Journalist Paula Kragten is founder of and driving force behind Period, the online magazine about the menstrual cycle. She is author of the book ‘Beautiful red is not ugly’ and co-host of the Bloody Sunday Afternoon on October 8, as part of the Sustainable Week Utrecht. Simavi asked her three questions. Bottom line: why is menstrual awareness important in the Netherlands?

Susanne Shatanawi is programme officer WASH at Simavi and responsible for managing WASH programmes in Indonesia and Nepal. She is an expert on technical and social aspects of WASH with a focus on strengthening the capacity of local stakeholders and community empowerment. She visited Stockholm World Water Week to give a poster presentation about wastewater treatment plants in Nepal.

Sanne Thijssen is the Sexual and Reproductive and Health Rights (SRHR) Youth ambassador of the Netherlands. Since September 2016, she is raising the voice of youth, to ensure better access to SRHR information and services. We talked to Sanne about her work and views.

Jennifer Amadi works as Advocacy Advisor at African Youth Initiative on Population, Health & Development (AfrYPoD). Together with Simavi’s Public Affiars Officer Morillio Williams, Jennifer is co-chair of the RHSC Youth Caucus. The Youth group aims to increase access to reproductive health supplies by making available research and data on youth contraceptives and other maternal health supplies needs, and also to strengthen young people’s engagement and participation within the Coalition.We spoke to Jennifer about the Youth Caucus Key Messages during the High Level Political Forum in New York.

Together with Solidaridad and Healthy Entrepreneurs, Simavi started the Going for Gold programme to address women’s economic empowerment in the small-scale mining sector. This 5-year programme aims to improve the health and economic opportunities for women living in and around artisanal and small-scale gold mining (ASGM) communities in Western Region, Ghana, and Geita district, Tanzania. We asked Martha Jerome, from Tanzania three questions about this topic.

Seema Gupta works at Voluntary Health Association of India (VHAI), a local partner of Simavi. As part of the More Than Brides Alliance, Simavi works together with VHAI to reduce child marriage and its adverse effects on young women and girls in India. Seema is the programme director of this programme, called Marriage: No Child’s Play programme. We spoke to her in the lights of the UN follow-up and review of the Sustainable Development Goals.

As well as studying Water Science and Management at Utrecht University, Irene Otieno is part of Simavi’s programme department on WASH Policy Influencing and Social Inclusion. Irene grew up in a village in Homabay county, Kenya, and she is fiercely committed to fighting the global water, sanitation and hygiene crisis by positively influencing WASH policy. We asked her three questions ahead of the forthcoming Global Citizens Festival, where she will share her personal story with the crowd.

Menstruation is a natural and essential part of the reproductive cycle. However, in most parts of the world it remains a taboo subject that is rarely talked about. We talked to Pim van der Male, Senior Policy Officer WASH at the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, about this topic. What are his thought about menstrual hygiene management?