Melinda Gates Quotes

In a world of growing food demand, Africa is home to two-thirds of the world's unexploited arable land.

It is always the village women who drive these things.

I decided in '96 to dedicate my life to mostly promoting literacy and education for girls in rural Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Women with minimal access to resources and no access to child care have limited choices that too often mean low-wage and part-time labor. In rural communities in the developing world, when women farmers have unequal access to fertilizers or training, their farm productivity lags behind men.

The majority of small-holder farmers in Africa are women and, in urban areas, you're primarily looking at women-led households. So we can't solve hunger if we don't have gender-sensitive programming that addresses access to opportunities for women, whether it's through education or tools for cooking, like solar-powered stoves.

Environmental concerns and feminism are locked together. Generally, women have closer connections to the organic nature of our lives.

I would supplant the ox with the automobile and pave instead of plowing the fields. 1 have a theory that if a corn field were paved, leaving out a brick for each hill, it would increase the yield, do away entirely with the mud, and give the farmer plenty of time to meditate on lofty subjects. That is only one theory. I have many others.

The root cause of the looming energy problem - and the key to easing environmental, economic and religious tensions while improving public health - is to address the unending, and unequal, growth of the human population. And the one proven way to reduce fertility rates is to empower young women by educating them.

Population growth is straining the Earth's resources to the breaking point, and educating girls is the single most important factor in stabilizing that. That, plus helping women gain political and economic power and safeguarding their reproductive rights.

Our farmers and ranchers have never faced as many problems as they do today with drought, range fires, high gas prices and an ever tightening budget on agriculture subsidies.

The rich agricultural nations are the ones that can adapt to the new biotechnologies.

Women in Africa are really the pillar of the society, are the most productive segment of society, actually. They do agriculture.

The agricultural potential of Africa is unlimited.

The education of women is the best way to save the environment.

The farmer had the right to migrate to where the rain fell.

The greatest service which can be rendered any country is to add a useful plant to its culture.

I wanted to make sure that women made up half of all Grameen's borrowers. But it wasn't easy to persuade the women in Bangladesh to join the bank. A man isn't even allowed to address a woman in her village.

I would like to make sure, first of all, that our women in the informal sector - I mean, these are the farmers and the traders; many of them are not educated, many of them lacking literacy - be able to give them better working conditions. And we've done a lot to be able to achieve that.

Svatantra's journey began with a vision to make women in rural areas self-sustainable.

To empower the women in rural areas, we have started something called Mission Shakti.

I don't have any plans to make money for myself. All I wish to do is empower rural women in our country.

I'm fortunate to be in a position to support nonprofits that align with my personal priorities, which include women's health issues, cancer research, environmental concerns, and education for women and children domestically and globally.

Without the wholehearted involvement of farmers, particularly of young as well as women farmers, it will be impossible to implement a Food Entitlements Act in an era of increasing price volatility in the international market.

There is talk about the need for a second Green Revolution. However, such a revolution is nowhere in sight.

Transforming our societies and our economies is an agenda that requires the participation of all. Gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls are key. Including and empowering women and girls to develop and implement climate solutions is the right thing to do. It is also the smart thing to do.