“Girls with Pride and Dignity” was found in April 2016 by Miss Kana Josee Bizimana who lives in Manchester/ England.

This is how I got inspired to start “Girls with Pride and Dignity”:

My name is Miss Kana Josee Bizimana (Known as Josee), I am a mother, an Entrepreneur, an Author, and UN Women UK (CSW participant).

I am originally from Burundi, born and raised in Rwanda, Dutch by Citizenship.

One afternoon in the month of April 2016, I was on the phone to my friend Mary who lives in Kampala – Uganda. That same day, Mary’s daughter wasn’t in school. I was curious to know the reason why her daughter wasn’t in school, and I came to find out that it’s because she wasn’t able to afford menstrual products to use during her periods.

That situation gave me a lot of courage and inspiration to start thinking about how I could help girls who miss school because of lack of period products.

It made me remember one of my worst memories of my past when I was living in DR Congo as a refugee back in 1995, when I experienced the lack of feminine hygiene products during my monthly periods. Those memories pushed me to start “Girls with Pride and Dignity”.

I remembered how I struggled to use a piece of cloth during my periods in a warm country, under 40 degrees and spend more than 6 hours in school without changing it. The biggest embarrassment was the bad odour caused by the hot temperature, and how I wasn’t comfortable to go to school. I would miss school at least 5 days in a month.

From 2016 to 2021, the focus was only working in Africa.

In 2022 the organisation became a registered charity in the UK. It was time for me to think about how I could give back to the community that gave me life stability. I thought about creating more projects that would benefit women’s overall wellbeing in Greater Manchester! (See on “our Projects” page).

That’s when GPD started operating in Greater Manchester focussing on “Period Poverty and Well-being projects”.

I believe that supporting women and girls contributes to community development and social progress.

Investing in women helps to achieve a more sustainable development, and a society that thrive.

And I am not done YET ……