Amplifying Local Partnerships for a Sustainable Future

Almost 70 years ago, Pathfinder started as a family planning organization—and we have only grown from there. As we look back on another incredible year, we reflect on our critical role in creating a more just, equitable world. Today, we continue to advance sexual and reproductive health and rights while enhancing the resilience of communities on the frontlines of climate change, supporting the financial autonomy of women and girls, and strengthening health systems to serve through times of crisis.

Explore our digital 2024 Annual Report or view and download the PDF version.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

DEAR PARTNERS, SUPPORTERS, AND FRIENDS,

Almost 70 years ago, Pathfinder started as a family planning organization—and we have only grown from there. As we look back on another incredible year, we reflect on our critical role in creating a more just, equitable world. Today, we continue to advance sexual and reproductive health and rights while enhancing the resilience of communities on the frontlines of climate change, supporting the financial autonomy of women and girls, and strengthening health systems to serve through times of crisis.

In 2024, we supported 6.8 million people to access modern contraception, preventing 3.3 million unintended pregnancies. We ensured 364,000 births took place in safe, skilled hands, and provided HIV counseling and testing to 2 million clients. Beyond reproductive health, we equipped more than 400,000 leaders with tools for climate resilience and nearly 7,000 women to take charge of their financial futures. These programs create pathways to sustainable, long-term change.

As leaders located in three different regions—South Asia, sub-Saharan Africa, and North Africa—we combine our experiences and perspectives about how to respond to today’s challenges. In Pakistan, for example, where extreme heat threatens food security and livelihoods, we work with women climate champions to help families adopt drought-resistant agricultural techniques while connecting them with essential reproductive health care. In Egypt, where women constitute only 18% of the formally employed workforce, we collaborate with Egyptian companies to create career pathways for women. In Burkina Faso, an ongoing security crisis hampers access to health care, so we partner with community-based organizations to deliver services as health centers close their doors. In all three countries, we expand access to contraception and create pathways for women’s autonomy and choice.

Despite the different challenges and approaches, we remain united in our conviction to run programs that uplift women, girls, and young people—and center the voices, ideas, and agency of local individuals and communities. Our community-centric programs reflect our commitment to honoring the integrity and self-determination of the people we reach.

Over this past year, we engaged local partners and communities in more than 20 countries on innovative programs that delivered tangible impact in communities facing immense challenges. We worked with community leaders and local organizations in Mozambique to sensitize their friends and neighbors about the dangers of child marriage, stopping multiple marriages and giving girls hope for the future. In Bangladesh, we helped health providers recognize and respond to gender-based violence, something being carried beyond our direct support through government ownership. In Sierra Leone, we joined youth and the private sector to create contraceptive products and services that meet the needs of young people.

Your support makes all this possible. Thank you for helping to create a more just and equitable world.

Yours,
Tabinda Sarosh, CEO
Lydia Saloucou, President, Africa
Mohamed Abou Nar, Interim President, South Asia, Middle East, North Africa

Advancing sexual and reproductive health and rights is central to our mission. We ensure all people can exercise autonomy over their futures by getting the sexual and reproductive health information and services they need. These services include contraception; gender-based violence prevention and treatment; maternal, newborn, and child health; and HIV & AIDS. Many of our programs focus on reaching adolescents with developmentally and culturally appropriate information and services.

Highlights:

• Tanzania: Maria’s story
• USAID Uganda Family Planning Activity
• Pakistan: Frontier Health Markets Engage
• Nigeria: FC2, the Female Condom
• Burkina Faso: PREPARE Burkina

M-mama
Tanzania | Vodafone Foundation

Maria — Emergency Transport Saves Lives

Meet Maria King’etu and her 1-month-old son Nimrod Makere, who live in Arusha, Tanzania.

When Maria needed an emergency C-section, Pathfinder’s m-mama program stepped in. M-mama created a network of local taxi drivers to act as “taxi ambulances” in areas where ambulances are rarely available. With detailed referral plans for every clinic and village, the system provides critical management of emergency transport. M-mama was led by the Ministry of Health, in partnership with Pathfinder, Touch Health, and the Vodafone Foundation.

The program is now funded by the government and built into local health budgets. Part of the success? Paying drivers immediately: Through Vodafone’s “M-Pesa” platform, money is automatically transferred to taxi drivers. The program contributed to a 38% reduction in maternal mortality in the Shinyanga region, where it was initially piloted, and its success has led to expansion into Kenya and Malawi.

USAID Uganda Family Planning Activity
Uganda | USAID

PARTNER SPOTLIGHT
Lake Albert Children Women Advocacy and Development Organization (LACWADO) protects and supports human rights, natural resources, and economic livelihoods in Uganda.

In western Uganda’s Buliisa district, discussions of family planning rarely take place within communities—instead, they are reserved for health facilities. To shift social norms around discussing family planning, the Pathfinder-led USAID/Uganda Family Planning Activity partnered with LACWADO and seven other community-based organizations across 11 districts, leveraging community groups to foster behaviors that improve healthy timing and spacing of pregnancies.

LACWADO supported Kalengeija Music Dance and Drama Group to develop and perform plays, songs, and poems in their community to raise awareness about family planning. Aimed at young parents and adolescent boys and girls working locally as farmers, Kalengeija’s performances were instrumental in generating demand for family planning services.

Frontier Health Markets Engage
Pakistan | USAID

PARTNER SPOTLIGHT
oladoc is Pakistan’s largest and most trusted digital health platform.

Our Frontier Health Markets Engage project supported young people to become advocates for their own health and wellbeing. Together with oladoc and the School of Leadership in Pakistan, Pathfinder formed a Youth Council for Sustainable Action dedicated to meeting the health needs of young people. The Youth Council developed BOLO Health, which provides accessible and confidential health care consultations, information, and products to young people.

FC2 The Female Condom
Nigeria, Mozambique, Uganda | Female Health Company

PARTNER SPOTLIGHT
Female Health Company manufactures, markets, and sells the FC2 female condom globally.

In Nigeria, Pathfinder developed a social media campaign series to raise awareness about FC2, developing promotional videos on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Tiktok with local influencers. These videos, alongside in-person awareness events, have reached millions of viewers, demystifying the female condom and bringing awareness about a wider range of contraceptive options.

PREPARE – BURKINA
Burkina Faso | USAID

PARTNER SPOTLIGHT
Association Burkinabe pour le Bien Etre Familial is a local International Planned Parenthood Federation affiliate that provides sexual and reproductive health services in Burkina Faso.

The USAID PREPARE-BURKINA project supported local organizations in Burkina Faso to deliver health care in communities affected by an ongoing security crisis. With Pathfinder’s support, a group of local organizations, including Association Burkinabe pour le Bien Etre Familial, delivered continuous healthcare to internally displaced people, women, and children in areas where many health facilities closed or were functioning at minimum due to ongoing terrorist attacks.

Alongside partner organizations Action Pour la Promotion des Initiatives Locales, Alliance Technique d’Assistance au Développement, Association pour la Gestion de l’Environnement et le Développement, and Association Tin Tua, PREPARE-BURKINA:

• Contributed to more than 39,000 instances of people using contraception for the first time.
• Held educational health talks reaching more than 64,090 people, the majority of whom were women and girls.
• Contributed to 1,176,923 children under five receiving nutrition services through community mobilization and referral to community health workers.

Climate change exacerbates health and gender disparities and places additional strain on health systems, putting everything we work for at risk. Unintended pregnancies, gender-based violence, early and forced marriages, and unsafe births increase during climate disasters. We see climate action as essential to furthering sexual and reproductive health and rights, improving health, and advancing the rights and agency of women and girls.

Highlights

• Burkina Faso, Niger, Côte D’Ivoire: Youth Champions for Climate Change
• Bangladesh and Pakistan: Advancing the Leadership of Women and Girls Towards Better Health and Climate Change Resilience
• Egypt: Women-led Climate Resilience
• Kenya: Darwin Initiative – Pairing Community Conservation Areas with Sustainable Aquaculture in Lake Victoria

Youth Champions for Climate Change
Burkina Faso, Niger, Côte D’Ivoire

Yayé Ali Aboubacar — Youth Champion, Niger

Through the Youth Champions for Climate Resilience in West Africa program, Pathfinder trains young leaders across Burkina Faso, Niger, and Côte D’Ivoire to become champions of climate resilience and sexual and reproductive health and rights. Through our partnership with these youth champions, we’ve reached more than 400,000 people with climate change information.

As Yayé Ali Aboubacar, a youth champion from Niger, put it: “I’m automatically up for any activity that aims to promote youth and improve living conditions in my community. First and foremost, this kind of program offers an opportunity to develop skills in leadership, advocacy, and awareness-raising, and it also enables me to contribute through tangible actions to mitigating the impacts of climate change and promoting a sustainable future. What’s more, committing myself to climate resilience enables me to play an active role in transforming society and helping to create stronger, more resilient communities.” 

Advancing the Leadership of Women and Girls Towards Better Health and Climate Change Resilience
Bangladesh & Pakistan | Takeda Pharmaceuticals

PARTNER SPOTLIGHT
Women climate champions lead and encourage climate and health action!

Pathfinder partners with women in Bangladesh and Pakistan to serve as climate champions in their communities. They provide essential information on climate change, play an active role in climate adaptation, and link their friends and neighbors with critical health care and social safety nets that provide support with preparing for and living through climate shocks.

Climate champions (or “surmis”), have engaged in gender-transformative workshops; served as executive committee representatives for the provincial Women’s Chamber of Commerce; and participated in activities like mangrove planting, folk music, and theater sessions focused on climate resilience and women’s agency.

Women-Led Climate Resilience
Egypt | Individual Contributions

PARTNER SPOTLIGHT
The Women-Led Climate Resilience (WLCR) Project (Green Clinics Model) integrates family planning and climate resilience activities.

When Rania Ahmed El Sayed first heard about Pathfinder’s Women-Led Climate Resilience project, which works with women to become “ambassadors of change” by leading green community initiatives, she was reluctant to participate. But after speaking with a project facilitator, Rania decided she would attend just the first session on a trial basis. The first session was enough to shift Rania’s perspective about the impacts of climate change on health— and the difference she could make by taking on a leadership role in her community.

As Rania learned about how plastic waste affects the air, soil, and water and how pollutants cause serious diseases, she vowed to change her habits and behaviors at home to reduce her family’s carbon footprint and prioritize health and wellbeing.

And she did. Rania swapped out plastic containers for clay and glass, rationed her energy consumption, “up-cycled” fruit crates into bookshelves and shoe racks, and collected plastic bottles for recycling. Rania also learned about duck farming, which today has become a steady stream of income for herself and her family.

Darwin Initiative – Pairing Community Conservation Areas with Sustainable Aquaculture in Lake Victoria
Kenya | Individual Contributions

PARTNER SPOTLIGHT
Conservation International empowers societies to responsibly and sustainably care for nature.

In collaboration with Conservation International, Victory Farms, and Fauna and Flora, Pathfinder has worked with communities surrounding Kenya’s Lake Victoria to cultivate a new model for responsible aquaculture that safeguards native species by engaging women to serve as entrepreneurs and leaders in the fishing industry and connecting them with essential health care.

Through the Darwin Initiative, Pathfinder introduced a community-led revolving fund—designed specifically for the women of Lake Victoria—with the goal of fostering greater economic independence by providing affordable, low-interest loans. Women participating in the project were organized into groups, with each group taking shared responsibility for managing and growing their modest fund of US$500.

Read more on the Darwin Initiative here.

Pathfinder opens doors for women and girls to forge their own paths ahead and live the lives they choose. We advocate for policies and run programs that build more gender-equitable societies, and we ensure that women have the resources they need to succeed. Our programs shift harmful gender norms that prevent women and girls from reaching their full potential. By investing in women, we invest in a healthier, more equitable and resilient future for all.

Highlights

• Mozambique: Preventing Child, Early, and Forced Marriage and Countering Violent Extremism in Cabo Delgado
• Ethiopia: Her Future, Her Choice
• Egypt: Women’s Economic and Social Empowerment Program
• Mozambique: Impacto

Preventing Child, Early, and Forced Marriage and Countering Violent Extremism in Cabo Delgado (Uholo)
Mozambique | USAID

Nyamo and Viaz — Business and Empowerment

Nyamo, 22, sells capulanas, rectangular lengths of cloth that can be used and worn in many ways. She opened her small business by participating in a saving and credit group in Pemba, Mozambique—managed by the Pathfinder-led USAID Preventing Child, Early, and Forced Marriage and Countering Violent Extremism in Cabo Delgado project (locally known as Uholo). Uholo improved the lives and livelihoods of 22,000 adolescent girls and young women by reducing child, early, and forced marriages; advancing their sexual and reproductive health and rights; and providing them with financial and educational opportunities.

Nyamo, who has the support of her husband and community, is now looking to grow her business over the next few years.

“With the profits of the business, I was able to enroll my daughter in school and buy school supplies. I dream of building a stall later, where I will put the merchandise so that customers can see it, says Nyamo. She proudly reports that she now has her own money, which she can manage without depending on anyone.”

Viaz Chata, 21, tells us how participating in Uholo helped her recognize abuse, and ultimately leave her own abusive relationship: “One day, I was with my friend. We were braiding our hair when we heard about
[Uholo] activities and headed there. Activists Luisa and Angelica discussed gender-based violence, and it really caught my attention. They talked about something I was experiencing at home, but didn’t know how to handle. I learned the violence I was suffering from my husband was a violation of my human rights, and I could
fight against it.

After an altercation with my husband, I talked to Luisa. She advised me to go to the police, and accompanied me
to the police station. The police called my husband, a case was opened, and I separated from him. Women and girls should not accept violence, not remain in silence. Silence kills.”

Her Future, Her Choice
Ethiopia| Global Affairs Canada

PARTNER SPOTLIGHT
Women Support Association works to build gender equity and empower men, women, and communities in sustainable livelihoods.

In the Waghmare Zone of Ethiopia’s Amhara Region, Her Future Her Choice contributed to preventing multiple early, forced, and child marriages—including 14-year-old Tseganat’s. When Tseganat learned her grandparents were arranging her marriage without her consent, she reached out to allies at her school and health center, informing them that four of her friends also faced forced marriages.

The school director convened the local Gender-Based Violence Committee, established by Pathfinder, and invited Tseganat’s father, a religious leader, to discuss the marriage. Committee members worked tirelessly to convince not only Tseganat’s father but also the other parents to cancel the scheduled marriages.

Thanks to the combined efforts of the health service providers, schoolteachers, police officers, and trained peer educators—including Tseganat!— all the forced wedding arrangements in the community were canceled.

Women’s Economic and Social Empowerment Program
Egypt| USAID

PARTNER SPOTLIGHT
National Council for Women is appointed by the President, and the only national, independent women’s political mechanism in Egypt.

USAID Women’s Economic and Social Empowerment Program engaged, leveraged, and partnered with the private sector, local communities, and NGOs.

The program encouraged women’s participation in the workforce; generated demand for financial services; promoted tailored, market-based solutions to women’s economic empowerment; and strengthened violence against women prevention and response to make women more economically and socially resilient.

Impacto
Mozambique| Global Affairs Canada

PARTNER SPOTLIGHT
Community radio stations developed tailored radio programs to stimulate dialogue on gender equality and the harmful effects of child, early, and forced marriage and gender-based violence. And community leaders worked with Impacto to facilitate community debates.

Impacto has improved gender equality in nine districts of Tete and Manica provinces so that adolescent girls and young women can exercise their rights to bodily autonomy and sexual and reproductive health.
The “Together for Change” talk show, broadcasted weekly by six community radio stations, discussed issues including teenage pregnancy, child and early forced marriage, contraception, and sexually transmitted infections. Talk shows used a debate format, and hosted guest speakers from communities, 70% who were adolescent girls and young women.

Community Leader Facilitators helped facilitate debates for Impacto, explaining that the debates helped them identify men and women with strong beliefs against adolescent girls’ and young women’s bodily autonomy. To shift their perceptions, the facilitators mobilized community leaders to participate in robust dialogues on gender equity; sexual and reproductive health; gender-based violence; and child, early, and forced marriage.

At Pathfinder, we envision strong, inclusive, resilient health systems that ensure access to person centered sexual and reproductive health and rights services. We contribute to functional health infrastructure and resilient health systems that meet the needs of communities in low-resource settings and sustain services during crises.

Highlights

• DRC: Annie’s story
• Burundi: Tubiteho
• Egypt: OSRA (Family)
• Pakistan: Building Healthy Families

PROSANI
DRC | USAID

Annie — Between life and death

“I was between life and death,” said Annie Banza Kamona. “The doctors told me that my blood pressure was very high and that I was having seizures… When we arrived at the health center, the nurse told me that my case was complicated. They sent me to the hospital.”

Annie was lucky. She ended up at the Adra 41 hospital in Democratic Republic of the Congo’s Kafubu Health Zone, where Dr. Gracia Tshimanga, the Medical Director, was on duty. Dr. Gracia and his team received training through the USAID Integrated Health Program, of which Pathfinder is a partner. The program strengthened the ability of staff at Adra 41 to handle complex cases like Annie’s.

Read Annie’s full story.

Tubiteho
Burundi | USAID

PARTNER SPOTLIGHT
2,855 community health workers in six provinces.

Every year, more than half of Burundi’s population contracts malaria—a total of 8 million cases that lead to 7,000 deaths. Through its partnership with community health workers, Tubiteho increased the number of malaria cases received by health facilities, increasing the proportion of malaria cases treated within 24 hours of symptom onset and reducing the malaria fatality rate. Tubiteho trained 2,855 community health workers in six provinces to detect and treat malaria, provided essential equipment and coaching, and strengthened the oversight of community health. This included multiple approaches for improving the supervision of community health workers and strengthening supply chains for the treatment of malaria.

OSRA (Family)
Egypt | USAID

PARTNER SPOTLIGHT
The HO Group—a conglomerate comprising 35 companies active in the pharmaceutical sector.

Mervat Kamal Abdel Zaher is a Raeda Refiyah, or a rural outreach community health worker in Abu Tig, Asyut Governorate, Egypt. Mervat attended an OSRA training, where she received information and guidance on how to enhance family planning interventions in her community, including using counseling charts and incorporating family planning home visit records into the national health information system. Mervat was then promoted as the local supervisor of community health workers and today is inspiring those she supports to enhance their own work in the community.

“OSRA is an excellent program that has developed our professional skills,” says Mervat. “I benefited from every training conducted by it and applied it in my field of work.”

Building Healthy Families
Pakistan | USAID

PARTNER SPOTLIGHT
Building Healthy Families (BHF) worked with local partner organization PPHI Sindh to ensure care reached the most affected places.

In Sindh, Pakistan, Pathfinder’s BHF program strengthened health systems through numerous interventions. In six districts, BHF was working to scale up DMPA-SC self-injection contraception. To support this work, empathy trainings were designed and deployed to enhance providers’ confidence and ability to effectively coach women in opting for the self-injectable. BHF has also trained 65 ‘master trainers’ on high-impact practices including postpartum family planning and essential newborn care.

“I was inspired to become a community midwife and open my own clinic because of a heart-wrenching incident,” said Khushbu. “My pregnant cousin gave birth at home, and during the delivery, the traditional birth attendant used rusty scissors to cut the baby’s umbilical cord. This caused her to contract tetanus, a condition that proved to be fatal. I couldn’t help but think that if only a sterilized and appropriate pair of scissors had been used, my cousin would still be with us today.”  Read Khushbu’s story.

Highlights

• Nigeria: Using Geospatial Data to Improve Women’s Health
• India: Never Stop Screening 2.0

Using Geospatial Data to Improve Women’s Health
Nigeria | Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Nomson Daji — Using new technology

In Nigeria, Pathfinder is using AI and geospatial data to improve reproductive, maternal, newborn, child health and nutrition coverage in four states. Through partnerships with GRID3, Natview Foundation for Technology Innovation, and Data Science Nigeria, the GeoST4R team is training local focal persons, like Sabon Tasha, on using the technology to ensure women have access to health care. The toolkit allows focal points to map distances women must go for care, understand where health facilities are, and “microplan” decisions on how they will receive care.

“If you carry services [directly to people], they will access [the service] more easily than when they have to travel to get services. Our plan is to have services carried out very close to the community where they can access them easily,” said Nomson Daji, Sabon Tasha Ward Focal Person.

Never Stop Screening 2.0
India | FUJIFILM INDIA PVT LTD

PARTNER SPOTLIGHT
A cadre of over 300 volunteers supported vulnerability mapping efforts to determine where project interventions were most needed.

Never Stop Screening 2.0 is a digital health intervention implemented by Pathfinder in partnership with Fujifilm, operating in three states of India. AI-aided technology was used to screen and identify tuberculosis (TB) cases.
The project employed a newly developed X-ray imaging device by Fujifilm that utilizes automated X-ray screening tools incorporating AI to enable diagnostic testing decisions to be made at the point of care. These point-of-care instruments assist in averting initial delays in receiving TB care.

DEAR PATHFINDER COMMUNITY,

One of the things that impresses me most about Pathfinder is the lasting change we deliver. Whether it’s giving a young girl a chance to finish school, offering an adolescent the means to prevent unintended pregnancies, partnering with community leaders to deliver life-saving reproductive health messages, collaborating with environmental experts to encourage climate-smart agricultural techniques, or working with a government to expand access to affordable healthcare services, our impact endures.

The sustainability of Pathfinder’s impact relies on our trusted relationships in the countries we serve. Historically,
our primary alliances have been with ministries of health and community-based organizations. Increasingly, however, we’ve diversified our partnerships with the private sector; ministries of environment, agriculture, and education; and in some cases, the courts and police. Our diversified partnerships reflect our expanded mandate. We seek not only to help women make informed decisions about their fertility, but to exercise their right to bodily autonomy and life of dignity with access to nutritious food, clean water, money, career pathways, and high-quality healthcare.

In Cabo Delgado, Mozambique, for example, we partnered with influential community members, school and health staff, judicial and law enforcement authorities, religious leaders, and policymakers to protect and uplift women and girls. We began our work in Cabo Delgado as attacks by armed insurgents had displaced communities and plunged families into poverty. Sexual violence against adolescent girls and young women was on the rise. The results of our partnerships were transformative: young girls staying in school instead of being forced into marriage; judicial processes for handling gender-based violence cases strengthened; young women participating in credit and savings groups; girls enrolled in sports; and communities abuzz with positive conversations about women’s and girls’ rights.

Pathfinders in Africa, South Asia, and the Middle East are at the heart of these enduring multisectoral partnerships. They are working hand in hand with the health providers, teachers, social workers, and youth groups, driving sustained impact in their communities and countries. This is why our country-led strategy is so important.

Our country-led strategy ensures that Pathfinder’s leadership, resources, and decision-making are anchored—not
in donor countries like the US and Europe—but directly in the countries where we work, making our impact more sustainable, relevant, and effective. Today, more than 40 percent of Pathfinders serving a global function are based outside of the US. Our teams in the countries we serve drive our regional and global strategies. This country-led approach deepens local ownership of our work and honors the voices, ingenuity, and self-determination of the communities we serve.

The make-up of our board of directors reflects the spirit of our country-led strategy. We now have more members with lived experience in the regions where we work than ever before. With roots in Tanzania and Kenya myself, I’m joined by board members originally from Eritrea, Ethiopia, India, Kenya, and South Africa.
The Pathfinder of today is better poised than ever to deliver on our mission.
Thank you for supporting Pathfinder and walking this path with us.

Yours,
Collin Mothupi, Board Chair