WHAT WE DO
Our Programmes
Our five interconnected pillars work together to create sustainable lives beyond conflict and displacement.
Every programme we deliver begins from our vision: a future where women and girls build sustainable lives beyond conflict and displacement, co-creating solutions that advance equality, security, and lasting peace.
HOW OUR PILLARS WORK TOGETHER
The Lotus Flower operates across permanent community centres and mobile teams in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, with programmes now running in Sinjar City and Mosul.
The five pillars are designed to work in combination. In practice, this means a woman in our Women's Business Incubator may also be receiving mental health support, attending peacebuilding sessions, or training in renewable energy through our climate programme.
Vocational training and financial skills build economic independence. Mental health and protection services address the barriers that prevent women from participating fully outside the home. Peacebuilding work focuses on the rights, policies, and community norms that shape what women can access and do. Climate programming responds to environmental pressures that fall disproportionately on women and girls.
Organisational Strengthening sits across all of this. It covers the financial systems, staffing infrastructure, and institutional capacity that allow The Lotus Flower to function sustainably over time. When international organisations reduce or end their presence in a region, local organisations absorb the gap. We are investing in being one that will.
Education & Livelihoods
Pillar 1
A woman who controls her income controls her future
Economic dependence is one of the most powerful mechanisms through which violence is sustained and choices are removed. We equip displaced women with vocational skills, financial literacy, and market connections to establish enterprises that belong entirely to them. When a woman controls her income, she begins to shape everything else.
We align with and complement government education systems, ensuring what we deliver is both permitted and genuinely needed.
1,384 women - supported to create their own businesses
UNHCR Award-Winning
Women's Business Incubator
End-to-end support from idea to business: vocational training, business planning, financial literacy, and small grants.
Active & Expanding
Literacy Classes
Adult literacy and language courses aligned with government education systems, equipping women with reading, writing, and communication skills.
Pillar 2
Health & Safety
Creating spaces to process trauma and restore dignity
We create spaces where women and girls can process trauma and restore their sense of dignity and agency. Clinical mental health support combines with creative and community-led approaches that recognise trauma lives in the body as well as the mind.
8 permanent centres - providing mental health and safety support
Individual & Group Therapy - Certified counsellors offer trauma therapy for GBV survivors, plus structured group therapy for PTSD and grief
GBV Case Management & Legal Assistance - Structured case management ensures no woman experiencing violence navigates complex systems alone
Healthcare Provider Training - Specialised training on trauma-sensitive approaches, GBV, and survivor-centred care
Art, Music & Sports-Based Healing - Art therapy, music therapy, boxing, and swimming as spaces to rediscover confidence and joy
Child Protection - UNHCR's chosen partner for child protection in KRI 2023-2025
Therapy Beyond Borders *Coming Soon*- Expanding access to trauma therapy through partnerships and capacity building.
Peacebuilding & Human Rights
Pillar 3
Sustainable peace cannot be built around women - it must be built by them
Sustainable peace requires work at every level: shifting norms within households, resisting regressive legislation, safeguarding digital rights, and reshaping international frameworks. Once women learn their rights, they act.
Lead NGO - for Women, Peace & Security localisation in Duhok
Child Marriage Prevention - Door-to-door campaigns bringing conversations directly into homes
Digital Rights & Cyber Protection - Building digital literacy against misinformation and harassment
National Advocacy - Publicly opposing regressive Personal Status Law amendments
WPS Localisation - Lead NGO for UNSCR 1325 in Duhok region, selected by UN Women and the High Council of Women’s Affairs
Peace Centre - The region's first Peace Centre advancing multi-stakeholder peace
Pillar 4
Climate Change
Climate stress intensifies risk for women and girls
Iraq is the fifth most vulnerable country in the world to climate change. When environmental stress intensifies, women and girls absorb the greatest risk. We integrate climate resilience across all our pillars, working with renewable energy and circular economy partners.
Actively fundrasing
Solar Sisters
Empowering women in renewable energy through solar installation, maintenance, repair, and green business training.
Actively fundrasing
She Leads in Food Security
Training women as community food security ambassadors with organic waste management and climate-smart agriculture.
Organisational Strengthening
Pillar 5
Building infrastructure that sustains a movement
"We need full recognition that we are the change makers, deeply committed to resolving the very problems we face. But recognition alone is not enough. We need support that enables us to do the work... When larger organisations or donors exit a country, it's the local partners who stay behind, holding the responsibility." - Taban Shoresh OBE, Founder & CEO
Local organisations are expected to deliver results on fragile foundations. We're building for the long term: investing in financial systems, data infrastructure, and core funding relationships that sustain a movement, not just the next funding cycle.
100+ local staff - across 8 centres and 15 mobile teams
Launching soon
Localisation in Action
Training and mentoring programme for local NGOs, sharing TLF's organisational development model.
Diversified Income Streams
Building sustainable funding through individual giving, corporate partnerships, and core funding relationships to protect our ability to serve communities through funding volatility.
Our impact aligns to a number of SDGs
Through our programmes, we’re providing women with the tools they need to rebuild their lives into sustainable futures. We achieve this through our five primary pillars. Through this impact we contribute to a total of 12 SDGs.
