second
Goalkeepers report that the stunning poverty progress of the
past few decades could crash to a halt if more isn’t done to help
people stay in school and get enough to eat. 

While the number of extremely poor people living in
countries like China and India looks to be relatively on track to
zero out by 2030, the number of people living in poverty in some
of the world’s poorest sub-Saharan African countries is still
creeping upward — and could skyrocket if current trends
continue.

Gates Foundation CEO Sue Desmond-Hellman says that
forecasted downturn into extreme poverty is not
inevitable. She believes the Foundation’s biggest task today
is helping prevent more poverty in Africa, largely by letting
women take the lead in starting and growing their own
families.

“If every African woman was able to have the number
of children that she wants, you could have a decrease in
population growth by 30% by 2100,” Desmond-Hellman told Business
Insider. “And that’s just if she gets to do what she
wants.” 

Education also plays a key role. China experienced its own
dramatic poverty reduction in 1990s, arguably
spurred in no small part by more educated women entering the
workplace. India followed suit
in the 2000s. Now is the time to foster a similar African “wave”
of prosperity, the Gates Foundation argues.

“We really need to have a third wave, and it needs to happen
in sub-Saharan Africa,” Desmond-Hellmann said. 

Business Insider

Why women are critical to everyone’s economic success

Today, women in sub-Saharan Africa have an average of .7
more children than what they’d ideally want, according to the new
report.

“The worry, the peril is that more babies are being born in the
places where it’s hardest to live a healthy, productive life,”
Desmond-Hellmann said. 

Nowhere will that be more true than in the African countries
sitting below the Sahara desert, she said.

“By 2050, 86% of the world’s extreme poor would be in sub-Saharan
Africa,” she said, “And 40% would be in just two countries: the
Democratic Republic of the Congo and Nigeria.” 

At the same time, these two countries are set to experience rapid
population growth, more than doubling and tripling in size. Fixes
for this kind of population boom are already working in other
African countries further north, like Kenya.

There, nonprofit Marie Stopes International provides free
contraception for teens. At first, young Kenyan girls weren’t
interested in the free contraception, so Marie Stopes shifted its
focus to empowering teenagers. They help young girls set goals
for the future, and nudge the young women to wait to have kids
until they want them, while continuing to finish school and
pursuing their own dreams. 

Refugees
from the Democratic Republic of Congo carry food distributed by
the World Food Programme in the Kyangwali settlement on April 10,
2018 in Kyangwali, Uganda.
Jack
Taylor/Getty Images

Research
shows clearly that a young woman who waits until she’s
finished school to have babies can have a positive, cascading
effect on the health of her entire family, and country, for
decades.

“Educated girls tend to work more, earn more, expand their
horizons, marry and start having children later, have fewer
children, and invest more in each child,” the report said. “Their
children, in turn, tend to follow similar patterns, so the effect
of graduating one girl sustains itself for generations.” 

The Gates Foundation is also highlighting the importance of
helping small-scale farmers move from subsistence farming to more
focused crop production, zeroing in on growing one product, such
as tomatoes, and selling it at market prices. That kind of
sustainable business plan means families can make money and
provide better nutrition for their kids, instead of simply
relying on their own farms for food.

“One thing we know about small-holder farmers is that many of
them are women,” Desmond-Hellman said. “We know when
that kind of economic gain is available for women,
she’ll spend money on health and education for her
children.” 

Even as Africa is projected to nearly double in population size
by 2050, the continent could produce a wave of healthier kids,
ready to solve tomorrow’s problems. But that’s only going to
happen if more women get to lead the way, putting their own
health and education first.