Tuesday, December 11, 2007
The Always Africa Campaign
We recently received the following link regarding an initiative by P & G, makers of Always menstrual pads and Tampax tampons, to provide free menstrual products to young women in Sub-Saharan Africa as a means of reducing female absenteeism.
http://www.pginvestor.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=104574&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=1076318&highlight
Ellen Macro, our resident blogger at Red Tent Sisters, shares the following reactions to the article:
Mary Harrison, employee extraordinaire at Red Tent Sisters, shares similar concerns:
In general, of course I think that girls everywhere have a right to an education and that femaleness should in no way impact that right. However, in an increasingly privatized, globalized (which P&G seems to embrace, as they remark that they wish to empower American girls to be global citizens), it's a shame that so often it seems that these kinds of initiatives have 'no choice' but to be corporately sponsored, rather than being provided by governments as a basic human right. Although Always and Tampax ARE doing something great for some girls in these countries, is it also exploitative to promote this initiative as a way to sell Always and Tampax in North America? Imagine how this would be different if they went quietly about the business of helping and supporting young women without this press release. Further, to go to the standard international development critique, is P&G empowering girls and young women in these areas to develop sustainable living patterns which will remain in place and continue to be self-governed and functional when Proctor and Gamble eventually remove their corporate support? Or would this removal only cause further problems - i.e., is there a pattern of corporate dependency being set up? Along these lines, the HERO program states that it has sent American teen girls to African countries as ambassadors. Is this project approached with a reciprocal learning/empowering relationship in mind? And finally, P&G states that it employs 140 000 people in 80 countries. Does it provide jobs for people in these areas?
As one of the owners of Red Tent Sisters, I also have to play devil's advocate and share my own thoughts...
I have to challenge the whole question of it being a BAD thing that young women are missing some time from school during their menstruation. Our store is named after the concept of the Red Tent, popularized by Anita Diamant as a place and time where women are given permission AND GIVE THEMSELVES PERMISSION to retreat, rest, share wisdom and be present with their bodily experience of menstruation. Rather than promoting a world where women are expected to be emotionally, hormonally, and physically consistent, like their male counterparts, I would prefer a world in which women's cycles are honoured and respected. While I agree that education is a value and a right, I disagree with a system of education that demands homogeneity in behaviour and stifles the essence of what it is to be female. Just some food for thought...
http://www.pginvestor.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=104574&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=1076318&highlight
Ellen Macro, our resident blogger at Red Tent Sisters, shares the following reactions to the article:
- I think it’s great that they’re going to be improving the sanitation facilities, providing nutritious feeding programs [using local, sustainable food sources?], and providing health support.
- I don’t have a problem with education and hopefully increasing openness about women’s reproductive and sexual health but I do have concerns about mainstream menstrual product companies doing it! First of all I’m not so sure that the job they’ve done in North America has been so stellar that they should be the ones running the education programs in
My biggest concern is with the pad distribution initiative.
- If only 1/10 girls miss school, what are the other 9/10 doing already?
- Not only is P&G going to “help” the 1/10 girls but they are probably going to influence the other girls who already have sustainable methods of “managing” their menses.
- P&G is going to make all/most girls reliant on imported products which cost money, drain resources, pollute the environment when produced and create a nightmare for disposal. There is a big enough problem dealing with the environmental and health issues caused by women in the first world using disposable menstrual products without women in the third world also becoming dependent on such products.
I also have a problem with P&G. Why have we made them the ones who are wealthy enough to put such a program in place?
- Check out Beinggirl.com – P&G’s website which is so stereotypically feminine and continues to link females with consumption and appearance.
- At the bottom of the article is written: “Three billion times a day, P&G brands touch the lives of people around the world. The company has one of the strongest portfolios of trusted, quality, leadership brands ….” This line almost makes me laugh out loud [a sarcastic cackle!!] because it was P&G that put out the Rely tampon. Here’s a quotation from The Curse – Confronting the Last Unmentionable Taboo by Karen Houppert (1999):
Mary Harrison, employee extraordinaire at Red Tent Sisters, shares similar concerns:
In general, of course I think that girls everywhere have a right to an education and that femaleness should in no way impact that right. However, in an increasingly privatized, globalized (which P&G seems to embrace, as they remark that they wish to empower American girls to be global citizens), it's a shame that so often it seems that these kinds of initiatives have 'no choice' but to be corporately sponsored, rather than being provided by governments as a basic human right. Although Always and Tampax ARE doing something great for some girls in these countries, is it also exploitative to promote this initiative as a way to sell Always and Tampax in North America? Imagine how this would be different if they went quietly about the business of helping and supporting young women without this press release. Further, to go to the standard international development critique, is P&G empowering girls and young women in these areas to develop sustainable living patterns which will remain in place and continue to be self-governed and functional when Proctor and Gamble eventually remove their corporate support? Or would this removal only cause further problems - i.e., is there a pattern of corporate dependency being set up? Along these lines, the HERO program states that it has sent American teen girls to African countries as ambassadors. Is this project approached with a reciprocal learning/empowering relationship in mind? And finally, P&G states that it employs 140 000 people in 80 countries. Does it provide jobs for people in these areas?
As one of the owners of Red Tent Sisters, I also have to play devil's advocate and share my own thoughts...
I have to challenge the whole question of it being a BAD thing that young women are missing some time from school during their menstruation. Our store is named after the concept of the Red Tent, popularized by Anita Diamant as a place and time where women are given permission AND GIVE THEMSELVES PERMISSION to retreat, rest, share wisdom and be present with their bodily experience of menstruation. Rather than promoting a world where women are expected to be emotionally, hormonally, and physically consistent, like their male counterparts, I would prefer a world in which women's cycles are honoured and respected. While I agree that education is a value and a right, I disagree with a system of education that demands homogeneity in behaviour and stifles the essence of what it is to be female. Just some food for thought...
Labels: Always, Education, Menstrual Products, Menstruation, Tampax, Women
Comments:
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I completely agree with these comments. I recently came back from Kenya whereby I worked with an East African NGO. We conducted research on the link between menstrual health and performance and attendance of school girls. The results were remarkable and expected, whereby on average the girls aged 12-17 years were missing 4-5 days of school/month due to (self-reported) menses-related problems. The problem with this corporate 'charity' project of sanitary pad distribution is that it is not government led, whereby the NGO I worked with has been struggling to get the Kenyan government to lower the prices of pads and/or distribute pads freely to school girls. Moreover, the problem is SUSTAINABILITY! What happens when the campaign ends? The dependence will be forced to run dry, no one to pick up the pieces. SO my research and work centers around HEALTH EDUCATION in the school curriculum, which does not exist. If anyone is interested in this issue, please feel free to contact me, I am completely endulged in this issue at the moment.
viv,
I am getting a masters of Public Health at the moment and in the process of writing some school-based health education curriculum focusing on this issue for an NGO that works in 8 African countries. I agree with the sustainability part and we think we have some solutions. Feel free to contact me @ kpbrown123@yahoo.com.
I am getting a masters of Public Health at the moment and in the process of writing some school-based health education curriculum focusing on this issue for an NGO that works in 8 African countries. I agree with the sustainability part and we think we have some solutions. Feel free to contact me @ kpbrown123@yahoo.com.
viv - I'm trying to start a campaign of donating reusable menstrual pads to African nations, to support young women in schools.
These pads would be sewn by SAHMs, or if the person donating doesn't know how to sew, they would donate money to purchase them.
Please check out my post and contact me if there's any way you can connect me with a group who would be able to distribute the donated items.
These pads would be sewn by SAHMs, or if the person donating doesn't know how to sew, they would donate money to purchase them.
Please check out my post and contact me if there's any way you can connect me with a group who would be able to distribute the donated items.
I was just reading about this; and the alternative. There is a woman who is collecting cloth pads to send over to Africa, and she says demand is out pacing supply. This is her blog post relating to it.
I wonder what you think about this?
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I wonder what you think about this?
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