Friday, October 15, 2010

Blog Action Day / Stop using girls as infrastructure

Happy Blog Action Day! In honor of Blog Action Day, I want to resurrect a HuffingtonPost blog post from almost a year ago:

India Economic Summit Champions Investing in Girls

Among other action items, Maria Eitel suggests:

  • Stop using girls as infrastructure. When we create proper infrastructures - build roads, install electricity and clean water - girls won't need to be used as infrastructure any longer. Today they function as the electric grid as they carry firewood, plumbing system as they carry water, childcare system, etc.

Couldn't agree more. Too often around the world women and girls are used as water (and all too often wastewater) infrastructure instead of being given the opportunity to be educated and become productive members of society.

Let's use Blog Action Day and its focus on water this year to stop using girls as infrastructure, and start giving them the opportunity to go to school, to learn, to be healthy, to be girls.

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