Feisty Aphrodite Archives
Gender Equality Gets a Drop of the Funding Bucket
The following is from the article written by Thalif Deen, published by the Inter Press News Service Agency (IPS):
The United Nations has never run out of statistics to reinforce its arguments against one of the most troubling issues the world over: gender discrimination.
The Asia Pacific region alone is losing between 42 billion and 47 billion dollars annually because of women's limited access to employment opportunities, according to a U.N. study, and another 16 billion to 30 billion dollars annually as a result of gender gaps in education.
The world body also says that one in three women in the world is likely to be subjected to violence in her lifetime.
And according to the World Bank, a sister institution of the United Nations, women aged 15-44 are more at risk from rape and domestic violence than from cancer, motor accidents, war and malaria.
The U.N. Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM), on the other hand, points out that women make up about 70 percent of the world's poor and 67 percent of the world's illiterate.
Elizabeth Mataka, the U.N.'s special envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa, estimates that nearly half of all adults living with HIV worldwide are women.
And perhaps one of the most neglected gender-oriented issues revolves round the under-funding of women's activities around the world -- and also at the United Nations.
All of these issues will be debated at a two week session of the U.N. Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) Feb. 25 through Mar. 7, which is expected to draw over 5,000 participants from governments, civil society and international organisations.
The meeting is scheduled to feature more than 240 side events, both inside and outside the U.N. headquarters in New York.
"Where is the money to sustain women's movements for justice and empowerment," asks the NGO (non-governmental organisation) Committee on the Status of Women.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon complains that the global commitments on gender equality and empowerment of women since the 1995 Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, and the 2002 International Conference on Financing for Development (FfD) in Monterrey, Mexico, "have yet to be implemented".
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Among other things, the study calls for an increase in the share of development assistance specifically targeting gender equality and women's empowerment.
According to a study by the Commonwealth Policy Studies Unit in London, of the 69 billion dollars in official development assistance in 2003, only 2.5 billion dollars was allocated to gender equality, as a principal objective. The situation has not changed significantly since then.
In his report, the secretary-general also urges international financial institutions to take gender perspectives into account in loan approvals, debt servicing and debt relief, in compliance with commitments to gender equality.
A follow-up to the FfD conference is scheduled to take place in Qatar in late November, where funding for gender activities is expected to be on the agenda. The secretary-general has asked the CSW to ensure that the preparations for, and outcome of, the Qatar conference "fully incorporate gender perspectives."
Read the entire story here.
