Sarah Boateng

IGEA started as Sarah Boateng the founder moved back to her home country of Ghana in 2016 and lived in a rural village to understand the issues impacting girls in rural communities that leave school at an early age. When in the community she saw that girls were missing 3-5 days of school each month, compared to boys who miss 5-8 days per year, and often the highest school-age of the girl would be 13 years old. Seeing that girls were experiencing what her mum has experienced growing up in Ghana over 50 years ago, she knew that there was something that could be done.
After working for large NGOs such as United Nations in Geneva, Volunteer Services Overseas, and Plan international, Sarah felt that in order to make an impact at a community level, it is something that needed to be explored independently of these organizations.IGEA Enterprise was launched in 2019 as an organization that wanted to advocate and support girls’ access to quality education at a local level. Our first program was called Menstruate and Educate with an aim to support girls attending school whilst on their period, by providing reusable period pads that last for up to two years and developing community workshops. IGEA received its first fund of £1,000 through Sarah winning a pitching competition about the project and support from mentors, family, and friends. In 2019 we were able to support 100 girls through our work and 250 community leaders, members, and teachers. In 2021, through a crowdfunding campaign, we successfully raised £8,000 to support the expansion project of Menstruate and Educate by supporting 550 girls in 9 schools in Bolgatanga through workshops and supply of reusable period products and 300 parents and teachers. We additionally launched a trial of our new project in Ghana working with the Girls Juinvelle home to run workshops on life skills and confidence as well as providing 80 reusable period pad kits.