Vitas Palestine launches its plan on the implementation of the Women Empowerment Principals (WEPs)
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Vitas Palestine launched its strategic plan to implement the WEPs, at Vitas Palestine's headquarters in Ramallah, represented by Mr. Alaa Sisalem, CEO of Vitas Palestine and Ms. Maryse Guimond, UN Women Special Representative.
Vitas joined the network of WEPs signatory companies in Palestine and globally in March 2022, through which the Vitas Palestine team acquired skills and tools related to gender mainstreaming in its policies, services, and procedures, through the application of WEPs, with UN Women technical support and guidance.
This plan comes within the framework of Vitas's strategic vision, in line with international conventions, to promote gender equality and enhance women's participation and leadership, based on equal opportunities in the Palestinian society. Vitas designed and implemented a loan scheme targeting women business owners to empower them economically and socially.
The Women’s Empowerment Principles (WEPs) are a set of global Principles offering guidance to business on how to promote gender equality and women’s empowerment in the workplace, marketplace and community. Established by UN Global Compact and UN Women in 2010, the WEPs are a primary vehicle for corporate delivery on gender equality dimensions of the 2030 agenda and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
Vitas is a company specialized in the field of lending and has spent more than $284 million since its establishment in Palestine. It has contributed to improving the living conditions for 34,000 Palestinian families, developing 20,000 businesses, and provided personal loans to support education and treatment of Palestinians amounting to 7,800 loans over the past years.
This plan comes within the framework of the joint regional programme "Work4Women" implemented by UN Women and and the ILO, with funding from the Government of Sweden and the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida).