“Girls Raise Pigs” is part 2 of a 3-part series on the transforming impact of equipping girls through Education, Economic Empowerment, and Anti-trafficking. Check out “New Life for Nina” to see how one girl was rescued from a life of being raised in the brothels of India and given new life.
In many cultures, women are not valued. A daughter is seen as worthless and a liability for her family. Mothers weep when handed their baby girls for the first time, and if a girl survives infancy, she faces years of struggle and will be continuously told that she is nothing, living her life of hardship and being indoctrinated to despise her own gender.
Poverty, an ever-preset problem in the developing world, makes the plight of girls even more perilous. Scarcity in poor villages drives families to sell their daughters. A trafficker arrives in a village, posing as a job recruiter and promising a family that he or she can find work for their daughter as a maid in a neighboring city or across the border. The trafficker pays the family, and the girl is now in the clutches of a criminal, to be exploited as long as there is demand for her.
But what if you could show a family that her daughter has value and could help her family financially? What if you showed a community? Such is the story of Daya.
Daya lives in a small village in Nepal. She is one of 20 girls who have received two pigs to care for and sell as part of She Is Safe-sponsored Economic Empowerment.
She has been a great success; she has had two litters of pigs and has been able to sell 10 piglets in her community to make $180, which is enough to pay for her school tuition. She is ambitious and has future plans to raise more pigs and raise them to an older age, because then they will return a greater profit.
Because she has been able to sell these pigs, Daya has gained the respect of her family, as she is a contributor to their success and her future. Additionally, because of Daya and other girls like her, the village is becoming known as the place to buy good pigs.
For the six weeks leading up to Easter, many are joining us to cut back on consumption and use the savings to provide opportunity and new life to thousands of at-risk girls like Daya.
If you haven’t already, please join us as we Give Life for Lent!
*She Is Safe uses representative names and photos to respect each girl’s dignity