SHE: Sustainable Health Enterprises

A while back, I very briefly mentioned a campaign that P&G was doing in Kenya called Protecting Futures, as well as a similar UK-based program in Zimbabwe called Dignity. Period. In a nutshell, theses are corporate campaigns in place to send disposable menstrual supplies to girls in Africa so that they're able to attend school during their periods.

I've recently learned of another program helping schoolgirls, this time in Rwanda, and I actually feel a little more comfortable getting behind this one.

SHE (Sustainable Health Enterprises) is an organization that provides microloans to Rwandan women to help them manufacture their own locally-based and eco-friendly menstrual products (they're made out of banana fibers!) I like this approach better because it's not short-term charity from a big globe-poisoning corporation, but is instead empowering women to succeed in their own local economies. And I could definitely see how this kind of commerce would strengthen networks of women in Rwanda.

Here's a pretty slick video about their she28 campaign: