5 1
Looking forward
Beyond 2021: our long-term vision Ariette Brouwer, managing director of Simavi, about the future of Simavi.
How do you prepare for the future?
It is time for a real change: starting from the in-country priorities, tackling the barriers that women face and how partners listen to and represent their voices.
72 |
Simavi Impact Report 2020
We are in the middle of the process of rethinking everything that Simavi is and finding business models and partnerships that fit the current landscape. The angle for this is ideologically driven and not solely financial, although a healthy financial status is needed for us to work towards our objectives. We formulated a new Theory of Change after our ‘Reinventing Ourselves’ process in 2018, so our approach and implementation are up to date. But after last year, we need to zoom out even more to prepare for the future. I call this ‘Simavi 3.0’. It involves critically reflecting on our position in the world: what do we have to offer as a Dutch organisation with expertise in WASH and SRHR? Without knowing the outcome of this process, it is hard to predict the future. Knowing that women’s rights and access to services are still – and in some cases increasingly – under pressure, and how this interacts with global problems such as climate change and Covid-19, it is obvious that we still have an important role. The question now is how do we position ourselves without keeping old (colonial, patriarchal, top down) systems alive? More concretely, how do we make sure we sustainably shift the power? These are existential questions.
Will Simavi still exist in five years? When asking big questions it is crucial to keep all options open. Looking at the Sustainable Development Goals and the needs of women and girls, it is easy to recognise the added value of Simavi. That to me is more important than anything, even more than financial setbacks and the crises that we are going through. I try to embrace change with a positive attitude and lead the teams with the credo that we are not only open to change, but are eager to change. Having said that, yes, I think Simavi will still exist.