In September, CARE participated in the 2025 UN General Assembly and NY Climate Week activities in New York City. From high-level convenings to musical celebrations, the week was marked by bold partnerships, sobering realities, and shared determination to build a more equal world.
The 2025 UN General Assembly Week and NY Climate Week spotlighted urgent global challenges and the innovative and unexpected collaborations needed to overcome them.
Two truths stood out:
- Communities most in need are reeling from shrinking global aid.
- These same communities, and those who support them, are not standing still.
CARE and peers are finding new ways to innovate and increase economic opportunities, leaning into locally led solutions and change-makers.
What women and communities need
A consistent theme across the week’s discussion was, “Women want access, not aid.”
This includes access to:
- Clean, green, and affordable energy
- Financial products that have been developed and designed specifically to meet the unique needs of women
- Affordable healthcare and childcare
- Safety in crises
- Stable jobs and livable incomes
- New climate financing, innovative agricultural techniques, and nature-based solutions
Yet far too often, the needs of women and the most hard-to-reach communities are overlooked. For example, less than 10% of climate financing reaches local levels, where the impacts of climate change is being felt now. Moreover, too few of the women and people from the communities being discussed were present during the conversations.
Corporate Council convening
For CARE, the week was a moment to lead with vision and urgency.
CARE started UNGA week with a meeting of our Corporate Council. This meeting brought together more than 30 forward-thinking companies committed to helping create equality for women and girls. The discussion centered on how global social impact programs can inform more equal and effective efforts in the United States. CARE and our partners explored how proven global solutions can address pressing domestic challenges, bringing our international experience home.
Featuring insights from corporate leaders, the event previewed CARE’s expanding U.S. Programs, including new opportunities for employee engagement. We “unpacked” the updated CARE PACKAGE® for Emergencies and marked the launch of new working groups focused on employee volunteering, digital access, and strengthening communities across supply chains.
Michelle Nunn takes the stage
CARE President & CEO Michelle Nunn took the stage at Foreign Policy’s Reimagining Resilience session, where she spoke with journalist Stacey Samuel on how investing in women delivers lasting returns amid crisis and recovery.
Nunn emphasized the need to expand work with private sector partners. “If we work with the private sector…to unlock the market for women entrepreneurs,” she said, “then we can create transformational engagement on their part and new capacities for women and girls.”
CARE President & CEO Michelle Nunn spoke with journalist Stacey Samuel spotlighting proven approaches—access to finance, digital inclusion, safer supply chains, and local leadership—that turn commitment into measurable impact.
Nunn also spoke on an Economist Impact session sponsored by Cargill. Entitled, “From soil to shelf: a unified approach to building resilient food systems,” the session considered how agricultural producers, their communities, manufacturers, suppliers, and consumers can find new opportunities for collaboration that create a more sustainable and resilient food economy. She was joined by leaders from Cargill, Mars, and a producer from Brazil to discuss innovations that benefit people across the agricultural supply chain.
Partnering with P&G at the Global Citizen Festival
At Global Citizen Festival, one of the world’s largest gatherings of artists, leaders, and citizens united in action for positive change, CARE and longstanding partner Procter & Gamble came together to recognize a major milestone for the Children’s Safe Drinking Water Program: 25 billion liters of clean water provided to children and families in more than 100 countries.
Other highlights
The event-packed week featured other special moments, including:
- CARE joined the CIFAR Alliance to demonstrate our commitment to advancing innovative climate solutions for vulnerable people and the planet.
- CARE/WWF Alliance, Project Dandelion, Women’s Earth Alliance, and Daughters of Earth hosted a networking breakfast at The Nest Climate Campus.
- Michelle Nunn joined a lively debate at Devex on the future of sustainable development goals.
- CARE’s new head of Resilient Futures, Ann Vaughan, joined others at The Conference Board to discuss translating bold climate and societal aspirations into tangible, lasting impact and actions.
- CARE’s new brand campaign, Who Cares?, launched with an advertising takeover in The New York Times that reached more than two million people during UNGA/Climate Week.
For more information on how your company can collaborate and innovate with CARE, by building unique solutions for the world’s most challenging problems, please contact Madden Manion at madden.manion@care.org.
