Speech
Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment
By Inés Alberdi, Executive Director, UNIFEM
Date: 14 October 2009
Occasion: 64th Session of the UN General Assembly, Second Committee, 14 October 2009
[Check against delivery.]
Mr. Chairperson, distinguished delegates, colleagues and friends,
I would like to congratulate you, Mr. Chairperson, and other members of the bureau on your election to this committee. I thank you for this opportunity to present the Note by the Secretary-General on the Activities of the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM).
Today we are on the threshold of a new era of recognition and action with regard to the centrality of gender equality and women’s empowerment to development, equality and peace. Last month the General Assembly adopted a resolution on system-wide coherence (A/RES/63/311) expressing support for uniting the four UN gender-specific entities (UNIFEM, OSAGI, DAW and INSTRAW) into one, backed by substantial resources and led by an under secretary-general. The Security Council has adopted resolutions 1888 and 1889 requesting the Secretary-General to appoint a Special Representative on sexual violence and armed conflict and to submit a set of indicators for monitoring implementation, the impact of conflict on women and women’s role in peace processes.
We cannot let the 30th anniversary of the Convention of the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), the 15th anniversary of the Beijing Platform for Action, the 10th anniversary of Security Council resolution 1325, the ECOSOC Annual Ministerial Review of agreed international development goals and the 10th anniversary of the Millennium Declaration go by without committing to more robust implementation and accountability. These are opportunities to reflect on what has worked and what is still needed to advance progress towards gender equality.
Guided by its strategic plan, 2008-2013 (DP/2007/45), UNIFEM works with governments, civil society and UN partners to strengthen women’s economic security and rights, end violence against women, reduce the prevalence of HIV and AIDS among women and girls, and advance gender justice in democratic governance in conflict and non-conflict situations. The report before you (A/64/164) reviews results in each of these areas, in support of the overall goal of supporting countries to implement commitments to gender equality and women’s empowerment in line with their national priorities and the Millennium Development Goals.
UNIFEM is guided by the Triennial Comprehensive Policy Review (TCPR) resolution, including its recommendation calling upon the United Nations system “to avail itself of the technical experience of UNIFEM on gender issues”. While a great deal of attention in relation to reform is now focused on the gender entity, it remains absolutely critical that all aspects of the UN reform effort — governance, financing and Delivering as One — take gender into account.
In presenting this report today, I would like to focus on three areas that link with the work of this Committee and that significantly impact our ability to support countries to achieve sustainable results.
UN Reform
There are two areas of results that UNIFEM has contributed to in line with the overall reform process. First, supporting the UN Development Group (UNDG) and Regional Directors’ Teams to build greater system-wide coherence on gender equality. Second, strengthening the gender equality perspective and learning opportunities in the Delivering as One pilots and self-starters.
UNIFEM continues to chair the UNDG Working Group on Programming Issues and the UNDG Task Team on Gender Equality, is now a member of all Regional Directors’ Teams, and co-chairs a new Regional Coordination Mechanism on Gender Equality with UN-ESCAP. Building on the TCPR recommendation, the UNDG Principals agreed to roll out the performance indicators on gender equality that the Task Team piloted. These were sent to all Resident Coordinators with a letter from the Administrator urging especially those UN Country Teams rolling out new UN Development Assistance Frameworks to establish a baseline for their performance using the indicators together with the gender audit methodology developed by the ILO. During this first year, 25 UN Country Teams have undertaken the assessment using the performance indicators, availing themselves of a Help Desk that UNIFEM established. UNIFEM and UNICEF are also co-leading, on behalf of the Task Team, an action learning initiative to strengthen guidance and lessons from joint programming on gender equality in country teams in Albania, Morocco and Nepal.
UNIFEM is present in the eight Delivering as One pilot programmes and is learning key lessons about how UNCTs can better deliver as one on gender equality. In 2008, the UNDG Task Team partnered with the Resident Coordinator of Viet Nam to host a workshop for gender equality specialists from all of the Delivering as One pilots. The recommendations from this workshop, endorsed by the UNDG Principals, included suggestions for strengthening the gender dimensions of One UN pilot evaluations and testing a methodology to apply gender-responsive budgeting in the pilots. UNDP is now leading a working group of the Task Team to adapt the methodology on gender-responsive budgeting that it is testing to the Delivering as One pilots. A key concern voiced by gender equality specialists from these pilots who attended the Viet Nam workshop was the inadequate amount of technical expertise on gender equality available to meet demand.
Since 2004, UNIFEM has been working with the Development Operations Coordination Office (DOCO) to monitor changes in reporting by Resident Coordinators on UN Country Team support to gender equality initiatives. Over this period, the number of country teams that reported on joint initiatives on gender equality has doubled, and the number of recorded gender theme groups has nearly tripled. Support to substantive programming is also becoming more visible with the number of country teams reporting on initiatives to end violence against women nearly quadrupling since 2004, which is a positive indicator of forthcoming support for the Secretary General’s UNiTE campaign.
Partnerships
Partnerships with governments, civil society, regional organizations, and UN organizations are the cornerstone of UNIFEM work and a key strategy for strengthening overall capacity to deliver on commitments to gender equality. UNIFEM continues to invest heavily in supporting the capacities of National Machineries for Women and women’s networks to drive stronger policy and practice on gender equality, but there are also a rapidly increasing set of partnerships with Ministries of Finance and Planning, Electoral Commissions, military and law enforcement personnel, the justice system, faith-based organizations and groups of men and boys.
In 2008, UNIFEM expanded its participation in UN coordination and reform processes at all levels, engaging in 72 joint programmes, 54 as participating agency and 18 as lead agency. We are also seeing a growing number of opportunities to develop holistic joint programmes supported by multi-donor funds in response to national priorities, and are leading UN Country Team efforts to do so in Uganda, Kenya and Ethiopia. These achievements are enabling country teams to respond in a coordinated fashion to the national action plans on gender equality and women’s empowerment that so many countries have now developed and are in line with the commitments made to advance aid effectiveness.
UNIFEM’s participation in and leadership of a growing number of global, regional and national-level partnerships contribute to lower transaction costs for countries and better use of the unique capacities of UN organizations. With UNDP, UNIFEM often supports national partners to strengthen gender equality commitments in national development plans and poverty reduction strategies, undertaking such efforts in 18 countries in 2008. UNIFEM works closely with the ILO and the European Commission in 12 countries to support multi-stakeholder groups to pilot indicators for tracking allocations to gender equality in the context of aid effectiveness. With UNFPA, UNIFEM has expanded its partnership to link gender-responsive budgeting to reproductive health policies and programmes, and is also working with UNFPA and the Office of the Special Advisor on Gender Issues to pilot indicators for National Action Plans on Security Council resolution 1325. This effort is intended to lead to a consolidated set of indicators that can be used for global monitoring of progress. UNIFEM also works with Secretariat-based departments and specialized agencies; in 2008 this included working with the Department of Political Affairs to field gender advisors to mediators and envoys to open spaces for women’s participation in peace negotiations, including to the Secretary-General’s Special Envoy for the negotiations on northern Uganda.
We are also increasing our partnerships with multilateral development banks. In Egypt, UNIFEM is working with the World Bank, the International Centre for Research on Women and a number of government departments, private sector and non-governmental organizations to pilot a Gender Equality Model that establishes voluntary certification schemes for private firms to meet standards for hiring, training, and promoting women, as well as a healthy work environment for women. After two years, 5 of the 10 companies have already met requirements and are slated to receive the gender equality seal. This programme, built on a similar model in Latin America, has significant potential for replication in the country, in the region and worldwide.
Resources
The need for an exponential increase in the financial and human resources available to meet growing demand for expertise, programming and services to advance gender equality is indisputable. While contributions to UNIFEM have increased in the past several years, they remain miniscule compared to the demand for UNIFEM expertise and assistance. The same applies to the trust funds, which UNIFEM manages and which are accounted for separately from UNIFEM finances. The UN Trust Fund to End Violence against Women, for example, received nearly US$900 million in requests in 2009, while it had only US$12 million to give out in grants as of the beginning of October. The Fund for Gender Equality, which UNIFEM has just launched with an initial grant of US$65 million from the Government of Spain, received more than 1,100 proposals, with funds to support only 30 to 40 of these in this first round. There are far more countries that request UNIFEM’s support to build their capacity in gender-responsive budgeting than UNIFEM can respond to. The UN Millennium Development Goals Report 2009 points out that Goal 5, improving maternal health, is the goal towards which least progress has been made. The target for this goal, reducing maternal mortality, is also a litmus test of national and international commitment to advance gender equality as UNIFEM noted in Progress of the World’s Women 2008/09. There are proven responses to stem the tide of maternal deaths, but the funding gaps for programmes needed to do this remain large.
Making the numbers count
Addressing the abuse of women’s human rights, persistent gender discrimination, and making it possible for women to fully contribute to development equality and peace requires coordinated action. The UN system is increasingly working together at all levels to address the causes and consequences of gender inequality, from inter-agency initiatives on sexual violence, trafficking and female genital mutilation to the increasing number of UN Gender Theme Groups active in UN Country Teams. But progress, even in the area of coordination, is uneven and too slow, particularly in the absence of a recognized driver.
The gaps and challenges identified in the Secretary-General’s paper in support of the General Assembly debate on strengthening the gender architecture also pertain to efforts to advance gender equality at all levels: within the UN and at country level. Without significantly changing the positioning, authority, coordination and resources available to those who drive the gender equality agenda — whether coalitions of women’s organizations, national women’s machineries or the four gender-specific UN entities — the risk is high that progress will remain haphazard.
As the countdown begins to the 2015 target for achieving the Millennium Development Goals, demand for assistance in achieving gender equality and women’s empowerment is increasing. We appreciate the partnership and support we have received from UN Member States and look forward to continuing to work together to implement commitments to gender equality and women’s empowerment and assist all countries to achieve the MDGs.
