The mWomen Design Challenge will raise awareness around the need for a more intuitive mobile phone user experiences.

AFP/Ali Al-Saadi

GSMA mWomen Design Challenge

On Sunday, September 23, Chief Innovative Officer Maura O'Neill will appear at the third annual Social Good Summit, presented by Mashable, 92Y and the UN Foundation. CIO O'Neill will address the technical literacy barrier of women’s mobile phone access and ownership and officially launch the GSMA mWomen Design Challenge.

This event will include a live design demo and discussions on improving mobile design to make it more intuitive for illiterate populations and the importance of collaborating with the private sector to drive change at scale. Administrator Shah will be joined by Qtel Group CEO Dr. Nasser, AusAID Director General Peter Baxter, GSMA Development Fund Managing Director Chris Locke and the design firm Huge. 

Read more about our mobile work

A Promise Renewed

We are seeing real progress on child survival. Thirty years ago, 46,000 children were dying every day. Today, that number has fallen to below 19,000.

While this progress is extraordinary, a child dying anywhere in the world is a tragic loss and undermines peace and stability. That’s why last June, USAID joined UNICEF and the governments of India and Ethiopia in hosting a Child Survival Call to Action, and we’ve already seen some exciting and important steps:

• More than 125 governments—including the United States—have signed a pledge to keep our promise to end preventable child death in a generation.
• More than 119 civil society organizations have signed a pledge to support the goal—and we’ve formed more than 20 new private sector partnerships to scale up effectives approaches and extend the reach of live-saving medicines.
• Over 260 interfaith leaders from over 90 faith based organizations around the world announced their commitment to adopt and promote 10 healthy practices—including drinking clean water and giving a sick child ORT—that are critical to child survival.

USAID will continue to work closely across all these partnerships to accelerate our progress and reach our goal of reducing child mortality by 20 deaths per 1,000 births in every country in the world by 2035. Assuming countries already making progress continue at their current trends, achieving this goal will save an additional 5.6 million children’s lives every year.

On Monday, September 24, Administrator Shah will appear at Social Good Summit at UNICEF’s event A Promise Renewed that will highlight child survival and technology and innovation for change. Dr. Shah will participate in a panel discussion with Tony Lake, UNICEF, Clay Shirky and Ethiopian Health Minister Tedros moderated by CNN anchor Zain Verjee.

Read more about our work on child survival.