A rights based blueprint enabling girls and young women to learn, earn, and lead with confidence at scale.
OUR STORY
Her Initiative was built not with another program, but with a blueprint. The blueprint began with one number. When Lydia Charles Moyo, the founder, looked back at her school cohort, only 9 out of 200 girls had progressed to high school. The system was working against them through poverty, child marriage, and early pregnancy not because they lacked ability. Lydia’s response wasn’t to wait.
At 16, she was already leading rights awareness campaigns in Dar es Salaam schools. At university, she used Panda events to connect young women with entrepreneurship networks. By 2016, those efforts had a name: Her Initiative.
What we built is not a single intervention. It is a connected system: Learn → Earn → Lead designed so that every pathway reinforces the next. Young women don’t just gain skills; they access capital.
They don’t just start businesses; they become ecosystem builders who train the next cohort. In 2021, during COVID-19, the model evolved. At a time when many paused, Her Initiative launched Panda Digital, a Swahili hybrid platform combining web and AI to continue reaching young women despite physical limitations.
What began as a response to the crisis is now a core part of the model, positioning Her Initiative as a digitally enabled organization expanding access and impact at scale.
THE PROBLEM
Economic exclusion, patriarchal norms, and systemic injustice deny young women access to skills, capital, and decision making power. The response has been fragmented training here, a microloan there, never connected.
18M
Women make up Tanzania's working age female population
93.8%
Of women in non agricultural work are in informal, insecure jobs
0%
Integrated pathways linking skills → income → leadership
THE BIG IDEA
Practical entrepreneurship, digital, and rights based skills
Business launch support, market access, and savings
Agency, protection, and leadership roles
Her Initiative delivers a rights based blueprint
01
Structured entrepreneurship, digital, and rights based curriculum delivered at scale.
02
Real world application with guided business simulations such as product improvement and customer outreach through mentorship and coaching.
03
Capital, markets, tools, VSLA, and referral pathways unlocked for participants.
04
Launch businesses, generate income, take on leadership roles.
05
Scaling through youth led organizations that are trained to deliver the same blueprint with quality assurance.
The blueprint is standardised, evidence tracked, and designed so any youth led organisation can replicate it with quality assurance.
USD 50
PER PARTICIPANT TODAY
136,640
WOMEN BY 2029
OUR PARTNERS
