The noble aim of Fundación Ana Bella is to build a society free from violence against women. A mobile application or ‘App’ and peer-to-peer support network seeks to help women in Spain and will later be rolled out to other Spanish-speaking countries.
(Programme concluded and no longer supported by the Trafigura Foundation)
Ana Bella Estevez is a domestic violence survivor, but does not define herself by her troubled experiences. Now one of Spain’s leading social entrepreneurs, in 2011 Ana Bella was granted a Fellowship by the global entrepreneurs’ organisation, Ashoka. Through her Foundation, Ana Bella spearheads the country’s women’s survivor movement, and reaches out to 1,200 women every year. By offering a peer-to-peer support based on the principle of portraying positive testimonies of survivors, Ana Bella is enabling abused women to empower themselves as social changemakers.
Worldwide, one in three women will have experienced physical or sexual violence in their lifetimes. This equates to 62 million women in Europe alone. Only 14% of abused women in Europe manage to extricate themselves from aggression. The Ana Bella Foundation believes the best way to help victims is to show them their peers’ success stories. Former victims are willing to offer counselling, companionship and give advice on housing and money matters. A new version of the “We” app is now in development. 321 inspirational survivors have been trained to counsel people through the app. 1,425 abused women, from 18 different countries, have received support thanks to the chat room. Last year, plans were put in place to replicate the model in Mexico and 23 survivors were trained.
