The Tibetan Women's Federation recently celebrated its 50th anniversary in a conference that brought together women of all ethnicity from all corners of Tibet.

The conference's delegates and organizers painted it as chance to commemorate the gains women have made in the fifty years since the organizations founding. BON takes a closer look at those delegates, and their claims for women's progress inside Tibet.

A report in Newsweek recently said a study showed "just over one third of all college-educated American women describe themselves as very ambitious." (PIC) In China that figure was closer to two thirds. What's more, over 75 percent of women in China aspire to hold a top corporate job, compared with just over half in the U.S., and 77 percent of Chinese women participate in the workforce, compared with less than 70 percent in the U.S. So what do people here in China think? Are Chinese women really that more ambitious than their American cousins – and, if so, why? Our reporter Stella Chen went out on the streets of Beijing to find out.

In a recent report, the International Labour Association projected that tens of millions more people could become unemployed, and that women would be hit harder, and more severely than men.

Given that women tend to work in labor intensive export industries, that feed the global supply chain, they're among the first to lose their jobs when demand for exports in manufacturing and clothing dries up.
However, a women's group in Hefei, in Eastern China's Anhui province, has stepped up to ensure that local business women are able to weather the financial storm. Last week, three of these local entrepreneurs were offered interest free loans of around 3,000 USD, in order to help their businesses survive.

The loans, which were provided by Chinese women's organizations and the Chinese women's federation, are aimed at helping women start their own businesses and fulfill their entrepreneurial dreams.