DAI Tapped to Help Evaluate Walmart Women’s Initiative

April 06, 2012

DAI is delighted to announce it has joined an alliance working with Walmart to evaluate the retailer’s initiative to empower women working in its factories in developing countries.

The program—implemented in factories in India, Bangladesh, China, and Central America that supply products to the Bentonville, Arkansas-based retail giant—will teach up to 60,000 women critical life skills related to communication, hygiene, reproductive health, occupational health and safety, identifying personal strengths and gender sensitivity. Up to 8,000 women will also receive leadership training to develop the skills necessary for personal and career development.

For its part, DAI will help evaluate the program in a partnership with Northwestern University and Mission Measurement. Walmart’s program will be rolled out to 150 factories over the next five years, initially launching in Bangladesh and India. The program was designed and will be implemented in collaboration with CARE in Bangladesh and SWASTI in India.

DAI has worked since the early 2000s with private companies to improve their workplaces in developing countries. In Central America, for example, we worked with international apparel buyers including Gap Inc., Walmart, Limited Brands, and Timberland to enhance labor standards in apparel and textile factories. In Nigeria, we assisted Chevron Corporation in outlining the strategy for its economic development program of its Nigerian-registered foundation, orienting its activities around values chains in a Making Markets Work for the Poor approach and developing monitoring and evaluating mechanisms to document impact. And in Indonesia, we formed a partnership with a private company, Freeport McMoran Indonesia, to bring economic development to remote areas of Papua.

For more information, watch this video about how the program will work in India.