"Why Invest in Women" USAID Infographic

As part of USAID's fifty-year anniversary celebration, they created an infographic illustrating how investing in women translates into investing in the community as a whole. Using facts and statistics they touched upon a range of topics from education to food production, to GDP, HIV, politics, and more.

One statistic I found especially interesting is that having 10% more girls in school will mean a 3% increase in a country's GDP. I'm not sure how they derived at this number but it's a different way of looking at women's education. All women should reserve the right to be educated, but the truth is that their education opportunities are far fewer than their male counterparts, mostly in the developing world. However, if countries focused their efforts on providing education to all, they may just see an increase in their overall GDP. For countries run predominantly by men and patriarchal social norms, they may not have any incentive to education women, but perhaps acquiring wealth and economic power are something they would be interested in.

Another fact that I found interesting was that girls who stay in school for more than 7 years will marry 4 years later on average, and have about 2 fewer children. Overpopulation is one of the largest (if not largest) causes of poverty in the developing world. Women who are not educated will not go on to pursue careers and so their only option is to raise a family and tend to the home. And with the frequent lack of contraceptives available to them (and lack of sexual health and family planning education in general), they will have large numbers of children and it will be difficult to support them. The overpopulation/poverty cycle is almost exclusively tied to women's education and career opportunities.

These are just two of the facts on the graphic, you can check out the rest of it here: http://50.usaid.gov/infographic-why-invest-in-women/usaid-women/?size=infographicMedium