Empowerment vs Sustainability? Gender Innovations in Microfinance (Discussion Transcript)

This is a summary for Speakers Corner #17 on the subject of "Empowerment vs Sustainability? Gender Innovations in Microfinance" that took place on January 16-18, 2007. Dr. Linda Mayoux, an international consultant working on poverty, gender, enterprise development and impact assessment, hosted this event.

A goal of the MicroCredit Summit Campaign is to both reach and empower women, and in the 2006 State of the Campaign, Sam Daley-Harris argued for the importance of women’s empowerment to achieving the Millennium Development goals. However, there is a continuing perception that empowerment and sustainability are inevitably in conflict, and gender issues are seen as already covered by female targeting and the recent attention to poverty targeting and impact.

This Speakers Corner discussed some of the ways forward in more detail, and the topics that were explored during the three-day e-Conference included: empowerment innovation, sustainability and strategies for mainstreaming empowerment.