The Gender Equality and Resilient (GEAR) project is a 5-year joint strategic partnership involving CARE Rwanda, CARE Uganda, and CARE Austria, funded by the Austrian Development Agency (ADA). Despite Rwanda’s progress, challenges like growing urbanization, climate crisis impacts, inequality faced by women and girls, and poverty persist. The overall goal of the project is to ensure women, girls, and youth (aged 15-59 years, with a focus on those aged 15-35) are more self-reliant and live in a responsive and inclusive environment.
Target Group & Approach: The GEAR project targets a total of 25,000 program participants in Rwanda through CARE’s Village Savings and Loan Associations (VSLAs). It also targets 57,000 women, girls, men, and boys in urban, refugee, and rural settings, especially marginalized women, girls, and youth (aged 15-59 years), including teenage mothers, survivors of violence against women and girls (VAWG), and persons vulnerable to it.
Together with women, youth, communities, civil society, and local authorities, GEAR challenges discriminatory social norms at community and household levels and strengthens women’s entrepreneurship and meaningful participation.
The project focuses on four key outcomes:
- Promoting positive social norms that protect women and girls and advance equality for them, as well as women and girls’ social and economic rights in the target communities.
- Enabling marginalized women, girls, and youth to have improved access to and control over productive assets and economic opportunities, leading to sustainable and dignified income opportunities.
- Strengthening the capacity of local actors, including CSOs, government, and the private sector, to respond to the rights and needs of women, girls, and youth. This includes increasing women and girls’ voice and leadership to influence decisions and effectively take action to address their priorities.
- Enhancing women, girls, and youth’s resilience to climate change and other shocks.
The project leverages CARE’s locally-led approach, fostering knowledge sharing and joint reflection among partners to generate evidence on social norm transformation and women’s economic growth. It also disseminates good practices and recommendations more widely.
