Women's Day campaigns that inspire

CAIRO – 10 March 2018: As we celebrated women from all around the world last week on International Women’s Day, which served as a platform to highlight their achievements, the journeys and the struggle that women go through in their everyday lives, many brands and corporations took this day as an opportunity to announce their gender equality campaign and future plans. We have picked our favorite campaigns that were launched in the country and the region with the motivation to change history.

Careem

The region’s fastest growing ride hailing app, that has spread across 100 cities in the region, with more than 500,000 captains is fighting the regional stigma that women cannot be drivers. Careem has proven that Pakistan has the largest number of female captains. In Saudi Arabia, Careem signed up 2,000 female captains and launched a female only training and call center. They have now decided to launch a regional campaign #SheDrivesChange in order to change the public's way of thinking, challenge gender stereotypes and create an equal opportunity for men and women. All this while working to achieve their goal of having 20,000 female captains by 2020.



Avon

As for the beauty industry, Avon, the company for women, they released a song created by Swedish electro-pop duo Icona Pop that presents Avon’s #Stand4Her movement, which was created to encourage women and endorse social change. The campaign serves as a platform for voices of empowerment.

Avon Egypt celebrated the release of the song on International Women's Day by hosting some of Egypt’s most inspirational women who have broken boundaries and achieved their dreams in different male driven industries. Among the inspirational guests was Egypt’s first ever female bodyguard Hind Wajih who is the first female to become an officially certified bodyguard, she wishes that one day she’ll be able to protect the president himself. She spoke at the event saying that she always aims to be the first in whatever she puts her mind to.



Jude Benhalim

Jude Benhalim recreated selected pieces from her latest collection the

‘Digital Citizen’

in the color red and showcased it in a photoshoot that represents modern day womanhood. The collection was modeled by mothers, sisters, artists, athletes, and poets showing diversity and presence in a male dominated society. In true giving back fashion, Benhalim collaborated with Banati (Abnaa El Ghad), an Egypt based NGO that supports young girls living on the streets of Cairo; 15 percent of all proceeds go to benefit the cause.

A post shared by JUDE BENHALIM Jewelry (@jude.benhalim) on Mar 7, 2018 at 9:08am PST

Vodafone

Vodafone launched an adorable campaign featuring children questioning everyday gender stereotypes that women go through every day.



“It takes courage and strength to face the enormous hurdles Egyptian women face every day in making a decent living, caring for their children and their elderly, being the source of comfort and refuge for their families, managing households, all the time while negotiating promotions, fending off discrimination, dealing with harassment, and having to work twice as hard to earn the respect they deserve in the workplace. I am inspired by Egyptian women, and women everywhere around the world, who selflessly stay the course and make it easier for all of us to do the same.” —

Shaden Khallaf