Rwanda and Kenya Changemakers Among Nine Recipients of 2025 Cartier Women’s Initiative Impact Awards
Rwanda’s Yvette Ishimwe and Kenya-based Caitlin Dolkart are among this year’s nine Cartier Women’s Initiative 2025 Impact Awardees. They will be celebrated next month at the Women’s Pavilion during Expo 2025 in Osaka, Japan.
The Impact Awards are dedicated to former Cartier Women’s Initiative Fellows who have achieved extraordinary impact over the years.
The 2025 nine impact awardees were selected across three categories, covering all 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): Preserving the Planet, Improving Lives and Creating Opportunities.
These awardees, representing the top three businesses from each of the above categories, will receive $100,000 grant each in addition to human capital support and media visibility.
IRIBA – The Transformative Power of Clean Water
Impact awardee Yvette, is a CWI 2023 fellow, awarded for her social enterprise project – IRIBA Water Group – which is addressing safe water access with a climate-smart water solution for low-income communities in Rwanda and other African countries.
“Water is life and life is a human right,” she asserts. “No one should have to die or get sick for a lack of something so basic and so achievable as safe water.”
Since its inception in 2017, IRIBA has brought safe, affordable water to more than 500,000 people in Rwanda, Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Central African Republic. Along the way, it has created 194 jobs, of which 86% are held by women, and prevents CO2 emissions as a result of climate-smart interventions.
In the next five years, IRIBA plans to reach 5,000,000 people with affordable, safe drinking water, create 2,000 jobs, and reduce emissions by a million tons yearly.These numbers represent real human impact. Look out for a detailed NewAfricanWoman interview with Yvette coming soon.
FLARE – Saving Lives by Saving Time
For Caitlin (pictured above), a 2019 CWI fellow, she is celebrated for her initiative – Flare. Dubbed the “Uber for ambulances” by the African start-up ecosystem, Flare uses that technology to connect patients throughout East Africa to life-saving services through its subscription-based emergency-response product Rescue.co. Using real-time tracking, Flare gives emergency response teams all the information they need to mobilize first responders, vehicles, equipment and resources rapidly and effectively. The Rescue.co dispatch center operates 24/7, leveraging the technology to instantly and automatically dispatch emergency providers, and coordinate end-to-end care.
“The WHO estimates that approximately 50% of emergency-related mortality and morbidity could be avoided in low-income countries if ambulance response times were faster,” she explains. “Yet 95% of Africa lives without an effective emergency service.”
She adds: Our vision is that no matter who you are and no matter where you are, we will get you timely care. Whether you’ve had a road traffic accident in downtown Nairobi, or you’re a farmer in a rural area, hours from the nearest hospital, we can get you life-saving services.”
Since joining the Cartier Women’s Initiative, Flare has expanded across East Africa to provide its services in Tanzania and Uganda, making it operational in three countries.
Caitlin’s vision for the next five years? To reach 10 million patients across five countries, saving 100,000 lives. “There’s just so much more to do!” she concludes. “Every year, when I reflect upon the business, it never feels like enough. It’s always like, okay, ‘what’s next?’”
Cartier has been selected by the committee of the Japan Association for the 2025 World Exposition, to present the “Women’s Pavilion” at Expo 2025 Osaka, Kansai, Japan. This is in continuation of the Women’s Pavilion at Expo 2020 Dubai, where it hosted the Impact Awards the very first time.
