Lilianne Ploumen
Founder, SheDecides
As the initiator of SheDecides, it fills me with pride to be a Champion and being part of this community of outspoken, brave and brilliant activists, politicians and organisations that are standing tall for bodily autonomy all over the globe.
For too many women, others stand in the way of them exercising their full autonomy. Millions of girls and women are not the true masters of their own bodies. And that needs to change!
How we are working so SheDecides
When President Trump signed the Global Gag Rule in January 2017, I, then Dutch Minister of Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation, took a bold step to say: “He doesn’t get to decide about women’s bodies… She Decides”. These two words began as a rallying cry, then a call to action, a hashtag, and just six weeks later, a conference where over 200 million dollars were pledged to organisations that were affected by the Global Gag Rule.
Investing in women’s right to decide over their own bodies is not only the right thing to do, it is also the smartest investment one can make.
Investing in women’s rights
Women represent the largest source of untapped economic potential. The McKinsey Global Institute think-tank estimates that advancing women’s equality could add $12 trillion to global growth by 2025. Closing the gender gap would be the smartest investment the world has ever made. Knowledge about sexual health and contraceptives helps prevent teenage pregnancy and its many consequences. Girls would not drop out of school — we know that each additional year of schooling increases girls’ future earnings by 10-20%. What is more, the benefits of modern contraceptives are incontestable. An estimated 214 million women in developing countries would use contraceptives if they had them. Investing in contraception yields a very high return: availability of birth control means, for instance, fewer teenage pregnancies and school dropouts, fewer unsafe abortions and maternal deaths, lower overall healthcare costs, and more productive years for women. We would all benefit if the world would invest in women’s rights.
How are we going to get to a future where SheDecides, without question?
There is both an easy and a complicated answer to the question: norms and values, laws, codes, and habits are preventing many women from being who they can be, from being the masters of their own fate and their own bodies. These written and unwritten rules have to change. And here is where I ask everyone to do their part: stand up and make your voice heard, be in solidarity, call on your governments, and organise for change!
