The Steering Committee

USAID is the world's premier international development agency and a catalytic actor driving development results. USAID's work advances U.S. national security and economic prosperity, demonstrates American generosity, and promotes a path to recipient self-reliance and resilience.

OCDC brings together ten organizations committed to building a more prosperous world through cooperatives. Its mission is to champion, advocate and promote effective international cooperative development.

The International Cooperative Research Group (ICRG) is the research arm of the U.S. Overseas Cooperative Development Council (OCDC). It conducts rigorous field-based research that bridges the gap between theory and practice, builds trust, ownership, and uptake of outcomes through engagement with local partners and organizations, and results in evidence-backed data to support cooperative development worldwide. The U.S. Overseas Cooperative Development Council (OCDC) champions, advocates and promotes effective international cooperative development to build a more prosperous world. OCDC members are: ACDI VOCA, Equal Exchange, Frontier Co-op, GENEX, Global Communities, HealthPartners, Land O’Lakes Venture37, NCBA CLUSA, NRECA International and the World Council of Credit Unions.

The United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) is mandated to promote the economic and social development of its member States, foster intra-regional integration, and promote international cooperation for Africa's development.

ECA through its Africa Trade Policy Centre (ATPC) continues to analyse trade-related issues through the lenses of Africa’s ongoing integration and transformation agenda. ATPC supports the inclusive implementation of the Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) Agreement by providing evidence-based analysis on key issues in gender and trade to support State Parties and other key stakeholders with tools for mainstreaming gender considerations in trade policy including in national and regional AfCFTA implementation strategies. 

As part of Canada’s foreign affairs and development efforts, the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) champions and funds research and innovation within and alongside developing regions to drive global change. IDRC invests in high-quality research in developing countries, shares knowledge with researchers and policymakers for greater uptake and use, and mobilizes global alliances to build a more sustainable and inclusive world.

UN Women is the UN organization dedicated to gender equality and the empowerment of women. A global champion for women and girls, UN Women was established to accelerate progress on meeting their needs worldwide.

Euromonitor International is the world’s leading provider for global business intelligence, market analysis and consumer insights. From local to global and tactical to strategic, our research solutions support decisions on how, where and when to grow your business. With offices around the world, analysts in over 100 countries, the latest data science techniques and market research on every key trend and driver, we help you make sense of global markets. Euromonitor’s international development work encompasses multiple practice areas from agriculture to gender and tourism to trade. We perform custom research and provide data and analysis for multilateral institutions, bilateral aid agencies, foundations, think tanks, and non-profits around the world.

At EMI we give 1% of our turnover to our CSR fund, and this Study was partially sponsored by our Pro Bono programme. We believe in empowerment of communities everywhere. We play our part by doing what we know best – providing key stakeholders with data and information allowing for well-informed gender inclusive decisions.