I graduated from university in Autumn 2007 with a Masters in Medieval History and a Bachelor’s in History. I’d spent a lot of time at university doing fundraising and volunteering, including 2 months spent in Uganda in 2005 and knew that I wanted to work for a charity. So my first ‘proper’ job was managing fundraising campaigns for the largest children’s hospice charity in the UK (in fact the world!). I got made redundant in 2009 when the recession started, and so spent most of 2009 volunteering as a project manager for Raleigh International in Malaysian Borneo, working on environmental and community projects. When I got back to the UK, I worked in communications and marketing for a social care organization before meeting Julia Lalla-Maharajh, founder and CEO of Orchid Project, at an event about careers in international development. I’d always felt strongly about female genital cutting as an issue and had recently decided that I wanted to work in international development and particularly on women’s empowerment. I started volunteering for Orchid in October 2010 and since January 2011 I’ve been full-time paid to work for Orchid Project as Programme Co-ordinator.

Plywood People: What problem are you solving?

Ruthie Taylor: 3 million girls a year are at risk of experiencing female genital cutting (FGC) and that’s just in the 29 African countries where it’s known to be an issue – many more girls in other countries in the Middle East, Asia and diaspora communities globally are also affected – and 140 million women worldwide are living with the after-effects of this damaging tradition. Orchid Project believes that a world without FGC is possible and that a significant impact can be made towards reducing the prevalence rates around the world by 2025. We are helping to solve the problem of FGC with a threefold strategy, involving working with partners in the field who deliver an end to FGC through their programmes, undertaking communications and awareness-raising activity to ensure people around the world hear about the FGC and the potential for an end to the practice, and by advocating at the highest possible level for increased resource to help end FGC. Orchid came about because our founder had spent time volunteering in Ethiopia and there came to understand the scale of the problem and its impacts on the lives of girls and women around the world; our strategy and vision comes out of this experience and is entirely based in a belief that, when communities understand that FGC is a human rights violation they will choose to abandon the practice themselves.

Plywood People: What is one piece of advice you would like to offer someone doing similar work?

Ruthie: For me, the thing that really motivates me is the fact that we know that an end to FGC is possible. If it weren’t, I think I would personally find it too difficult to work on this issue every day. Knowing that our partner Tostan is achieving so many successes at the grassroots and supporting communities to end FGC really inspires me and helps me believe that a world without FGC is possible within my lifetime. Having that sort of positive goal is amazing, and I think looking for the positive examples and successes is really motivating, and I would advise anyone working in this sort of sector to look for the positives – often it surprises others, too.

Plywood People: What is the most valuable resource to you in the work you’re doing?

Ruthie: Orchid is a new organisation, founded in 2010 and achieving our charitable status in April 2011. One of the most valuable resources we have at our disposal is the huge amount of activism and work that has already been done around ending FGC in the past 40 years or so; be that UN documents, World Health Organisation statements, Population Council surveys or writing, opinion and research by any of the activists who have been working on FGC. Our partner, Tostan, is our other greatest resource. Before we knew about Tostan, Orchid Project hadn’t heard of any organisation working in the field and really achieving success in ending FGC on any great scale – then we were introduced to Tostan, an NGO which, to date, has enabled over 6,200 communities to choose to abandon FGC in West Africa. Tostan have been working in West Africa since 1991, so we are small, young fry compared with them, but our partnership is going from strength to strength and collaborating with them lets us believe that we will see a world without FGC. For me personally, one of the most important resources is the other people (almost all women) who work on Orchid Project. There’s several of us in our office in London, and we can call upon a couple of dozen volunteers around the world, too, so when something urgent comes up and we need to act fast, there’s always a way.

Plywood People: Who has been the most influencial person in your life as you are working to make a difference?

Ruthie: “In terms of my current role, it’s most definitely been Julia, the Founder and CEO of Orchid Project, without whom I wouldn’t be working on this issue. In a wider way, Heather Corinna (Founder of Scarleteen) has always been an inspiration for me, because of her work on sex-positive sex education.

I’m continually inspired by the people around the world working tirelessly to end female genital cutting, and Sister Fa, a Senegalese hip-hop singer who we are supporting is just so inspiring – she sings about FGC and visits remote regions of Senegal on tours, singing about the fact that FGC can end and putting the word out there that cutting should not be what ascribes value to a girl or woman. She is so charismatic and talented it’s a pleasure to work with her.

Plywood People: How can people join you in what you’re doing?

Ruthie: Orchid Project is active online and has a Facebook page, and you can follow us on Twitter. Our blog is regularly updated, and, if you’d really like to support our work you can of course donate. If you choose to donate, a monthly donation is the best way to help us achieve our goal of a world without FGC.