The organization has done this through providing capacity-development workshops for rural women. Helen’s Daughters also partnered a team of Engineering students from the University of British Columbia with St. Lucian women farmers in an innovative project on Humanitarian Engineering that matched technical expertise with on-the-ground agricultural issues. 

Keithlin and her team also lead a “Rural Women’s Ag-cademy”, that trains marginalised rural women on climate-smart agriculture techniques and practices. This flagship initiative exposes women to industry experts and addresses gender disparity that impact not only women in agriculture but women in other sectors as well. Through the six-month program, women are given the insights and mentorship to become better producers and business owners. They are also given direct access to local hotels and restaurants as a source of income option.

“Our program considers things that most persons do not pay attention to. For example, a woman who cannot attend a training program at 3: 00 p.m. or 11: 00 a.m. because she may be holding down a full-time job or taking care of a child or elderly person or she is on the farm at the time and may need to stay closer to home, can join us on our live recorded sessions.

We also use strategies that women can relate to and tailor our subject matter to them; for example, we have included components of nutritional marketing in the program,” Keithlin Caroo, Founder and Executive Director.

 

For her vision and hard work, Keithlin was conferred the title of Goodwill Ambassador of the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA) for sustainable development issues in 2021. She is the first woman from the Caribbean with this title. She is also a One Young World Ambassador and Queen’s Commonwealth Trust award recipient.