UNIFEM B

Committee: UNIFEM

Topic B: The economic empowerment of women in developing countries

Director: Nuria Alvarez Del Bosque

Moderator: Maryafernanda Coutiño Gonzalez

What does our committee stand for?

UNIFEM is the women's fund at the United Nations, dedicated to advancing women’s rights and achieving gender equality. It gives financial and technical assistance to innovative programs and strategies that foster women's empowerment. UNIFEM works on the fundamental rights of every woman to live a life free from discrimination and violence, and that gender equality is essential to achieving development and to build societies with justice.

UNIFEM was established in 1976. It maintains strong ties to both women’s organizations and governments, linking them with the UN system to join national and international political action, and to create change.

Also focuses its activities on one goal: to support the creation at the national level of existing international commitments to advance gender equality. In support of this goal, UNIFEM works in the following areas:

· enhancing women’s economic security and rights,

· ending violence against women,

· reducing the prevalence of HIV and AIDS among women and girls, and

· Advancing gender justice in democratic governance in stable and fragile states.

What exactly is empowerment in women´s lifes?

The empowerment of women is one of the central issues in the process of

development of countries all over the world.

Women's empowerment is a process in which women gain greater share of control over resources - material, human and intellectual like knowledge, information, ideas and financial resources like money - and control over decision-making in the home, community, society, nation and to gain `power'.

Description of the topic, the Problem.

Development cannot be achieved if fifty percent of the population its excluded from the opportunity it brings. Gender equality and women's empowerment are human rights that lie at the heart of development and the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals.

Despite the progress that has been made, six out of ten of world's poorest people are still women and girls, less than 16 percent of the world's parliamentarians are women, two thirds of all children shut outside the school gates are girls and, both in times of armed conflict and behind closed doors at home, women are still systematically subjected to violence.

Sometimes for women nowadays it’s very difficult to make progress to their empowerment due to the lack of opportunities that government, society, and sometimes religion give to women´s rights. Women have the same right as men to be involved in economical participations, political empowerment, educational attainment, health and well-being.

Unfortunately many countries around the world do not capitalize on the full potential of their societies (women) and are violating their human resources and undermining their potential to compete. Even in light of heightened international awareness of gender issues, it is a disturbing reality that no country has yet managed to eliminate the gender gap, which doesn’t let women develop fully in society, and neither does it gives the opportunity to demonstrate women´s potential.

Some nations are against women´s empowerment due to the fact that women may take over men´s jobs, business, and power. The past three decades have witnessed a steadily increasing need to empower women through measures to increase social, economic and political equity, and wide access to basic human rights, improvements in nutrition, basic health and education.

In many countries women´s rights are not even taken to action, for example:

In Africa women are 180 times likely to die due to pregnancy, or in some nations rape is not a crime, and even worse violence against women is condoned as well as slavery.

Women are being minimized in some developing nations, with gender inequality as a base.

Education is still one of the main obstacles to women´s empowerment. Women are two thirds of the world´s illiterate adults. There is one major global gap between genders.

Facts:

*In the United States 90% of AIDS cases less than 20 years of age are girls.

*Women still hold only 15.6% of elected parliamentary seats GLOBALLY.

*Worldwide, outside of the agricultural sector, in both developed and developing countries, women are still averaging slightly less than 78% of the wages given to men for the same work, a gap which refuses to close in even the most developed countries.

*Two thirds of the poorest population in the world are women.

*Women provide 70% of agricultural labor and produce 90% of the food!

* The people in the United States living on US$1 or less half are women.

*According to the World Health Organization 585,000 women die every year because of the lack of health support.

*13 % of mortality in women is because of maternal deaths.

*Of the 1.3 billion people who live in absolute poverty around the globe, 70 percent are women.

Background History:

Women´s lack of development in many nations made the UN establish UNIFEM in 1976, and also established UNDP (United Nations Development Program) in 1984.

At that time, the General Assembly instructed to “ensure women’s involvement with mainstream activities.” The Platform of Action resulting from the 1995 Beijing World

Conference on Women expanded this concept, calling it “gender mainstreaming”— (the application of gender perspectives to all legal and social norms and standards, to all policy development, research, planning, advocacy, development, implementation and monitoring)—as a mandate for all member states.

In this way, the gender factor is no longer to be only a supplement to development but central to the practice. As a result of the Beijing conference— and the many years of work leading up to it—more than 100 countries announced new initiatives to improve the status of women. In 2000, the follow-up Beijing conference further strengthened the application of the mainstreaming concept, and used it to highlight the need for more progress in reaching equality worldwide.

But still women were not given the opportunity to empower themselves by being involved in nation-wide decisions. UNIFEM has tried to achieve in many forms equality and still now, women´s empowerment is a big global issue.

The work of the United Nations and many other agencies in advancing gender equality was set in three closely interconnected areas:

*strengthening women’s economic capacity, with a focus on new technologies and the new trade agenda

*promoting women’s leadership and political participation; eliminating violence against women and,

*supporting the implementation of the Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW).

*The year 2005 marked the tenth anniversary of the Beijing World Conference on Women, which brought renewed focus and energy to the efforts of empowering women.

*Women´s empowerment was and still is a big issue in the world.

Points of view:

INDIA

The complete evaluation of the IFAD (International Fund for Agricultural Development)-supported Tamil Nadu Women's Development Project in India took place in late 1999. The project aimed to bring about the social and economic betterment of women. The core mechanism was the women's self-help groups, which were set up with both financial (saving and lending) and community action objectives. At the time of the evaluation, a total of 5,207 of these groups had been formed, almost double the established target.

India´s opinion is that, women's empowerment does not occur easily or overnight. In the India case described, there was evidence of such change beginning, to which the project had apparently contributed. It was most noticeable among certain types of women. Perhaps one of the most important emerging lessons is that women's groups themselves, in their social aspects, play a role in such empowerment. This argues for placing emphasis on sustaining groups beyond the life of the project, which indeed was done in this instance. The project evaluation also recommended that communication support (films, radio broadcasts and so on, with sensitization and training content) be used to speed up the empowerment process.

GHANA

In Ghana, NGO´s (non governmental organizations) are the ones with women´s empowerment initiative. There are several organizations currently working in Ghana that are focusing on women's empowerment. The Center for Responsible Democracy is launching a new program called the National Women's Forum to discuss issues specific to Ghanaian women. This particular initiative is also receiving support from the Ministry of Women and Children Affairs (MOWAC). The initiative, which is designed for women of different professions, capacities and capabilities, is expected to be a platform for them to say their various ideas that would contribute significantly towards national development. Additionally, the program is also aimed at enhancing the socio-economic and political status of women and to promote gender equality among them to increase gender mainstreaming.

CHINA

China mainly focuses on women farmers, which are helped by the UNESCO and UNIFEM with literacy programs. Life is not easy for women farmers in some rural areas in China. They live in regions where low literacy rates combined with a harsh geographic environment result in poor health conditions, scarcity of clean drinking water and limited access to electricity and information. “Life is one long cycle of cooking, cleaning, washing and farm work,” says Namtip Aksornkool of UNESCO Paris, “Women have no time to rest, no time to complain.” This induces women´s empowerment through the process of learning; this plays a big role in China´s development.

IRAN

The advancement of women in Iran has been considerable in recent years, but their participation in community or social development programs remains low. Although rural women form a major portion of the labor force, their participation is not considered vital in social decision-making processes due to their limited access to formal education. There is, therefore, a lack of self-esteem and confidence among women. Official statistics show the rate of female economic activity to be 14.3%. However it is difficult to accurately assess rural female employment in traditional businesses, households and agricultural and handicraft production due to the absence of accurate statistics. Iran has yet to accede to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women. One major focus is raising awareness among policy makers of the important role women play in communities. By engaging women to monitor community indicators such as domestic violence and girls’ school enrolment and retention, women will improve their capacity to assess, analyze and take action, and strengthen their role as agents of change in communities. The participation of women in village development committees and village government is also encouraged.

IRAQ

The role and experience of women is not always considered in wartime or during stabilization and reconstruction operations. In Iraq, it is essential to consider women’s needs and the obstacles they now face, mainly because of the ¨Islamic restrictions¨.

JAPAN

Japan mainly focuses on the building of education schools, were women can study by groups, to develop in life. And also this nation makes sure the same Japanese population constructs educational places, so women and men can act as teams. Japan's Official Development Assistance Charter has stipulated that "Full consideration will be given to the active participation of women in development, and to their obtaining benefits from development" as necessary measures for the effective implementation. Japan announced its wide Initiative at the Fourth World Conference on Women held in Beijing in 1995. This initiative embodied Japan's intention to consider women's empowerment and gender equality, to education, health, and economic and social participation of women in the implementation of assistance projects and actively to seek cooperation from developing nations, other donors, international organizations and NGOs.

PAKISTAN

Pakistan’s first lady Sehba Musharraf said women have been given prominent roles in the government. They are being empowered to shoulder more responsibilities and play their part in the development of the country. They are now ministers, advisers and members of Parliament. ¨Women constitute 50 percent of our population, and so they need to be empowered in a way that they can play a complementary role,” said Mrs. Musharraf. Nevertheless, women in Pakistan still have to overcome obstacles such as illiteracy, poverty and abuse. Honor killing is a very serious and disturbing issue in this country.

RUSSIA

Due to international interventions and the globalization of gender mainstreaming, the RussianGovernment introduced measures for empoweringwomen politically. Notably, however, the changes brought inby the democratic transition in Russia havehad a negative impact (a cultural and structural change in the government, daily live´s problems, struggles women had to overcome due to the male domination in the political culture, and transforming this process) on aspects of gender equality.

SAUDI ARABIA

Discussing the role and rights of women in this highly conservative and tightly ruled kingdom is a touchy subject. In a society where women constitute the majority of the population and account for more university graduates than men, they have few of the rights that most of Western society usually grants.

They are not allowed to study any subject they want - law and engineering, for example, are closed to them. They cannot vote, travel without the explicit approval of their husband or a male guardian, drive, or work in most government offices. Even when hired in a private office, they are usually put in a separate room from men.

And, what perhaps has attracted the attention of the human rights and feminist groups in the West the most is the fact that they have to wear 'abayas' - the neck-to-ankle black robe, and cover their hair with a black scarf. Saudi Arabian women say religious traditions are blocking their rights!

THE UNITED STATES

First of all, The United States supports Iraq´s women empowerment, making the USA plan programs for Iraqi women.

Second, in the USA women´s right to vote was given in 1920! And no woman was a major presidential nominee. But nowadays The United States has women run for vice president in the government and has a major role in the Congress. Still only 15% are representing senators and representatives. And according to polls 80% of Americans would vote for a female candidate which makes the world think that The United States is now open minded to women´s empowerment!

QUESTIONS FOR THE DELEGATE:

1) What kind of obstacles do women have to face in your nation?

2) Are religion/beliefs, another major obstacle for women´s empowerment in your country?

3) What has your country done to accomplish women´s empowerment?

4) Does your country assist to Beijing´s World Conference for Women?

5) Is your country coordinated with UN actions for the development of Women?

6) Has your country made any programs for women?

7) Is your country willing to help other nations to fight against gender inequality?

8) What is the percentage of illiteracy in women in your country?

BIBLIOGRAPHY

http://www.weforum.org/pdf/Global_Competitiveness_Reports/Reports/gender_gap.pdf

http://www.undp.org/women/