Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion are Guiding Principles for VectorLink

May 20, 2022

The Women Innovators and Leaders (WILD) 2022 Women in Global Development Leadership Forum was this week, so today’s Fist Bump goes to VectorLink Zimbabwe COP, Carmen Vilanova de Denys, who served as a panelist for the session, Challenges & Opportunities: Translating DEI Programs Across Multinational Organizations with a Wide Variety of Cultural, Political, and Legal Contexts.

Incorporating diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) is an ongoing process. Carmen discussed how within the VectorLink project, including Zimbabwe, there are equity focal points, who with guidance from the home office gender equality and social inclusion advisor, lead the project’s equity agenda within their respective countries. VL Zimbabwe has made strides in its inclusion of female seasonal workers. From 2014 (under AIRS) to 2020 (last year of spraying), the team increased female supervisors from 11 to 23, and female SOPs increased from two to 50.

On a personal level, Carmen stated, “I feel extremely valued and supported by the company [as an Abt female COP].”

The session later went into the importance of data. Carmen discussed how VL Zimbabwe is collaborating with the NMCP and other stakeholders to conduct a landscape analysis on unreached populations. These populations include those who refuse IRS. The analysis will cover two high burden malaria districts in each province. This information will enable more informed IRS and SBC interventions, tailoring strategies to reach these unreached populations.

Fully representing the PMI VectorLink project, Carmen also plugged how equity is a part of the whole project, citing last week’s webinar as an example. She said, “we also had a webinar last week about how Rwanda, Senegal, and Ghana are reaching unreached populations like in jails or in geographically remote communities.”

Thanks for sharing the great work that the PMI VectorLink Project is doing to incorporate DEI into our work, Carmen! It was a very interesting and informative session.