Go Equal was founded by Dr Joyce Das in 2021 with a vision of gender equality. Joyce has worked in senior executive positions in international women’s organisations and movements in Bangladesh for a decade before arriving in Australia in 2012. In her various roles, both in Bangladesh and in Australia, Joyce has worked on gender issues in several regions including South and West Asia, Africa, Australasia, and the Pacific Islands. During this time, Joyce noticed that despite of all the initiatives and investments that have been made to achieve gender equality, it still remains a distant dream for most developing countries as well as many developed ones, including Australia. The current COVID-19 pandemic has further worsened the gender parity situation. As the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic continues to be felt, closing the global gender gap will now take 136 years (pre-COVID 99.5 years).

Joyce quickly realised that to tackle the problem of gender inequality, we need to do things differently by engaging innovative and cutting-edge approaches based on research evidence. She then began to bring great minds together, who are champions in their respective fields working on various aspects of gender equality. This amazing team believes that together, we can go equal. With this highly ambitious aim, Go Equal has begun its journey towards an equal world for women and men free from discrimination and violence.