1.Short title; table of
contents
(a)This Act may be cited
as the Global Resources and
Opportunities for Women To Thrive Act of 2009
or the
GROWTH Act of
2009
.
(b)The table of contents of this Act is as follows:
Sec. 1. Short title; table of contents.
Sec. 2. Findings and statement of purpose.
Sec. 3. Microfinance and microenterprise development assistance
for women in developing countries.
Sec. 4. Support for women’s small- and medium-sized enterprises
in developing countries.
Sec. 5. Support for private property rights and land tenure
security for women in developing countries.
Sec. 6. Support for women’s access to employment in developing
countries.
Sec. 7. Trade benefits for women in developing
countries.
Sec. 8. Exchanges between United States entrepreneurs and women
entrepreneurs in developing countries.
Sec. 9. Assistance under the Millennium Challenge
Account.
Sec. 10. GROWTH Fund.
Sec. 11. Data collection.
Sec. 12. Support for women’s organizations in developing
countries.
Sec. 13. Report.
Sec. 14. Authorization of appropriations.
2.Findings and
statement of purpose
(a)Congress finds the following:
(1)Women around the world are especially
vulnerable to poverty. They tend to work longer hours, are compensated less,
and have less income stability and fewer economic opportunities than
men.
(2)Women’s share of the labor force is
increasing in almost all regions of the world. Women comprise more than 40
percent of the global labor force as well as 40 percent of the labor force in
eastern and southeastern Asia, sub-Saharan Africa, and the Caribbean. Women
comprise a third of the labor force in Central America and nearly a third of
total employment in South Asia. About 250,000,000 young women will enter the
labor force worldwide before 2015.
(3)Women are more likely to work in informal
employment relationships in poor countries compared to men. In sub-Saharan
Africa, 84 percent of women are employed informally compared to 71 percent of
men. In the Middle East, 44 percent of women are employed informally compared
to 29 percent of men. Informal employment is characterized by lower wages and
greater variability of earnings, less stability, absence of labor organization,
and fewer social protections than formal employment.
(4)Changes in the economy of a poor country
affect women and men differently. Women are disproportionately affected by
long-term recessions, crises, and economic restructuring and they often miss
out on many of the benefits of growth.
(5)International trade can be an important
tool for economic development and poverty reduction. The benefits of
international trade should extend to all members of society, particularly the
world’s poor women.
(6)Policies that promote fair labor practices
for women, and access to information, education, land, credit, physical
capital, and social services can be a means of reducing poverty, ensuring food
security, and boosting productivity and earnings for the economies of
developing countries.
(7)Expanding economic opportunity for women in
developing countries can have a positive effect on child nutrition, health, and
education, as women often invest their income in their families. Increasing
women’s income can also decrease women’s vulnerability to HIV/AIDS,
gender-based violence, and trafficking, and make women more resistant to the
impact of natural disasters.
(8)Policies that promote economic
opportunities for women, including microfinance and microenterprise development
and the promotion of women’s small- and medium-sized businesses, can be a means
of generating gainful, safe, and dignified employment for the poor.
(9)Women play a
vital, but often unrecognized, role in averting violence, resolving conflict,
and rebuilding economies in postconflict societies. Women in conflict-affected
areas face even greater challenges than men do in accessing employment,
training, property rights, credit, and financial and nonfinancial resources for
business development. Policies designed to ensure economic opportunity for
women in conflict-affected areas play a significant role in economic
rehabilitation and consolidation of peace.
(10)Given the important role of women in the
economies of poor countries, poverty alleviation programs funded by the United
States in poor countries should seek to enhance the level of economic
opportunity available to women in those countries.
(b)The purpose of this
Act is to ensure that the policies of the United States actively promote
development and economic opportunities for women, including programs and
policies that—
(1)promote women’s ability to start micro-,
small-, or medium-sized business enterprises, and enable women to grow such
enterprises, particularly from micro- to small-sized enterprises and from
small- to medium-sized enterprises, or sustain current business
capacity;
(2)promote the rights of women to own, manage,
and inherit property, including land, encourage the adoption of laws and
policies that support women in their efforts to enforce those rights in
administrative and judicial tribunals, and address conflicts with
country-specific legal regimes or practices (often known as customary
law
) to increase the ability of women to inherit and own real
property;
(3)increase women’s access to employment,
enable women to access higher quality jobs with better remuneration and working
conditions in both informal and formal employment, and improve the quality of
jobs in sectors dominated by women by improving the remuneration and working
conditions for those jobs; and
(4)bring the benefits of international trade
policy to women in developing countries and continue to ensure that trade
policies and agreements adequately reflect the respective needs of poor women
and men.
3.Microfinance and
microenterprise development assistance for women in developing
countries
(a)Authorization;
implementation; targeted assistance
(1)Section
252(a) of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 (22 U.S.C. 2211a(a)) is
amended—
(A)by redesignating
paragraphs (1) through (4) as subparagraphs (A) through (D),
respectively;
(B)by striking
The President is
and inserting the following:
(1)The President is
;
and
(C)by adding at the
end the following:
(2)Assistance for
women in developing countriesIn providing assistance under
paragraph (1), the President shall pay special attention to the needs of women
in developing countries, including by—
(A)carrying out
specific activities to enhance the empowerment of women in developing
countries, such as providing leadership training, basic health and HIV/AIDS
education, and assistance with the development of literacy skills;
(B)carrying out
initiatives to eliminate legal and institutional barriers to women’s ownership
of assets, access to credit, access to information and communication
technologies, and engagement in business activities within or outside of the
home;
(C)providing
assistance for capacity building for microfinance and microenterprise
institutions to enable such institutions to better meet the credit, savings,
insurance, and training needs of women who are microfinance and microenterprise
clients; and
(D)carrying out microfinance and
microenterprise development programs that—
(i)specifically
target women with respect to outreach and marketing;
(ii)provide products
specifically designed to address women’s assets and needs and the barriers
women encounter with respect to participating in enterprise and financial
services; and
(iii)promote women's
ability to grow micro-enterprises to small- and medium-sized
enterprises.
.
(2)Section
252(b)(2)(C) of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 (22 U.S.C. 2211a(b)(2)(C))
is amended—
(A)in clause
(ii)—
(i)by striking microenterprise
development field
and inserting microfinance and microenterprise
development field
; and
(ii)by
striking and
at the end;
(B)in clause
(iii)—
(i)by inserting after
competitive
the following: , take into consideration the
anticipated impact of the proposals on the empowerment of women and
men,
; and
(ii)by
striking the period at the end and inserting ; and
; and
(C)by adding at the
end the following new clause:
(iv)give preference to proposals from providers
of assistance that demonstrate the greatest knowledge of clients’ needs and
capabilities, including proposals that ensure that women are involved in the
design and implementation of services and
programs.
.
(3)Section 252(c) of
the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 (22 U.S.C. 2211a(c)) is amended—
(A)in the first sentence, by inserting before
the period the following: and an effort shall be made to target such
resources to women
; and
(B)in the second
sentence, by striking 2006
and inserting
2011
.
(b)Section 253(b)(1) of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961
(22 U.S.C. 2211b(b)(1)) is amended to read as follows:
(1)The monitoring
system shall include performance goals for the assistance and shall express
such goals, to the extent feasible—
(A)in an objective
and quantifiable form;
(B)in a manner that
describes the effects of such goals on women and men, respectively; and
(C)in a manner that
describes the number of women and the number of men benefiting from the
assistance.
.
(c)Microenterprise
development creditsSection 256(b)(2) of the Foreign Assistance
Act of 1961 (22 U.S.C. 2212(b)(2)) is amended by inserting before the semicolon
the following: , especially the needs of clients who are
women
.
(d)Additional report
requirementsSection 258 of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961
(22 U.S.C. 2214) is amended—
(1)in subsection
(b), by adding at the end the following new paragraph:
(12)An estimate of the potential global demand
for microfinance and microenterprise development for women, determined in
collaboration with practitioners in a cost-effective manner, and a description
of the Agency’s plan to help meet such
demand.
;
(2)by redesignating
subsection (c) as subsection (d); and
(3)by
inserting after subsection (b) the following new subsection:
(c)All information
in the report required by this section relating to beneficiaries of assistance
authorized by this title shall be disaggregated by sex to the maximum extent
practicable.
.
4.Support for
women’s small- and medium-sized enterprises in developing countries
(a)The Secretary of
State, acting through the Administrator of the United States Agency for
International Development, shall—
(1)where appropriate,
carry out programs, projects, and activities that meet the requirements
described in subsection (b) for enterprise development for women in developing
countries; and
(2)ensure that any
programs, projects, and activities for enterprise development for women in
developing countries that are carried out pursuant to assistance provided under
part I of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 (22 U.S.C. 2151 et seq.) meet the
requirements described in subsection (b).
(b)A
program, project, or activity described in subsection (a) meets the
requirements described in this subsection if the program, project, or
activity—
(1)in coordination with the governments of
developing countries and interested individuals and organizations, promotes the
development or enhancement of laws, regulations, or practices (including
practices with respect to the enforcement of such laws or regulations) that
improve access to banking and financial services for women-owned small- and
medium-sized enterprises;
(2)promotes access to information and
communication technologies by providing training with respect to such
technologies for women-owned small- and medium-sized enterprises;
(3)provides training, through local
associations of women-owned enterprises or nongovernmental organizations, with
respect to recordkeeping, financial and personnel management, international
trade, business planning, marketing, policy advocacy, leadership development,
and other areas relevant to running enterprises;
(4)provides resources to establish and enhance
local, national, and international networks and associations of women-owned
small- and medium-sized enterprises;
(5)provides incentives for nongovernmental
organizations and financial service providers to develop products, services,
and marketing and outreach strategies specifically designed to facilitate and
promote women’s participation in development programs for small- and
medium-sized businesses by addressing women’s assets and needs and the barriers
women face to participating in enterprise and financial services; and
(6)seeks to award contracts to qualified
small- and medium-sized enterprises owned by women, particularly indigenous
women, including—
(A)for postconflict reconstruction; and
(B)to facilitate employment of women,
particularly indigenous women in jobs not traditionally undertaken by
women.
5.Support for
private property rights and land tenure security for women in developing
countries
(a)The Secretary of
State, acting through the Administrator of the United States Agency for
International Development, shall—
(1)where appropriate,
carry out programs, projects, and activities to promote private property rights
and land tenure security for women in developing countries that—
(A)are implemented by
local, indigenous, nongovernmental, and community-based organizations,
especially women’s organizations, that are dedicated to addressing the needs of
women; and
(B)otherwise meet the
requirements described in subsection (b); and
(2)ensure that any programs, projects, and
activities to promote private property rights and land tenure security for
women in developing countries that are carried out pursuant to assistance
provided under part I of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 (22 U.S.C. 2151 et
seq.)—
(A)are implemented
by local, indigenous, nongovernmental, and community-based organizations,
especially women’s organizations, that are dedicated to addressing the needs of
women; and
(B)otherwise meet
the requirements described in subsection (b).
(b)A
program, project, or activity described in subsection (a) meets the
requirements described in this subsection if the program, project, or
activity—
(1)advocates to amend and harmonize statutory
and other country-specific legal regimes or practices to give women equal
rights to own, use, and inherit property;
(2)promotes legal literacy among women and men
about property rights for women and how to exercise such rights;
(3)assists women in making land claims and
protecting existing land claims; and
(4)advocates for equitable land titling and
registration for women.
(c)Section 103(b)(1) of the Foreign Assistance
Act of 1961 (22 U.S.C. 2151a(b)(1)) is amended by inserting , especially
for women
after establishment of more equitable and more secure
land tenure arrangements
.
6.Support for
women’s access to employment in developing countriesThe Secretary of State, acting through the
Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development, shall,
where appropriate—
(1)support activities to increase the access
of women in developing countries to employment and to higher quality
employment, in informal and formal employment, with better remuneration,
working conditions, and benefits (including health insurance and other social
safety nets) in accordance with the core labor standards of the International
Labour Organization, including—
(A)public education efforts to inform poor
women and men of women's legal rights related to employment;
(B)education and vocational training tailored
to enable poor women to access job opportunities, whether for formal or
informal employment, in—
(i)sectors in their local economies with the
potential for growth; and
(ii)sectors in which women are not
traditionally highly represented;
(C)efforts to support self-employed poor women
or wage workers to form or join independent unions or other labor associations
to increase their incomes and improve their working conditions; and
(D)advocacy efforts to protect the rights of
women in the workplace, including—
(i)developing
programs with the participation of civil society to eliminate gender-based
violence; and
(ii)providing
capacity-building assistance to women’s organizations to effectively research
and monitor labor rights conditions; and
(2)provide assistance to governments and
nongovernmental organizations in developing countries seeking to design and
implement laws, regulations, and programs to improve working conditions for
women and to facilitate the entry into, and advancement in, the workplace by
women.
7.Trade benefits
for women in developing countriesIn order to ensure that poor women in
developing countries are able to benefit from international trade, the
President, acting through the Secretary of State (acting through the
Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development) and
the heads of other appropriate departments and agencies of the United States,
shall, where appropriate, provide the following training and education in
developing countries:
(1)Training women in civil society
organizations, including those organizations representing poor women, and
women-owned enterprises and associations of such enterprises, on how to respond
to economic opportunities created by trade preference programs, trade
agreements, or other policies that create or facilitate market access. The
training shall include information with respect to requirements and procedures
for accessing the United States market.
(2)Training women entrepreneurs, including
microentrepreneurs, with respect to production strategies, quality standards,
formation of cooperatives, market research, and market development.
(3)Teaching women, including poor women, to
promote diversification of products and value-added processing.
(4)Instructing negotiators officially
representing the governments of developing countries in international trade
negotiations in order to enhance the ability of the negotiators to formulate
trade policy and negotiate agreements that take into account the respective
needs and priorities of poor women and men in developing countries.
(5)Educating local groups representing
indigenous women in developing countries in order to enhance the ability of
those groups to collect information and data, formulate proposals, and inform
and impact negotiators described in paragraph (4) with respect to the
respective needs and priorities of poor women and men in developing
countries.
8.Exchanges between
United States entrepreneurs and women entrepreneurs in developing
countries
(a)The Secretary of
Commerce shall, where appropriate, encourage representatives of United States
businesses on trade missions to developing countries to—
(1)meet with
representatives of women-owned small- and medium-sized enterprises in such
countries; and
(2)promote internship
opportunities for women owners of small- and medium-sized enterprises in such
countries with United States businesses.
(b)The Secretary of State
shall promote exchange programs that offer representatives of women-owned
small- and medium-sized enterprises in developing countries an opportunity to
learn skills appropriate for promoting entrepreneurship by working with
representatives of businesses in the United States.
9.Assistance under
the Millennium Challenge AccountThe Chief Executive Officer of the
Millennium Challenge Corporation shall seek to ensure that contracts and
employment opportunities resulting from assistance provided by the Corporation
to the governments of developing countries are fairly and equitably distributed
to qualified women-owned small- and medium-sized enterprises and other civil
society organizations led by women, including nongovernmental and
community-based organizations, for projects, including for infrastructure
projects, that facilitate employment of women in jobs not traditionally
undertaken by women.
10.
(a)
(1)The Secretary of State, acting through the Administrator
of the United States Agency for International Development, shall establish the
Global Resources and Opportunities for Women to Thrive (GROWTH) Fund (in this
section referred to as the Fund
) for the purpose of enhancing
economic opportunities for very poor, poor, and low-income women in developing
countries with a focus on—
(A)increasing the
development of women-owned enterprises;
(B)increasing
property rights for women;
(C)increasing women’s
access to financial services;
(D)increasing the
number of women in leadership in implementing partner organizations (as defined
in section 259(6) of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 (22 U.S.C. 2214a(6))),
as well as financial service providers;
(E)improving the
employment benefits and conditions available to women; and
(F)increasing the
benefits of international trade available to women.
(2)Application for
funds by USAID missions
(A)A mission of the United States Agency for International
Development may apply for funds from the Fund to support specific activities,
in addition to activities already carried out by that mission, that are
described in subsection (b) and enhance economic opportunities for women in
developing countries or integrate gender into economic opportunity
programs.
(B)Funds provided to a mission of the United States Agency
for International Development pursuant to subparagraph (A) shall supplement and
not supplant other funds available to that mission.
(b)The activities
described in this subsection are—
(1)activities
described in title VI of part I of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 (22
U.S.C. 2211 et seq.), as amended by section 3 of this Act;
(2)activities
described in sections 4 through 7 of this Act; and
(3)technical
assistance to, and capacity building for, civil society organizations,
particularly to carry out activities described in paragraphs (1) and (2),
for—
(A)local and
indigenous women’s organizations to the maximum extent practicable; and
(B)local, indigenous,
nongovernmental, and community-based organizations and financial service
providers that demonstrate a commitment to gender equity in the leadership of
such organizations and intermediaries either through current practice or
through specific programs to increase the representation of women in the
governance and management of such organizations and intermediaries.
11.The Secretary of
State, acting through the Administrator of the United States Agency for
International Development, shall—
(1)provide support
for tracking indicators on women’s employment, property rights for women,
women’s access to financial services, and women’s enterprise development,
including microenterprises, in developing countries;
(2)to the extent
practicable, track all foreign assistance funds provided by the United States
to local, indigenous, nongovernmental, community-based organizations, and
financial service providers in developing countries, including through
subcontractors and grantees, disaggregated by the sex of the head of the
organization, senior management, and composition of the boards of
directors;
(3)encourage agencies
of the United States that collect statistical data to provide support to
agencies in developing countries that collect statistical data to collect data
on the share of women in wage work and self-employment, disaggregated by type
of employment; and
(4)provide funding to
the International Labour Organization—
(A)to carry out
technical assistance activities in developing countries; and
(B)to consolidate
data indicators collected in different developing countries into cross-country
data sets.
12.Support for
women’s organizations in developing countries
(a)Section 102 of the Foreign Assistance Act
of 1961 (22 U.S.C. 2151–1) is amended—
(1)in subsection (a),
by inserting after the ninth sentence the following new sentences:
Because men and women generally occupy different economic niches in poor
countries, activities must address those differences in ways that enable both
women and men to contribute to and benefit from development. Throughout the
world, indigenous, local, nongovernmental and community-based organizations, as
well as financial service providers, are essential to addressing many of the
development challenges facing countries and to creating stable, functioning
democracies. Investing in the capacity of such organizations, including women’s
organizations, and in their roles in the development process shall be an
important, cross-cutting objective of United States bilateral development
assistance.
; and
(2)in subsection
(b)—
(A)in paragraph (1),
by adding at the end the following new sentence: The principles
described in this paragraph shall, among other strategies, be accomplished
through partnerships with local, indigenous, nongovernmental, and
community-based organizations, as well as financial service providers, that
represent the interests of women.
; and
(B)in paragraph (6),
by adding at the end the following new sentence: Such participation and
improvement shall be encouraged and promoted by, among other strategies,
investing in the capacity of and participation in local, indigenous,
nongovernmental, and community-based organizations, especially women’s
organizations, dedicated to addressing the needs of women.
.
(b)The Secretary of State, acting through the
Administrator of the United States Agency for International Development, shall,
where appropriate—
(1)ensure project
proposals include capacity building and technical assistance for local,
indigenous, nongovernmental, organizations and community-based organizations
dedicated to addressing the needs of women, especially women's organizations,
to promote the long-term sustainability of projects;
(2)provide
information and training to local, indigenous, nongovernmental, and
community-based organizations, especially women’s organizations, focused on
women’s empowerment in countries in which missions of the United States Agency
for International Development are located in order to—
(A)provide technical
assistance with respect to United States foreign assistance procurement
procedures; and
(B)undertake
culturally appropriate outreach measures to contact such organizations;
(3)encourage
recipients of United States technical and financial aid to the maximum extent
practicable, to provide financial support to local, indigenous,
nongovernmental, and community-based organizations that focus on women’s
empowerment, including women’s organizations and other organizations that may
not have previously worked with the United States or a partner of the United
States, in fulfilling project objectives;
(4)work with local
governments to conduct outreach campaigns to register, as required by local
laws and regulations, unofficial local, indigenous, nongovernmental, and
community-based organizations, especially women’s organizations; and
(5)support efforts of
indigenous organizations, especially women’s organizations, focused on women’s
empowerment to network with other indigenous women’s groups to collectively
access funding opportunities to implement United States foreign assistance
programs.
13.
(a)Not later than June
30, 2011, the Secretary of State, acting through the Administrator of the
United States Agency for International Development, shall submit to Congress a
report on the implementation of this Act and the amendments made by this
Act.
(b)Not later than June 30, 2012, the Secretary
of State, acting through the Administrator of the United States Agency for
International Development, shall submit to Congress an update of the report
required by subsection (a).
(c)The report required by
subsection (a) and the update required by subsection (b) shall be made
available to the public on the Internet websites of the Department of State and
the United States Agency for International Development.
14.Authorization
of appropriations
(a)There are authorized to be appropriated to the Secretary
of State to carry out sections 10 and 11—
(1)$40,000,000 for
fiscal year 2011; and
(2)such sums as may
be necessary for each of the fiscal years 2012 and 2013.
(b)Amounts
appropriated pursuant to the authorization of appropriations under subsection
(a)—
(1)are authorized to
remain available until expended; and
(2)shall supplement
and not supplant any other amounts available for the purposes described in
sections 10 and 11.