About SEED

SEED

SEED is a women-led, local NGO in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, working to create a future where everyone can thrive by protecting rights, empowering communities, and strengthening systems. We promote gender equality and work to end gender-based violence; protect children and promote the healthy development of children, adolescents, and youth; combat human trafficking and uphold survivor rights; and improve mental health and well-being. Through transformational services, community development, capacity building, and policy and advocacy, we support individuals, communities, and institutions to create sustainable impact.

Vision

A future where everyone can thrive.

Mission

To protect rights, empower communities, and strengthen systems.

Purpose

SEED is creating a future where everyone can thrive by protecting rights, empowering communities, and strengthening systems.

Goals

  • Achieve Gender Equality and End Gender-Based Violence (GBV): SEED works to empower women and girls, uphold their rights, prevent violence against them, protect survivors and support their recovery, and engage men and boys.

  • Protect Children and Promote Their Development: SEED works to promote children’s growth and development by advancing and safeguarding their rights, protecting them from violence, exploitation, abuse, and neglect, and supporting survivors.

  • End Human Trafficking and Uphold Survivor Rights: SEED works to prevent and respond to human trafficking, protect and empower survivors and others at risk, uphold their rights, and strengthen response and prevention systems.

  • Improve Mental Health and Well-Being: SEED works to strengthen the mental health and psychosocial well-being of individuals and communities, and support the development of institutional and social structures that enable human flourishing.



Objectives

  • Deliver Transformational Services (Service Delivery): SEED promotes the rights, protection, empowerment, and recovery of survivors of violence and others at risk through comprehensive care including case management, mental health and psychosocial support, legal services, cash assistance, and shelter services.
  • Empower Communities (Community Development): SEED supports the development of a healthy, resilient, and cohesive society through community-based initiatives designed to foster social and emotional well-being, prevent violence and discrimination, and promote social and economic empowerment.
  • Increase Local Capacity (Education, Training and Capacity Building): SEED equips local actors to prevent and respond to violence by strengthening capacity through education, training, mentoring, and professional development.
  • Strengthen Systems (Policy and Advocacy): SEED works to achieve sustainable institutional change and social development through advocacy, technical assistance, and awareness-raising to strengthen rights and protections for all.
  • Ensure Organizational Excellence (Management and Operations): SEED strives to build strong organizational and technical capacity through effective management and operational systems, empowering leadership, prioritizing accountability and learning, and fostering a collaborative and supportive work environment focused on achieving results.

Approaches

  • Holistic: SEED takes a comprehensive, whole-systems approach, leveraging interventions across society—individual, family, community, and institutional—at every stage, from prevention to recovery, to drive meaningful change.
  • People-centered: SEED takes a survivor-centered, trauma-informed, and rights-based approach; prioritizes well-being, dignity, and empowerment; works with women, men, and children; and focuses on the most vulnerable, including marginalized, displaced, and conflict-affected communities.
  • Accountable: SEED is committed to acting with integrity, being accountable to those we serve and for everything we do. This involves consulting with communities, evaluating challenges and successes, and applying lessons learned to strengthen future programming.
  • Impactful: SEED pursues long-term, sustainable development that creates lasting change by tackling root causes, making strategic investments in systemic transformation, and applying evidence-based approaches.
  • Locally Driven: SEED invests in people, builds local capacity, and strengthens systems to support sustainable, locally-led development in line with local priorities and culture.
  • Innovative: SEED uses innovative approaches to tackle complex problems, synergizing global best practice and local expertise.
  • Collaborative: SEED fosters partnerships, alliances, and coalitions to unify, amplify, and advance shared goals, recognizing that lasting change requires collective action, local leadership, and cross-sector collaboration.

Values

  • Integrity: We are committed to doing the right thing and being accountable for all that we do.
  • Equality: We believe in respect, fairness, justice, and equal rights and opportunities for all.
  • Impact: We are committed to delivering high quality results and achieving sustainable change.
  • Collaboration: We believe in teamwork and know that by working together, we can achieve more.