About GERA - GERA Staff | GERA Steering Committee

GERA Secretariat
Third World Network-Africa (TWN-Africa)
TWN-Africa was selected as the GERA secretariat by an all African Steering Committee through an open and competitive selection process. It was established in Accra, Ghana in April 1994 as a fully independent, non-profit, African managed and governed non-governmental research, advocacy and communications programme. The moving of the Secretariat to TWN-Africa marks the beginning of Phase II of GERA.

GERA's inclusion as part of TWN-Africa's programme and the resulting synergies are crucial assets for the achievement of its objectives and goals. TWN-Africa's expertise and experience as a research and advocacy organisation anchored in a vigorous international network involved in issues with direct relevance for GERA will strengthen its capacity to successfully take up the remaining challenges, while maintaining innovation and creativity.

The objectives of TWN-Africa are research, information dissemination, education and advocacy on economic, social and environmental issues pertaining to Africa and to provide a platform representing broadly African interests and perspectives in policy debates at regional and international levels.

Gera Staff
Kathleen Boohene, GERA Programme Officer

Pauline Vande-Pallen, GERA Program Assistant

GERA Steering Committee

GERA is managed by a five member all-African Steering Committee which provides important strategic guidance for GERA programme management and direction. Currently members of the Steering Committee are:

Professor Marjorie Mbilinyi who has devoted much of her time to advocacy activities, especially with respect to the Rural Food Security Policy and Development Group (RFS) [in Tanzania] which she co-ordinates. RFS is in the start of a three-year programme including a policy review, the popularisation of the results and their analysis with the grassroots groups and communities involved in the first phase of the programme to get local views about the policies under review. The outcomes will be used in the preparation of the material for the campaign to be launched in 2001 in order to raise awareness on issues pertaining to macro-economic reforms and their impact on livelihoods and incomes.

Odile Asim is preparing a thesis in Economics on gender discrimination within the urban labour market in Cameroon at the University of Yaoundé II. She is currently a visiting scholar at the Centre for the Studies of African Economies of the Oxford University. Odile had been the delegate of the PTCI third class , and ex-President of the Rotaract of Yaounde Doyen Club. She had also been member of the AFARD Cameroon, and delegate of the Youth National League for rural activities.

Joanna Kerr is the new Executive Director of the Association for Women's Rights in Development (AWID) in Toronto, Canada. AWID is an international membership organization connecting, informing and mobilizing people and organizations committed to achieving gender equality, sustainable development and women's human rights. Previously, she was a Senior Researcher at the North-South Institute in Ottawa. She managed the gender program at the North-South Institute for almost 7 years, where she started the Gender in Economic Reforms in Africa Program (GERA). She holds an MA in Gender and Development from the Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, Brighton, UK. She has policy research, participatory research, advocacy, gender training, project management and monitoring, writing and public speaking experience on issues related to the gender dimensions of economic reform, trade and investment, women's human rights, and women's employment issues. Some of her publications include The Gender Dimensions of Economic Reforms in Africa, editor with Lynn Brown (1997), Gender and Jobs in China's New Economy, co-authored with Julie Delahanty (1996) and Ours by Right: Women's Rights as Human Rights (1993), published by Zed press.

Rose Kiggundu is currently serving as research fellow at The United Nations University, Institute for New Technologies based in Maastricht, The Netherlands. She is managing the research program on Technology and Women's employment at INTECH. She is concurrently undertaking a Ph D program in Economics of Technical Change, at MERIT, University of Maastricht. She is the founder, and first chairperson of The Board of Directors of CEEWA-Uganda, a women's professional NGO focusing on research, training and advocacy on finance, agriculture and economic decision making in Uganda. Her past employment history includes several years as microfinance specialist, banker, trainer, and small-business support project manager. Her most recent position as Center for Microfinance Enterprise Finance(CMF) manager facilitated her to conduct training courses, policy seminars and technical assistance programs in microfinance for over 40 microfinance organizations, donors and policy makers in Uganda. Rose has served as Assistant General Manager, Uganda Women's Finance Trust. She has also served on several non-governmental Boards as Treasurer, and member. She was actively involved in the establishment of Uganda Women's Network and convened the working group on gender and structural adjustment for almost three years. Rose has presented several papers at various conferences and she is an active advocate for economic policy reform that enables women's economic empowerment.

Rudith King is a PhD holder in Gender and Development Studies from Sussex University, Brighton, UK. She has been working as a research fellow of University of Science and Technology for the past twelve years and is a member of the Board of Trustees for Centre for the Development of People (CEDEP), a local NGO based in Kumasi, for ten years. She is also a member of the Energy Research Group of Ghana. She has been involved in many research activities that has to do with the development of women in Ghana. She is one of the first recipients of the GERA project fund and she was the team leader her project that was trying to lobby for traders in Kumasi to be part of the decision making process of the local government. She is an activist in women's rights.