Nike’s supply chain doesn’t live up to the ideals of its “Girl Effect” campaign.

Noted: Nike didn’t invent the idea that tapping into the earning potential and selfless spending patterns of impoverished women can ignite economic development. It’s been promoted by the World Bank and other international development organizations since the 1980s; before that, attention to girls was substantially absent in global development efforts. But by coining and investing in the Girl Effect, the Nike Foundation, the company’s philanthropic arm, “gave it authority and made it catchy,” says Kathryn Moeller, an assistant professor of gender and women’s studies at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, who is writing a book about the Girl Effect. “Without them, we wouldn’t hear poverty and development experts talking all the time about the importance of prioritizing girls in development.”