Women on Wings is proud to present its Annual Report and Accounts FY 2020-2021. The report not only shares how the social enterprise continued its work with its business partners in India during the COVID-19 pandemic, it also highlights the positive impact that Women on Wings has on its volunteer experts and the social entrepreneurs it partners with.
Contributing to one million jobs
Women on Wings’ mission is to take rural families out of poverty through economic development for women in rural India. In FY 2020-2021 a network of 51 volunteer experts contributed a total of 208 working days on realizing this mission. Shilpa Mittal Singh, joint Managing Director at Women on Wings: “We are grateful for our experts’ investment in time and talent and the support of our funding partners. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, we shifted to an online mode completely and this gave more experts the opportunity to moderate 9 webinars and 315 online workshops. And thanks to our online community platform we have been able to share information about COVID-19 relief and support programs, and various award initiatives to which some of our partners successfully applied to. Also, business partners shared supply and demand for mask making orders. The platform really added to keeping the connection with our business partners in a year that was beyond imagination.”
Connecting business partners during COVID-19
The lockdown in India at the beginning of the pandemic, had dramatically impacted the lives of many rural families. For almost three months shops were closed, exhibitions were cancelled, transport of raw materials like fabrics or yarns was forbidden. Says Ronald van het Hof, joint Managing Director at Women on Wings: “Especially our partners in Textiles & Handicrafts were highly affected by production losses, supply chain disruption, mounting stockpiles and cancelled orders, to name a few. Therefore, in FY 2020-2021, we could not focus on growing our partners’ businesses and adding extra jobs. Instead, we focused on keeping the connection with our partners, keeping their businesses alive and maybe even more important, offering a listening ear.”
Business consultancy creates impact
Women on Wings works with social enterprises in India on accelerating their businesses and thus create new employment opportunities for women in rural India. During FY 2020-2021, Women on Wings welcomed nine new business partners with which the business strategy planning and consultancy workshops happen online only. More about the Women on Wings approach and results of FY 2020-2021 can be found in the Annual Report & Accounts 2020-2021, see below.
For a download in PDF, click here.
Image@ special thanks to Scott Stulberg
