The CAREC Gender and Green Innovation Awards 2025 aims to recognize individuals and organizations making significant contributions to advancing gender equality through green innovation and technology in the context of climate resilience, adaptation, and mitigation within the CAREC region. This year’s awards emphasize the transformative role of green technologies in addressing climate challenges and promoting inclusive development, aligned with the theme of the CAREC Women’s Business Forum 2025: “Together for Green Innovation and Gender Equality.”
The awards aim to inspire outstanding efforts to achieve gender equality and climate resilience, ultimately contributing to a more sustainable and equitable future for everyone in the CAREC region.
Winners for the Individual Category
Azerbaijan
Firuza Sultan-zada
Head, "EkoSfera" Social-Ecology Center Public Union NGO
Firuza Sultan-zada is the founder of the international Children’s Climate Platform: Green Network of Public Eco-Leaders, which empowers young people to actively engage in environmental decision-making and advocacy.
Through educational forums, workshops, and environmental campaigns, she promotes community participation in environmental conservation and equips them with the tools and knowledge in sustainable leadership. Her leadership in projects such as the Eco-Schools and Green Key programs, as well as her work at COP29, has focused on integrating the perspectives of girls and women into environmental policies and practices—ensuring that women’s voices are heard and their contributions recognized.
People’s Republic of China
Guanghua He
Deputy to the National People’s Congress (NPC) and Director, Cable Operation and Maintenance Center, State Grid Wuxi Power Supply Company
Guanghua He has always adhered to the “dual carbon” goals and the concept of gender equality. She pioneered the Non-destructive Construction Technology for High-drop High-voltage Cable Lines, transforming traditional manual labor into intelligent operations. Recognized as a National Model Worker and a National March 8th Red-banner Pacesetter, she has championed women’s leadership in the green energy transition through technology, employment, and long-term mechanisms. She led digital platforms and programs which raised female participation in green power from 32 percent to 51 percent and trained 46 women as energy managers. To ensure sustainability, she founded the Green Power Her Strength training system, cultivating over 300 female specialists.
Kazakhstan
Gulsara Akanova
Founder and CEO, Kaz-REEcycling
Gulsara Akanova’s Kaz-REEcycling project reflects her contribution to solving environmental and technological problems taking into account the principles of sustainable development and gender equality. The project is engaged in the recycling of electronic waste with the extraction of rare earth metals using environmentally friendly green extractants. This innovative direction is important both for environmental protection and for the development of the green economy, where women are still underrepresented. She strives to inspire girls and women to choose STEM fields and environmental projects, showing by her example that scientific and technological initiatives can be inclusive and socially significant.
Kyrgyz Republic
Aijan Chynybaeva
Head of “Eco Demi” and Ambassador of World Cleanup Day in Kyrgyz Republic
Aijan Chynybaeva is a recognized leader in promoting green initiatives aimed at women and youth. She heads Bizdin Aymdar and WomenInTech Kyrgyzstan, actively promoting women’s participation in environmental projects and technologies. She initiated the Clean Games project, involving marginalized communities in eco-game formats. Thanks to an intersectoral approach, including cooperation with businesses, local governments, and international organizations, Aijan has achieved systemic changes: from the implementation of national programs to the creation of the Green Alliance of Kyrgyzstan, which unites more than 100 organizations. Her activities are aimed at creating an inclusive, sustainable environment where women play a key role.
Pakistan
Tara Uzra Dawood
Founder and Chairperson, LADIESFUND
Under the visionary leadership of Tara Uzra Dawood, LADIESFUND Energy and Dawood Global Foundation have delivered transformative impact at the intersection of gender equality and green innovation in Pakistan. It has developed a scalable service model that offers solar solutions (5KW–500KW) to residential, commercial, and institutional clients, including embassies, churches, orphanages, salons, and schools.
LADIESFUND Energy’s flexible financial models (e.g., pay-as-you-save solar) increase adoption among underserved communities, while creating opportunities for women-owned micro solar businesses. Together, these interventions represent a holistic ecosystem of measurable impact, ensuring that women are not just beneficiaries but drivers and leaders of the green economy.
Turkmenistan
Gulshat Petrosova
Founder and Chairperson, Women in Business Turkmenistan
Gulshat Petrosova founded the Women in Business Turkmenistan community in 2023 to support women in building modern, sustainable enterprises. Through more than 50 coaching sessions and trainings on digitalization, e-commerce, and logistics management, they teach women entrepreneurs, managers, and female students to use technology to optimize processes, reduce costs, and use resources more wisely. They pay special attention to e-commerce as a more environmentally friendly high-tech alternative to traditional retail: less need for physical outlets, packaging, and transportation. By promoting technologies in women’s business, she helps participants build not only successful, but also sustainable, environmentally oriented models.
Uzbekistan
Dilorom Fayzieva
Director, Indigo Yoshlar JF
Dilorom Fayzieva’s work has advanced gender equality through the introduction of clean technologies that enable women’s economic independence. She trained women as solar panel technicians, increasing the number of female technicians in the energy sector by 40 percent in pilot areas. This, in turn, provided access to electricity in remote communities where women had previously been excluded from education and employment opportunities. She also established women’s cooperatives producing and selling energy-efficient stoves, cutting firewood consumption by 50 percent, reducing carbon emissions, and providing women with a stable income. These initiatives led to long-term contracts between cooperatives and local schools and hospitals to supply stoves, as well as an increase in the number of women opening their own repair shops. Analysis showed that the income of women participating in these initiatives increased on average by 60 percent, and the incidence of respiratory diseases decreased by 25 percent.
Winners in the Organization Category
Azerbaijan
CLIMASEL’s mission is to revolutionize energy efficiency in buildings by providing sustainable cooling solutions that reduce electricity consumption and carbon emissions. Their form-stable panels, embedded with bio-based phase change materials, absorb and release heat to regulate indoor temperatures without consuming electricity.
Co-founded by two young female leaders who are both Chemical Engineering students in energy systems and sustainable technology, the startup demonstrates women’s leadership across strategy, R&D, and commercialization. With CTO Dr. Aysel Mammadova’s Material Science expertise, the company demonstrates women’s leadership in advancing cutting-edge insulation technologies. Beyond their company, the team supports young women in STEM through university initiatives, workshops, and climate entrepreneurship events.
People’s Republic of China
Established in August 2008, GDS is a non-profit, non-governmental organization in Shaanxi Province, recognized as a 4A-Level Social Organization under China’s Social Organization Evaluation System.
Their mission is to empower women and children in rural western China through inclusive and sustainable development to create a society founded on shared opportunities, equitable access, and zero gender discrimination. The core program areas include women & rural community sustainable development, child protection & development, research, and advocacy for policy impact. Internationally, GDS collaborated with ADB on the Alternative Livelihood Development Consultancy Service for the ADB-funded Weinan Luyang Lake Salt Alkali Land Comprehensive Management Project, incubating 10 SMEs in operation and providing job opportunities for displaced villagers.
GEORGIA
JSC Microbank Crystal is the leading financial inclusion organization and the largest non-banking financial institution in Georgia. It manages the loan portfolio of GEL 550 million, employing more than 1,000 members of staff, operating in around 50 branches, and serving more than 100,000 unique customers across Georgia.
Crystal acts as a platform for economic development for micro and small entrepreneurs as well as farmers, providing them with innovative financial products and value-added services. While delivering strategically important products and services to customers, it is important for Crystal to uphold social, gender, and environmental principles.
Crystal works actively toward the SDGs, focusing on SDG 5 (Gender Equality), SDG 10 (Reduced Inequalities), and SDG 13 (Climate Action), embedded within its 3P business model: People, Planet, Profit.
Kazakhstan
Founded in 2021, HelloEco is a Kazakhstan-based social enterprise promoting sustainable consumption and climate-conscious living through green innovation, inclusive business practices, and environmental education. The organization operates in two directions: the first and only zero-waste store in Central Asia, and HelloEco Consulting—a climate and ESG consulting company.
HelloEco, Central Asia’s first zero-waste store, provides access to over 2,500 safe, locally made, low-waste, and eco-friendly products from mostly women entrepreneurs. Furthermore, over 90 percent of the store’s customers are women, making it a hub that empowers them to take climate action in daily life while supporting the growth of women-led green businesses.
HelloEco Consulting advises on ESG, climate resilience, and waste management, with projects like the “Green Schools” program in 50 schools and women-focused climate entrepreneurship training. Amplified by digital advocacy and partnerships with public and private actors, HelloEco drives gender-inclusive climate action and green innovation across Kazakhstan.
mongolia
URECA is leading innovative solutions targeting women and households to adapt and overcome air pollution and climate challenges in one of the most polluted cities in the world. URECA is integrating digital tools and renewable energy solutions, thereby enhancing their roles in the clean energy transition, especially focusing on economically marginalized Mongolian Ger dwellings. Since 2022, in partnership with The Asia Foundation, URECA successfully piloted the Coal-to-Solar initiative on five households, which was expanded to up to 100 women-led households in collaboration with UNDP Mongolia. Between 2024 and 2029, the initiative will be expanded to three provinces of Mongolia and women entrepreneurs in Ulaanbaatar.
PAKISTAN
Over 33 years, the National Rural Support Programme (NRSP) has advanced rural development, community engagement, gender sensitization, financial inclusion, capacity building, across 75 districts of Pakistan, partnering with over 150+ national and international organizations, including USAID, European Union, World Bank, ADB, KfW, UN Agencies, Green Climate Fund, and the Government of Pakistan. It has implemented more than 1000 projects with a wide-reaching impact on sustainability and climate action.
NRSP champions women’s leadership by promoting women’s decision-making roles in sustainability, environmental planning committees, and technology-focused sectors, encouraging institutions to adopt quotas or mentorship pathways that promote women into leadership roles.
TAJIKISTAN
As Tajikistan’s leading microfinance institution, the IMON Fund promotes women’s leadership in green innovation and technology through targeted financial and capacity-building. Over the past two years, IMON has financed 828 women entrepreneurs with over 23 million somoni, supporting projects in sustainable agriculture, clean technology, and climate-resilient business models. A key initiative is the Women’s Business Acceleration Program, providing interest-free startup financing and tailored support to women launching green businesses. To date, 150 women have completed the acceleration program, with a business success rate of 80 percent within the first year.
IMON also integrates gender considerations into its green technology policies and practices by including gender criteria in its environmental and social impact assessments. Guided by its ESG policy, they ensure that financed projects meet ecological standards and actively advance women’s participation and leadership.
TURKMENISTAN
Mirasly Senet is the first non-profit organization in Turkmenistan dedicated to preserving the art and spirit of the country’s rich cultural heritage. It aims to revive traditional crafts by bridging the time-honored skills of their ancestors with a sustainable future for a new generation of artisans.
Mirasly Senet aims to develop women’s leadership at all levels—from craftswomen to workshop managers. Over 70 percent of their program participants are women, and they create platforms for their self-realization, advancement, and representation at both regional and international levels. By supporting women in crafts as a pathway to sustainable development, they are shaping a new generation of women leaders capable of influencing climate and social change through green innovation.
Uzbekistan
Social Protection and Ecology Center “Shijoatli Ayol”
The “Shijoatli Ayol” Center is a non-governmental, non-profit organization operating in the Bukhara region of Uzbekistan. The organization works in the fields of social protection for vulnerable groups, promotion of environmentally sustainable agriculture, and women empowerment. Its main areas of activity include supporting women and youth, agroecological education, the introduction of water-saving technologies, combating desertification, and the development of organic farming. The center actively collaborates with government bodies, NGOs, and international partners to implement projects aimed at the sustainable development of rural areas.
Regional (PAK; UZB; TKM; TAJ and KAZ):
Brainbox Syndicate is deeply committed to advancing gender equality and fostering green innovation as integral components of sustainable development by leading initiatives that blend cutting-edge technology with sustainable practices.
Brainbox Syndicate has consistently promoted women’s leadership in sectors advancing green innovation and technology through various initiatives, fostering an inclusive environment where women can lead and innovate. They have launched programs specifically designed to encourage women’s participation in green technology, such as mentorship opportunities for young women in STEM and sustainability-focused hackathons. These initiatives aim to equip women with the technical skills, resources, and networks necessary to excel in the green tech space.
Awards Ceremony
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