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Introduction: Disaster and resilience: intersectional approaches towards establishing resilient communities during crises
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This is the introduction to the special issue on 'Disaster and resilience: intersectional approaches towards establishing resilient communities during crises'.
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The Financing of Energy Transition in Senegal: Green promises, unequal gains?
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Senegal's energy transition is at a critical juncture. While the country has made significant progress in terms of access to electricity and the integration of renewable energies, its energy financing model remains heavily dependent on foreign private investment and favors the latter. This implies debt-based financing and risk mitigation mechanisms that protect investors while risking increased fiscal pressure on the state.
The dominant model of independent power producers (IPPs) shows how heavily these projects depend on sovereign guarantees and international financial institutions (IFIs) to attract capital. While these projects increase electricity production, they also reinforce financial dependence, can lead to local socioeconomic inequalities, and create an energy system that primarily serves the interests of investors rather than reducing inequalities.
This study examines the financial mechanisms underlying Senegal's energy transition, highlighting their implications for national sovereignty, a just transition, transparency, and accountability. It also explores alternative financing models, such as community initiatives like the “Progrès Lait” project and the “Programme d'accès aux énergies renouvelables” (PAER), which integrate renewable energy into local economies and strengthen energy sovereignty.
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Analysis of Oxfam’s Female Food Hero Engagement Strategy: A case study of Nigeria’s Obonge Women Program
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This evaluation report analyzes Oxfam’s Female Food Heroes (FFH) Initiative in Nigeria, known locally as Ogbonge Women. Since 2012, the program has celebrated and empowered women smallholder farmers through recognition, training, leadership development, and advocacy. The study confirms that FFH has enhanced women’s participation in agriculture, expanded their economic opportunities, and strengthened their leadership capacity through initiatives such as Village Savings and Loan Associations (VSLA), sustainable farming training, and exposure to policymaking platforms. The initiative has significantly improved women’s visibility in agriculture, enabling them to serve as role models and advocates for food security, gender justice, and rural development.
At the same time, the evaluation identifies persistent challenges. Limited and inconsistent funding, weak staffing structures, and gaps in communication and follow-up have undermined the sustainability of Oxfam’s engagement with women farmers. The absence of robust monitoring, evaluation, and learning (MEL) systems, alongside reduced post-award support and declining media visibility, has constrained the program’s long-term impact. Structural barriers—such as cultural norms restricting women’s land ownership and limited access to financial resources and agricultural inputs—further compound these challenges.
The report calls for renewed investment in capacity building, alumni networks, and gender-transformative approaches, as well as stronger collaboration with government, civil society, and private sector actors. Policy recommendations include expanding training and resource access, institutionalizing follow-up and monitoring, strengthening advocacy platforms, and diversifying funding. By addressing these systemic gaps, the FFH Initiative can fully realize its potential to empower Nigerian women farmers, transform rural livelihoods, and advance inclusive and sustainable food systems.
This report is one of two evaluation studies conducted on the Female Food Heroes (FFH) Programme, designed to assess its strategies, achievements, challenges, and opportunities. Together, these evaluations provide evidence and lessons to inform the sustainability and future development of the initiative across the wider programme. You can find the study on Ethiopia here and a synthesis report of the two case studies here. 
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Intersectional Feminism: A Primer
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English Description: This primer introduces the concept of intersectional feminism and serves as a guiding document for Oxfam America staff. Intersectional feminism explores multiple and intertwined systems of oppression such as patriarchy, racism, and capitalism through three core pillars: gender, race/ethnicity, and class. Intersectional feminism is crucial to the work of Oxfam America because of the complexity of the issues the organization engages in with partners and communities. We must increase our ability to make sense of the multiple experiences of gender oppression at the individual, systemic, and structural levels. Throughout this primer, we include examples from the literature and Oxfam’s work to showcase how we are endeavoring to incorporate intersectional feminism in our work. By embedding intersectional feminism in our analyses and approaches, we demonstrate our shared commitment to addressing systemic inequalities and enhancing the effectiveness and integrity of our shared mission.  
Descripción en español: Esta guía básica presenta el concepto del feminismo interseccional y tiene como objetivo servir de orientación para el personal de Oxfam en Estados Unidos. El feminismo interseccional examina los múltiples y entrelazados sistemas de opresión, como el patriarcado, el racismo y el capitalismo, a través de tres ejes fundamentales: género, raza/etnia y clase. El feminismo interseccional es fundamental para la labor de Oxfam en Estados Unidos, ya que la organización aborda temas complejos con sus contrapartes y comunidades. Debemos aumentar nuestra capacidad para comprender las múltiples experiencias de opresión de género a escala individual, sistémico y estructural. A lo largo de esta guía, incluimos ejemplos de la literatura y del trabajo de Oxfam disponibles, con el fin de mostrar cómo buscamos integrar el feminismo interseccional en nuestro trabajo. Al integrar el feminismo interseccional en nuestros análisis y enfoques, demostramos nuestro compromiso compartido de abordar las desigualdades sistémicas y mejorar la eficacia y la integridad de nuestra misión común.  
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Kenya's Inequality Crisis: The great economic divide
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The Status of Inequality in Kenya 2025 report provides a comprehensive analysis of inequality trends in income, wealth, and access to essential public services such as health and education. It highlights how deepening disparities in public service delivery continue to shape social and economic outcomes and offers bold policy recommendations to advance equality and inclusive growth. This report comes at a critical time, as Kenya grapples with growing economic pressures, rising living costs, and fiscal constraints that affect the provision of quality public services. The findings seek to inform ongoing national debates on economic inequality, tax reform, public finance management, and social protection; key levers for addressing inequality and achieving the Sustainable Development Goals and Vision 2030. 
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The role of rituals and cultural heritage in post-disaster social resilience: the case of Antakya
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This study is based on the role of rituals and cultural practices which shaped the recovery process after the earthquake in Hatay, Türkiye. We observed that those who had to leave Hatay after the earthquake tried to continue the rituals in their hometowns or only came to Hatay during ritual times and participated in this ceremony. At this point, we investigated the role of rituals and cultural heritage values in social resilience and repair through the eyes of both those who stayed and those who left, by conducting field research as two faculty members at Hatay Mustafa Kemal University. In this context, the study was conducted using participant observation and in-depth interview techniques. We observed that some changes were made in rituals (due to lack of capacity such as space and physical conditions), but the continuation of these rituals and cultural heritage values in some way makes those who stayed and those who left feel ‘hope’ and ‘the possibility of re-existence’ and the socially restorative role of this feeling is among the most important results we have reached. In the process of adaptation to the ‘new order’ and recovery after disasters, the participants emphasised that only economic development or construction activities are not sufficient, but the unifying role of shared cultural values and rituals around social/cultural belonging needs to be understood. Cultural norms and ritualised practices have been found to revitalise social life, strengthen social cohesion, cultural identity and psychological well-being, and play a helpful role in increasing the resilience of disaster-affected communities in coping with natural disasters.
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Together Against Poverty Phase II Project Learning Review - Advocacy in Action: Stories of Change and Learnings for the Future
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Oxfam, through the four-year, multi-country program Together Against Poverty Project -Phase II (TAP2), has implemented impactful interventions contributing to strategic policy and practice outcomes in agriculture, aid effectiveness, and gender equality.
Throughout the project, Oxfam has undertaken continuous learning and adaptation to ensure that our different advocacy and program tactics and strategies, which include research, policy development, direct advocacy, alliance building, and public communications, are the most effective for achieving desired outcomes.
To this end, we present seven stories of ‘Signs of Change’ that highlight how Oxfam’s work has contributed to change, the different strategies utilized to effectively make change happen, and general reflections and learning for our future work. These stories come from across the project’s geographies and cover work related to food systems, aid quantity and quality, and gender justice from the start of the grant in July 2021.
This Learning Report serves as a concise but powerful resource for internal learning and external impact showcasing concrete examples of policy and program successes across multiple contexts.
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Beyond the Targets: An ambitious agenda to put aid back on track
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Aid can make a huge contribution to significantly reducing inequality. Given the widespread agreement that bringing down inequality is necessary to underpin efforts to end poverty, achieve gender justice and successfully fight climate change, there is an urgent need for donors to make this a priority in their aid policies. For this virtuous cycle to be effective, there is also an imperative to rebalance decision-making on aid, ensuring it is done in an inclusive way that centres Global South governments and civil society.
Building on the findings of the 2019 Oxfam report 'Hitting the Target: An agenda for aid in times of extreme inequality', this paper presents a new and updated agenda to put aid back on track given recent changes in the development landscape and the multiple crises facing our world. It makes 10 concrete recommendations on how to ensure development finance effectively contributes to building a more equal and sustainable world.
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Raising the Bar: Supermarkets must urgently address structural exploitation of cocoa farmers
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Most cocoa farmers in main cocoa producing countries Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana are poor, even though they are at the heart of the supply chain for a luxury good: chocolate. For decades they have been receiving low farm gate prices, which don’t allow them to earn a living income for their families. At the same time, companies in the cocoa and chocolate supply chains have been making huge profits. Supermarkets in the Netherlands and Germany have taken first steps by making long-term commitments to ensuring cocoa farmers are paid a living income reference price, but the share of honest chocolate they have on offer only reaches 5%. It’s time that they radically change the way they do business, by committing to long-term fair prices for farmers, sharing the risk with cocoa farmers and being accountable for all the chocolate products they sell. 
This paper focuses on supermarkets, which are powerful actors in the cocoa and chocolate supply chain. As primary retailers, supermarkets have a direct link with consumers and have power across the supply chain so they can drive real change. Dutch and German supermarkets have made living income commitments, and they have started implementing them.
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Not Everyone Is in the Same Boat: Climate and inequality in the Middle East and North Africa
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The Middle East and North Africa is one of the regions that will be affected the most by climate change, extreme weather events, exacerbating the chronic water scarcity that it suffers from and current dependency on fossil fuels. Climate change impacts are already witnessed in many countries, especially those experiencing conflicts. At the same time the decades-long austerity policies in the region are not only fuelling inequalities but also make it virtually impossible for the countries in the region to spend on climate. The climate threats driven by the richest people, corporations, and rentier economies are existential to the region. Meanwhile, people living in poverty, marginalized communities vulnerable to climate change and those living in conflict-settings are the ones impacted the hardest. Women and girls, refugees and other groups experiencing discrimination, are particularly at disadvantage to current austerity policies and the consequences of climate change. The consequences are felt in all parts of the region and by most people, yet only the richest people have the wealth and the power and influence to adapt from the consequences of climate breakdown. Austerity policies are exacerbating the climate crisis, and the only way to address the climate breakdown is through taxing the wealthy and their polluting consumptions and massively invest in public services and climate mitigation, adaptation and transition.
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