'A Shawl for all women' by Zambia's first Lady - Dr Christine Kaseba.

'A shawl is a powerful and universal symbol that unifies all women and represents the interrelated themes of art, culture, health and motherhood', says Her Excellency Dr Christine Kaseba, First Lady of Zambia, at this year's Cannes international festival of creativity.  The launch of Shawl for all women came about as a result of MARITAGE (multicultural Art and Heritage) international's partnership with McCann Health to create this first ever global campaign.
MARITAGE international as a global initiative led by first ladies, women leaders, and influential artistic societies, governments, policy makers, and development actors, seeks to economically empower female artisan groups in developing countries through collaboration with the public and private sectors.
Speaking of the his delight with the partnership, Mr John Cahill of McCanne health says, " its a privilege to embark on this journey of hope with MARITAGE and to have the opportunity to connect partners brands with a global initiative that supports women's health and empowerment. A shawl for all women will bring together partners from health, beauty, and fashion to generate economic development opportunities for women through the design and sales of Shawls, often leveraging partnerships with high fashion partners. Also will raise funds for maternal and child health initiatives, such as every mother counts".
The initiative - 'A shawl for all women' will be launched at a gathering of first ladies and influencial women of the world on 24th - 25th September coinciding with the United Nations General assembly conference and New York fashion week.

Black women authors - Chika Unigwe - The new distinct voice of African Literature.

In our time, Chika Unigwe has become one of the distinct voices of African literature. With several of her works - fiction, Poetry, articles and educational materials published both in journals, and as stand alone.
In 2003, Chika won the BBC short story competition for her story 'Borrowed Smiles', she also won the commonwealth short story award for her story 'Weathered Smile' and a flemish literary prize for 'De Smaak Van Sneeuw'.  She also won several other prizes including a nomination of her first short story written in Dutch 'The Secret  and another being nominated for the 2004 Caine prize. In 2007, she received the UNESCO - Aschberg fellowship for a creative writing and of a 2009 Rockerfeller foundation fellowship for creative writing too.
She became the first African Flemish author with her first novel 'De Freniks published in Dutch in 2005. Recently, she published her second novel 'On Black Sisters' Street'  which was first released in Dutch under the title, 'Fata Morgana. Today, 'On Black Sisters' Street ' have won also the NLNG prize for literature.