Ekiti Development Foundation

Two editions of the Ekiti Gender Summit were organized by the Foundation in collaboration with the Ekiti State Ministry of women Affairs,social Development and Gender Empowerment between 2011 and 2012.These were held in line with the 8 point agenda of Governor Kayode Fayemi led administration in Ekiti State on Gender Equality and Women Empowerment.
The summit had important resource persons, including Dr. Joy Ngozi Ezeilo,the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Trafficking and Founder of Women Aids Collective (WACOL), in Enugu State.
A number of the resolutions reached in the two summits include:
*The need for the domestication of the laws protecting women's Rights and the abrogation of the gender discriminatory laws across the country.
*The necessity of training law enforcement agencies to ensure the laws protecting the Rights of women and children are enforced.
*That vocational jobs should be encouraged to support economic empowerment of women ,and that more women should be enabled to participate in politics, especially partisan politics.
*Other resolutions made consist of the need to enhance the capacities of ministries,departments and Agencies for gender budgeting and planning.
*The necessity of setting up of a R**e crisis centre by the state Ministry of Health
*The importance of integrating men in issues of gender justice etc.

ECONOMIC EMPOWERMENT SCHEME IN PARTNERSHIP WITH GLOBACOM. The Foundation implemented the Glo empowerment project in partnership with Ekiti Enterprise Development Agency.During the programme, Erelu Bisi Fayemi distributed materials for the establishment of commercial public call centers to 200 women across the State. About 12million was invested in the project and the distribution of materials started on Wednesday, April 11, 2012 in Ado-Ekiti and ended on Friday, April 13 at Ikere-Ekiti.

Ekiti is one of the Federating units in Nigeria, created on October 1,1996 with Ado-Ekiti as the capital. With a population of over two and half million people, Ekiti takes pride in its socially and culturally homogenous nature. In terms of culture, Ekiti state is among the richest in Nigeria with a variety of traditional arts, music, poetry, and witty sayings. Ekiti is known and referred to as the ‘Land of Honor’

The Ekiti Development Foundation (EDF) was launched, on June 10, 2011 with concentration on six thematic areas that will cover economic empowerment and promoting the rights of women and girls. We are trying to build a cadre of women leaders at community and state levels, as well as helping them balance the challenges that leadership poses to women through a leadership academy. We will be complementing the government’s efforts in healthcare delivery, and we will be working specifically on gender-specific cancers. In education, the focus is supporting young girls in schools. We will also be taking advantage of our state’s human and cultural resources to promote arts and culture.