The Womanity Foundation
As a founding patron of The Womanity Foundation, Dona Bertarelli supports its work to accelerate gender equality through innovative investments.
Womanity believes in a world where women and men enjoy equal rights and opportunities. Much of its work is focused on shifting attitudes and reaching entire communities, including boys and men.
Its founder, Yann Borgstedt, understood that communication and technology would allow women to be heard and listened to, triggering major change. Womanity has been working to promote a world where all women and men would enjoy equal and full social, economic and political rights since 2005.
With the launch in 2015 of the UN sustainable development goals which included Goal 5: Women Empowerment, gender equality was recognised as a necessary foundation for a peaceful, prosperous and sustainable world.
Womanity’s programmes include Girls Can Code, which works with schools in Afghanistan to provide 16 to 19 year old girls with basic computer literacy, as well as coding and English language skills. WomenChangeMakers identifies women-focused social ventures, including in India and Brazil, while Disruptive Media in the Middle East work to transform power relations and shift societal norms. The Womanity Award enables organisations fighting violence against women to adapt and scale proven innovative models with a local partner, and has made awards internationally.