UNWG - United Nations Women's Guild

The African Women's Group is a regional group of the United Nations Women's Guild. As the UNWG, the Group is a non-profit making association. Members are African or African related women who are connected, directly or indirectly, with the Rome based agencies of the United Nations (FAO, WFP, IFAD).

The purpose of the Group is to conduct activities of interest to the members, based exclusively on voluntary work. All members freely accepts to dedicate a fraction of their time to the achievement of the common goals, that are:

promoting friendship, exchange of cultural experiences and solidarity among the members
working together for developing new ideas and opportunities for raising funds to the benefit of the disadvantaged women and children of the African continent

The Group pursues these objectives through frequent membership gatherings hosted on rotation in the home of a member. The Group has also the aspiration to play a lead role in advocacy for the diverse, rich cultural heritages of the African peoples, a distinctive mark of which the membership is particulary proud. For this, the Group is committed to organize social events open to non-members, such as lunch or dinner parties based on African traditional cuisine, arts and crafts exhibits, and presentations of the work of African artists and writers.

Beyond its regional focus, the Group membership is ready to mobilize efforts and resources in response to the UNWG call for relief assistance on occasion of humanitarian crises caused by natural or man-made emergencies.

The Group normally carries out a minimum of four found-raising events per year, one of which coincides with the UNWG Bazaar that takes place at the St Stephen School in November. Every other year, the African Group organizes its celebrated dinner dance, that is hosted in the premises of one of the Rome based UN agencies, attracting wide participation of international staff of these agencies and their Italian colleagues and friends.