About Mercy Corps

Mercy Corps is International Not for profit organization established in 1979. Since then, Mercy Corps have helped all over the world people grappling with the toughest hardships survive — and then thrive. That’s the heart of our approach: we help communities turn crisis into opportunity.

Our mission is: Alleviate suffering, poverty and oppression by helping people build secure, productive and just communities. From 2000 Mercy Corps are working in Georgia. The goal in Country is to create stable and secure communities in regions impacted by poverty and conflict.
Mercy Corps is helping Georgian farmers by using an integrated approach to address all these issues, rather than treating them as separate and disconnected problems. We have established a centrally-located Rural Service Center that provides communities and local farmers with important agricultural and economic information and training, as well as assistance in connecting with markets and buyers.
Mercy Corps provides these small, rural and often isolated communities with the technical know-how to scale up agricultural production. Mercy Corps also helps farmers from different villages to form associations and cooperatives.
Currently in Mercy Corps Georgia is implementing several projects, links to which are given above.
Learn more at mercycorps.org
 

About “Safe Online” Program

Starting in September 2023, Mercy Corps launched the 3-year program “Safe Online:  Empowering Women in the Digital Economy” (Safe Online) that will operate in targeted areas of Georgia and Armenia to advance inclusive economic growth through democratizing digital transformation and online safety for women in business.

The Safe Online partners will pursue three interconnected outcomes to achieve its ambitious goal – first, organizing a stakeholder community and carrying out formal research activities to  better understand how digital exclusion and technology-facilitated gender based violence (TFGBV) operates to limit women’s online business opportunities in the two countries; second, working directly with women in business and technology to develop concrete solutions and model tools and interventions that increase their safety online and improve the performance of their online business activities; and third, working directly with government and private sector  actors to promote the uptake and scaling of proven solutions that can shape and maintain a safer and more accessible digital economy.

In Georgia, the program will work with the Center for Strategy and Development (CSD), a leading human rights organization, and in Armenia with Impact Innovation Institute’s Initiatives Foundation (IMINI), a leading local CSO working on gender equality.
 

About IMINI

Impact Innovations Institute’s Initiatives Foundation (IMINI) is a women-led non-profit organization created by Impact Innovations Institute in 2020, a social enterprise aiming to tackle global social problems through innovative technologies. As its first major undertaking, the team has embarked on developing Safe YOU, a mobile app and a multistakeholder web platform to prevent and combat gender-based violence (GBV).
IMINI has been committed to using technology to combat violence from the date of its establishment. At the same time, through experience in an industry where technology and social justice meet, IMINI has been able to identify multiple ways that technology can facilitate violence, instead of combat it. Through IMINI’s experience with the Safe YOU solution, the team have improved knowledge of AI & other digital technologies used to commit technology-facilitated gender-based violence (TFGBV). 
As a solution aiming to attain Sustainable Development Goals, in particular SDG #5 Gender Equality, Safe YOU has been recognized as a Digital Public Good as set by the UN Secretary-General in the 2020 Roadmap for Digital Cooperation. In 2023, Safe YOU won the UNWTO Awake Tourism Challenge and was selected as the European Champions at the WSA European Young Innovators Awards, as well as being featured in UNDP’s Digital X Catalog and winning the UNFPA Innovation Challenge. Additionally, Safe YOU is supported by the L’Oreal Fund for Women, the Armenian International Women’s Association (AIWA) and the Cartier Women’s Initiative. 
Safe YOU has been active in Armenia and Georgia since 2020, as well as in Iraq since December 2021 with more than 30,000 users combined.
IMINI is partnering with the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs of the Republic of Armenia and the Coalition of Support centers, and provides Safe YOU to 10 Regional Support centers across the country and 1 shelter to conduct their work through the platform.. Professionals working at these centers are able to respond to cases and provide support services & consultations through the app and web platform. 

IMINI also has an official partnership with the Coalition to end Violence against Women (Armenia), with the 9 members of the Coalition providing resources & content for the application, and the Safe YOU solution disseminating this information in order for greater reach to beneficiaries. 

Through the Safe YOU solution, IMINI has reached over 30,000 women and girls, empowering them with access to emergency help in dangerous situations, and consultations.

IMINI’s Experience working with Mercy Corps

IMINI concentrates on research and promotion of gender equality and as a result prevention of GBV cases through tools provided by the Safe YOU solution.
Since November 2022 IMINI has been an implementing partner in the “Women Initiative for Security and Equity’’ (WISE) program, supported by the United States Department of State and implemented in Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia by the Mercy Corps Georgia. The project aims at supporting the community, which works on women’s rights and raises awareness on combating gender-based violence ( GBV) and violent extremism (VE), as well as identifies and responds to various forms of violence, which negatively affects gender equality and formation of an inclusive, democratic society. 
From September 2023, IMINI has been an implementing partner in the “Safe Online: Empowering Women in the Digital Economy” program carried out by Mercy Corps, that operates in targeted areas of Georgia and Armenia to advance inclusive economic growth through democratizing digital transformation and online safety for women in business. Through this project, IMINI has a specific focus on the widespread issue of Technology-Facilitated Gender Based Violence (TFGBV). 

Within the scope of IMINI’s activities, the team is developing a tool to report cases of TFGBV through the Safe YOU mobile application. Additional activities through the Safe Online project carried out by IMINI include breaking down the barriers to women’s participation in the digital economy through both supporting workplaces in combating TFGBV and ensuring women are empowered through education, mentoring and support. 

The IMINI team has a strong working relationship with the Mercy Corps Georgia team and is looking forward to strengthening our partnership through new projects.