Foluke is a public health and development expert who is passionate about working in her home country and globally to address the multi-dimensions of poverty and its twin--inequities. She is currently working as an Advocacy Officer in the Division of Global Communications and Advocacy at the UNICEF Headquarters in New York, where her work spans policy advocacy, planning and monitoring project implementation while mobilising data for documentation, and knowledge management.
Her current focus is on improving livelihoods for women at the bottom of the open market eco system in Nigeria. She is the lead for the Mirrors of Equity project that aims to document and reflect lived experiences of socio-economic inequities that are similar in different parts of the world. The project will gather information, propose ideas to transform current business models and engage in policy advocacy to deliver the new ideas.
Foluke joined the Nigerian office of UNICEF in 2016, serving as a Social Policy Officer. In this role, she focused on working for poverty reduction and social inclusion using innovative social protection interventions. Before that, she worked at community level, nationally and internationally in social policy, health advocacy, and the implementation of development projects that aim for equity.
Foluke is an alumna of the Atlas Corps Fellowship in Washington, DC, and in 2012 was chosen as one of 100 young Commonwealth leaders for leadership training. From 2009-2010, Foluke initiated a health equity dialogue with traditional leaders in Northwestern Nigeria, where she engaged in Kebbi and Niger states with the emirs of Argungu, Koko-Besse, Jega, Tunga-Magajiya, Borgu and Lapai.
She has served as an ambassador in Nigeria for the Girl Rising global project, and was on the technical team coordinating the two-day Women and Girls Summit 2014 in Abuja, a collaborative project between Friends Africa, Nigeria’s National Centre for Women Development and the Office of the First Lady of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. In December 2020 she was named to the Advisory Board of Women in Technology Nigeria (WITIN). Foluke is also a member of the Global Burden of Disease Study collaborative network.
Foluke studied at the University of Ibadan and has an MPH in Public Health.
Technology gives me hope because it has provided a platform for me to hear from far and wide about the inequalities that girls and women face. It has broken barriers and merged a vast global space. Technology keeps alive the flame of working to end inequalities in my lifetime, to pursue knowledge and exchange ideas, and to document what generations yet to come can learn from. Technology gives me hope for the future that improvements can be realised and barriers can be broken. Through technology I hear a steady rhythm to keep working, keep reaching out, keep writing and most importantly keep up hope: this is the right cause to remain committed to!Foluke Ojelabi