NOTE TO CORRESPONDENTS THREE WOMEN'S GROUPS TO BE HONOURED AT UNITED NATIONS CEREMONY; GENERAL ASSEMBLY PRESIDENT, SECRETARY-GENERAL AMONG SPEAKERS

Press Release

NOTE TO CORRESPONDENTS THREE WOMEN'S GROUPS TO BE HONOURED AT UNITED NATIONS CEREMONY; GENERAL ASSEMBLY PRESIDENT, SECRETARY-GENERAL AMONG SPEAKERS

UNIFEM Envoy Julie Andrews to Present Award; Maya Angelou to Moderate; Videotape Appearance by United States First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton

The United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) is to honour three grass-roots women's organizations at an awards ceremony in New York next week.

Speakers at the ceremony -- in the Chamber of the Economic and Social Council, at 5 p.m. on Tuesday (29 October) -- will include the President of the General Assembly, Razali Ismail (Malaysia), and Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali. Also taking part will be Noeleen Heyzer, Director of UNIFEM, and James Gustave Speth, Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). Rosario Green, Assistant Secretary-General and Special Adviser to the Secretary-General on Gender Issues, will give closing remarks.

During the ceremony there will be a taped video appearance by United States First Lady, Hillary Rodham Clinton. The awards will be presented by UNIFEM Goodwill Ambassador Julie Andrews. The programme will be moderated by the poet Maya Angelou.

The organizations to receive the awards are:

-- Iida, a women's group in Somalia, which provides housing, counselling, education, training and jobs for women displaced by war and victimized by violence and rape. Without regard to clan or ethnic affiliation, Iida works to mobilize women to advocate peace and dialogue among warring factions. The award will be accepted by Nasri Hussein Adam, a Kenyan volunteer who works among women in war-torn Mogadishu.

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-- Las Molineras, a group of 10 women in Peru who won UNIFEM's "Food Technologies Contest" earlier this year. Las Molineras started a business from scratch, buying their own machinery to grind traditional grains into quality flour, which they then marketed. Through a combination of ingenuity, technology and hard work, they revitalized a traditional food source, improved regional food security, created jobs for women, and built a business model for replication in rural areas. The award will be accepted by Maria Del Carmen Ramirez, who provides space for Las Molineras' machinery in her home, and is in charge of grinding the grains.

-- The Centre for Social Research and its "Women in Grassroots Democracy Project" in India which prepares women to participate in politics and provides support for female candidates. Through legal-rights education and leadership training, it also helps women to gain access to health care, jobs and lost property rights. The award will be accepted by Rekha Dubey who, married at 14, was deserted by her husband and deprived of her home and children, and subsequently was enabled by training at the Centre to regain her children and property, and went on to train and mobilize other women.

According to UNIFEM, women make up 70 per cent of the world's absolute poor, earn one tenth of the world's income, hold 10 per cent of parliamentary seats worldwide and comprise 80 per cent of the world's refugees. The UNIFEM, was created by the General Assembly in 1976 as the Voluntary Fund for the United Nations Decade for Women and became an autonomous organization in 1985. It has helped improve the lives of tens of thousands of women in more than 100 nations in Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean, and Asia and the Pacific.

For further information, please contact Geoffrey Knox: (212) 229-0540; for media accreditation: (212) 963-6934; for United Nations Television coverage, Jim Ludlam: (212) 963-7650.

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