We are thrilled to have 15 girls from the governorates of Fayoum and Sharqia participate in the race day of the sixth edition of the Marakez Pyramids Half Marathon, competing alongside nearly 7,000 people from around the world under the sponsorship of The TriFactory. This flagship race invites runners to ‘Race Through History’ at the iconic Great Pyramids of Giza. Our mission is to empower girls and women through a range of initiatives, including sports and competition participation, promoting healthy nutrition and leadership, addressing gender issues, fostering community engagement and enhancing life skills.

Globally there is a social consensus on the power of sports to ensure healthy lives, promote well-being (Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 3), enhance comprehensive education (SDG 4), and have the capacity to increase gender equality (SDG 5). Sports is recognised as a relevant area of intervention to enhance emancipating gender experiences in society. As an enabler of teamwork, self-reliance, and confidence, UN Women states that:

women in sports defy gender stereotypes and social norms, making inspiring role models, and show men and women as equal.

Project: The Empowerment of Girls through Sports

While girls in sports benefit from improving health, well-being, and physical body experiences, sports offer a stage for girls to perform their subjectivity/individuality and life skills. These sports performances, in turn, nurture self-esteem and self-confidence in relation to others. Social interaction is core to sports engagement which sows the seeds for friendships and even social inclusion. The impact of sports has been recognised by the United Nations (UN) in developing tolerant, respectful, and peaceful relations. The UN considers girls in sports as an act of awareness raising on empowered gender roles within communities. Moreover, ensuring girls’ accessibility to gender-sensitive sports is at the core of overcoming masculinist models of playing sports as well as living life in general. Therefore, girls’ access to gender-responsive infrastructure is an objective of the “Empowerment of Girls through Sports” project. Access to sports is therefore intimately linked to sustainability.

“Empowerment of Girls through Sports” has as its core impact objective to contribute to youth civic and social empowerment through strengthening the capacity of Egyptian sports organisations to promote and offer inclusive access to sports practice and competitions, especially to marginalised groups. Adolescent girls are identified as one of the most vulnerable groups and therefore a priority intersectional target group in the project.

The initiative was founded in 2012 by Tilly Mulder & Dr. Seif Shaheen, the current President of the Egyptian Athletics Federation (EAF). North South Consultants Exchange (NSCE) has been partnering with the EAF since 2018 to implement this project. The Embassy of the Netherlands in Egypt has been a core donor of the project throughout the years in addition to other private funders. Since 2023, the project is depending on corporate contributions and private funds. Within the framework of NSCE’s corporate social responsibility, we aim to advance this project through grant applications and crowdfunding initiatives, while bearing responsibility for the implementation thereof.

See also: Go Girls 

We thank The TriFactory for their unwavering support of the girls in our project and for offering them the opportunity to participate in this inspiring sports event. The sponsorship is an essential part of our efforts to ensure the girls’ active participation in competitions and serves as a powerful incentive to keep them motivated and engaged in sports.

Our congratulations to Zainab Osman Jaber and Habiba Mohsen Hamdy for winning second and third place in the 5-kilometres race and receiving recognition from the TriFactory team for their outstanding performance!