Ending period poverty and supporting female entrepreneurship

Procter & Gamble understands women and girls are at the heart of sustainable growth and development. According to the European Commission, addressing gender employment & pay gaps would boost Eurozone GDP by 10% (€3 trillion) by 2050. To accomplish this, there are three areas where P&G believes the company can have the biggest impact: leveraging its voice in advertising and media to tackle gender bias; creating an inclusive, gender-equal environment inside P&G; and removing gender-biased barriers to education for girls through brand programs.

Girls’ confidence plummets at puberty and P&G Always wants to change that to stop the drop in confidence and empower girls to become confident women. In many countries, lack of access to sanitary products causes girls to miss school and all of the confidence building activities that happen at school. That is why one of the focus areas for P&G Always brand is ensuring girls in-need have access to period products. In the past 10 years, they have donated over 100 million pads to girls in-need worldwide. Lack of access to period products is an issue not just in developing countries, but also in developed countries in Europe and around the world. In the UK, there are more than 137,000 girls missing school on a regular basis because they cannot afford sanitary protection. The latest P&G research also reveals that missing school is detrimental to girls’ futures. Over half of women who have experienced period poverty believe it has had a direct effect on their success, confidence and happiness. This is why P&G Always brand is committed to #EndPeriodPoverty, and to making sure every girl has the protection she needs to stay in school through the 1pack = 1 donation campaign.

For every consumer who purchased ALWAYS Ultra between March and September 2018, P&G donated pads directly to UK schools. In total, over 14 million pads were donated via the program. They also partnered with the Red Box Project, a community organisation that delivers boxes of sanitary products to schools across the UK through a network of volunteers. It is P&G’s aim to make sure every girl has the sanitary protection she needs to stay in school which is key to her growth, building her confidence, her future, and empowering her to Keep Going #LikeAGirl. The program was also launched in 2018 in Turkey, with plans to extend it to other countries in the future.

P&G brands also help support female entrepreneurship across Europe, eg, via the “Sigue Adelante” project in Spain. The program was executed in the summer of 2018 by P&G Spain, in partnership with a perfume retain chain and Womenalia (a network for businesswomen that promotes female participation at managerial and executive level, female-led businesses and better work-life balance). Via the “Sigue Adelante” initiative, P&G provided three women with the means to implement their business ideas (an e-commerce project focusing on children’s stories and enhancing them with virtual reality; a digital tool helping achieve weight goals through encouraging healthy lifestyle habits; and the first healthy and natural caramel candy that does not contribute to caries and helps re-mineralise enamel). Each of the winners received a scholarship of 6 000 EUR, which was funded by the sales of P&G brands in over 200 stores across Spain.