Cummins Inc. Celebrates International Women’s Day by Marking the First Anniversary of its Cummins Powers Women Program

On International Women’s Day 2018, Cummins Inc. (NYSE: CMI) announced the launch of Cummins Powers Women, the company’s most ambitious community initiative ever, focused on advancing equity for women and girls globally.

By partnering with a network of expert nonprofit organizations around the world, including Girls Inc. – North America; Rosa Fund – UK; Save the Children – Germany; China Women’s Development Foundation – China; Rise Up – Africa, Latin America and India; Camfed, the Campaign for Female Education – Ghana; CARE Australia – Cambodia; and, Girls Academy – Australia, the program has achieved significant results in its first year:

Cummins Powers Women positively impacted more than 34,000 women and girls in one year. Through supporting a wide range of programs from on-the-ground mentoring and teaching of women and girls, to financial empowerment through entrepreneurship, to leadership development and advocacy at the regional level;

The nonprofit partners have furthered 37 advocacy movements in Nigeria, England and Mexico; 

And, 17 Cummins leaders serve as regional program champions, and more than 70 regional leaders engage directly with our partners in 13 countries.

"We asked every leader at Cummins to approach this program just as they would any other business initiative at Cummins," said Tom Linebarger, Cummins Inc. Chairman and CEO. "It is clear that they have, and that our nonprofit partners are fully utilizing our financial commitment to make a real impact in their communities."

Cummins Powers Women is an extension of the positive transformation that the company has experienced firsthand with its focus on ensuring diversity and inclusion at every level of the organization.

"As we celebrate Cummins' 100th anniversary, we know the time is now to invest in the rights of women and girls," said Mary Titsworth Chandler, Vice President of Corporate Responsibility and Chief Executive Officer of the Cummins Foundation. "Our partnerships with excellent nonprofits and other corporations will undoubtedly extend beyond Cummins, to the women and girls who live among us but apart from us. Empowering women and girls is one of the single most important issues of our time, and I am so proud of how Cummins has stepped up to the challenge of addressing it, just as we have with both business and social issues throughout our history."

The challenges facing women and girls globally are incredibly complex and diverse – there is no single cause and no single solution, which means it will take a concerted and multi-faceted effort to enact and sustain real change. For example, the gender pay gap stands at 23 percent globally, and without decisive action, it will take another 68 years to achieve equal pay. If women were to participate in the economy equally with men, they could add as much as $28 trillion, or 26 percent, to annual global GDP in 2025 (McKinsey Global Institute, The Power of Parity: How Advancing Women’s Equality Can Add $12 Trillion to Global Growth (2015)).

"We know that investing in women and girls is the key to creating exponential change," said Dr. Denise Dunning, founder of Rise Up, one of the program's nonprofit partners. "Rise Up activates girls and women to transform their lives, their families and their countries to create a more just and more equitable world. When we invest in girls and women, everyone wins."

Now in its second year of operation, the Cummins Powers Women program will continue to focus on its goal of accelerating gender equality.