Feed the Future Advancing Women’s Empowerment (AWE) Program

Background Narrative

The USAID Feed the Future Advancing Women’s Empowerment (AWE) Program was a 5-year activity that sought to enhance women’s empowerment and gender equality in agricultural systems and programming. AWE provided targeted technical assistance to Missions, implementing partners, the Bureau for Resilience and Food Security (RFS), and other USAID offices and Missions to increase women’s participation, productivity, profit, and benefit in agricultural systems. AWE was led by Encompass LLC, with sub-partners ACDI/VOCA and MarketShare Associates.

AWE promoted a cycle of learning by capturing technical best practices, generating practical resources for gender equality and women’s empowerment, building the capacity of practitioners, and widely sharing information and resources. ACDI/VOCA conducted portfolio and landscape reviews on female empowerment and youth engagement in agricultural systems; conducted deep dives into prioritized learning questions through case studies, rigorous evaluations, and peer consultations; and designed and facilitated capacity building activities for USAID DC-based and Mission staff.

In addition to our robust Equity and Inclusion practice, we brought to the team practical experience as a leading implementer of major Feed the Future agricultural development programs globally as well as proven ability to learn and evolve institutional practice in an inclusive, collaborative manner, cultivated through over a decade of work on the influential Leveraging Economic Opportunities (LEO) and Accelerated Microenterprise Advancement Project-business Development Services (AMAP BDS) K&P I & II contracts.

See a full listing of AWE’s work

View the activity’s landing page on Agrilinks

  • Apply evidence-based analysis and learning on gender to Feed the Future project designs, Activity designs, and work plans.
  • Support activities to address women’s empowerment deliberately and at scale, emphasizing one or more Gender Integration Framework domains.
  • Expand evidence on good practices to address women’s empowerment in agriculture and food systems.

AWE promoted a cycle of learning across three main learning and capacity-building objectives by capturing technical best practices, generating practical resources for gender equality and women’s empowerment, developing practitioners’ capacity, and widely sharing information and resources developed through our work. Key project activities and approaches include:

  • 10,043 unique views of AWE’s Agrlinks page
  • 1,320 individuals received the AWE quarterly newsletter
  • 93% of AWE stakeholders found tools and resources developed by AWE to be highly revelant and useful
  • 71% of AWE stakeholders found their understanding and knowledge of women’s empowerment improved significantly
  • 94% of staff from Mission, RFS, and implementing partners trained by AWE found the training favorable, engaging, and relevant to their jobs
  • 486 unique organizations engaged with AWE activities
  • 41 USAID Bureaus and Missions participated in AWE activities
  • 59 products on women’s empowerment produced by AWE including newsletters, case studies, reports, and analyses
  • 49 events and activities led by AWE including consultations, brown bags, webinars, workshops, seminars

Funder: USAID Feed the Future
Contact: Jenn Williamson, jwilliamson@acdivoca.org, Alex Dunkel, adunkel@acdivoca.org

Resources: See a full listing of AWE’s work

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