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Introduction: Rwanda stands out in East Africa with the lowest infant mortality ratio at 29 per 1000 live births. It also leads in gender equality on the African continent, ranking sixth globally according to the 2022 Global Gender Gap Report. This makes Rwanda an ideal case for studying the link between women's empowerment and infant mortality. Method: This study aims to assess the impact of women's empowerment on infant mortality using data obtained from the Rwanda Demographic and Health Survey conducted in 2005, 2010, and 2015. A three-category women's empowerment index was created using the principal component analysis method. The statistical analysis employed in this study is multivariate binary logistic regression. Results: Results demonstrate a significant impact of women's empowerment on reducing infant mortality, considering regional and residential inequalities, bio-demographic factors, and healthcare variables. Conclusion: The findings contribute to existing literature and highlight the importance of empowering women to improve maternal and child health outcomes. Such empowerment not only enhances health but also supports sustainable development and social progress. Policymakers, healthcare providers, and organizations should prioritize investing in women's empowerment to achieve maternal and child health goals, as empowered women play a pivotal role in driving positive change for a healthier and more equitable society. Significance: This study highlights the critical importance of women's empowerment in improving infant survival rates and promoting population health in Rwanda. The study is significant due to the country's low infant mortality rate and leading position in gender equality in Africa. By demonstrating the strong association between women's empowerment and infant mortality, the findings highlight the need for ongoing efforts to empower women and ensure equitable access to healthcare services for all. This research provides valuable insights that can inform policies and programs aimed at reducing infant mortality and enhancing the well-being of both women and children in Rwanda and similar contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In alignment with the sustainability strategy focusing on good governance, sustainable development, and racial harmony, this study investigates the access, use, and effects of ICT training on women in Sarawak. Its primary objective is to assess how ICT training benefits women in managing small homebased businesses. Data was gathered through questionnaires from 62 participants who attended training sessions in various Sarawak locations: Kota Samarahan, Sri Aman, Sarikei, Kuching, and Bako. This research holds significant importance for the state government, as it strives to increase the number of individuals with ICT skills and narrow the digital divide between urban and rural areas. The study reveals a strong consensus among respondents regarding the positive impact of ICT on empowering women, boosting their self-esteem, enriching their knowledge and skills, benefiting the socio-economic community, and fostering efficient management practices. The findings offer valuable insights into the effectiveness of ICT training for Sarawakian women engaged in home-based businesses. The mean scores for all variables indicate high agreement among respondents, with values exceeding four for each variable. This study underscores the substantial role of ICT in knowledge dissemination and empowering individuals, particularly in advancing gender equality. It suggests that ICT is an invaluable tool for successful training in rural areas and underscores the need for a systematic strategy to enhance ICT literacy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Women's empowerment is a multidimensional construct which varies by context. These variations make it challenging to have a concrete definition that can be measured quantitatively. Having a standard composite measure of empowerment at the individual and country level would help to assess how countries are progressing in efforts to achieve gender equality (SDG 5), enable standardization across and within settings and guide the formulation of policies and interventions. The aim of this study was to develop a women's empowerment index for Tanzania and to assess its evolution across three demographic and health surveys from 2004 to 2016. Results: Women's empowerment in Tanzania was categorized into six distinct domains namely; attitudes towards violence, decision making, social independence, age at critical life events, access to healthcare, and property ownership. The internal reliability of this six-domain model was shown to be acceptable by a Cronbach's α value of 0.658. The fit statistics of the root mean squared error of approximation (0.05), the comparative fit index (0.93), and the standardized root mean squared residual (0.04) indicated good internal validity. The structure of women's empowerment was observed to have remained relatively constant across three Tanzanian demographic and health surveys. Conclusions: The use of factor analysis in this research has shown that women's empowerment in Tanzania is a six-domain construct that has remained relatively constant over the past ten years. This could be a stepping stone to reducing ambiguity in conceptualizing and operationalizing empowerment and expanding its applications in empirical research to study different women related outcomes in Tanzania. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tanzania has, over the past two decades, made remarkable progress in terms of women's representation in the parliament. In the women in parliament rankings, Tanzania comes 23rd in the world and the 8th in Africa with 36.6% Members of Parliament. This achievement is largely a result of struggles by the women's movement in which a transformative feminist organization namely the Tanzania Gender Networking Programme (TGNP-Mtandao) is clearly singled out to have played a leading role. This paper provides a critical assessment of the contribution of TGNP-Mtandao in promoting women's representation and participation in decision-making processes in Tanzania. Specifically, it focuses to understand how TGNP's leadership style contributed change in the rules of the game towards the achievement of gender equality and women's political empowerment. In order to accomplish this endeavour, this work employed qualitative research so as to gain an in-depth understanding of gender issues in Tanzania's context. Data were collected mainly through interviews with key stakeholders from parliamentarians and non-governmental organizations. Moreover, election reports, evaluation reports, gender reports, and legislations were reviewed to provide secondary data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Aspirations are often missing from women's empowerment models and measures. • Aspirations are related to agency, but they are more than how women make decisions, a common domain of women's empowerment. • The A-WEAI does not capture key domains of empowerment for ethnic minority women in Vietnam. • Without understanding women's aspirations, programs may not empower women. Empowerment programs for women have been key development initiatives toward achieving gender equality. Projects, models, and measurement tend to focus on resources and agency as core to empowerment. Missing from most models and research is women's own aspirations, or what they value for their futures, that affect how women use their resources and agency to achieve wellbeing. Aspirations are central to a sense of a good life and are necessary to strengthen among poor communities, but they are often overlooked among women, particularly those who are not pursuing formal schooling and who work in informal labor. This paper examines how aspirations matter for women in poverty who are working in informal sectors (agriculture and tourism) in Vietnam. It argues that without examining women's aspirations for themselves, their family, and community, development projects may miss achieving their outcomes because they are not valued by women. Using data from the abbreviated version of the Women's Empowerment in Agriculture Index (A-WEAI), and qualitative interview data from women and men from minority ethnic groups in Vietnam, we show that women and men achieve similar rates of adequacy in their access to resources and decision-making as measured by the A-WEAI, and that women's aspirations for themselves and their community emphasized other valued outcomes from projects aimed at economic empowerment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]