TO BRING REAL BENEFITS TO WOMEN, INSTITUTIONAL MECHANISMS NEED TO BE EFFECTIVELY POSITIONED IN WIDER CONTEXT, WOMEN'S COMMISSION TOLD

2 March 1999

Press Release
WOM/1103

TO BRING REAL BENEFITS TO WOMEN, INSTITUTIONAL MECHANISMS NEED TO BE EFFECTIVELY POSITIONED IN WIDER CONTEXT, WOMEN'S COMMISSION TOLD

19990302 Commission Hears Experiences Related to National Machinery For Women; Discusses Follow-up to Fourth World Conference on Women

Institutional mechanisms needed to be positioned effectively within a wider context for them to have a real impact and bring real benefits for women, the Commission on the Status of Women was told this afternoon as it heard experiences related to national machineries for women.

Fiona Reynolds, Director of the Women's Unit Cabinet Office of the United Kingdom, said that, while institutional mechanisms were important, whether they truly delivered real change depended on whether there was political support for their goals. Her country had therefore sought to build, in tandem, both new institutional mechanisms and political support.

The representative of the Republic of Korea said the new administration in her country had made the promotion of women's rights a priority. It sought to create a society where there was gender-equal participation in all spheres. However, her country was faced with difficulties arising from the economic crisis affecting Asia. To keep the crisis from unfairly burdening women, the Government had enacted the Women Enterprise Assistance Act to promote the establishment of businesses by women. There was also a plan to deal with the job security of part-time women employees.

The representative of Chile, speaking on behalf of the Member States of the Group of Latin American and Caribbean countries, said her region had been a pioneer in the creation of national mechanisms. As a result of the Beijing Platform for Action, her region had created autonomous organizations, which were part of the State's apparatus, as well as departments, councils and divisions for women located in sectorial ministries. In almost 60 per cent of the region's countries, a process of institutionalization of the gender perspective had been initiated outside the national mechanisms.

The representative of Slovakia said the governments of the Eastern European Group of States, recognized the importance of empowering both men and

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women to become partners in correcting the gender disparities inherited from the past and in promoting gender balance. National machineries, however, were facing several obstacles, including: vulnerability to political changes; insufficient mandates and human and financial resources; marginalization of women's issues; lack of consistency and sustainability of government planning; and absence of a clear concept for public enlightenment, education and cooperation.

Auxilla Ponga, Gender in Development Division, Office of the President, Zambia, said her country was proud of the progress it had made in implementing its institutional mechanism for women. However, it still faced a number of challenges in that regard. The national machinery needed to be strengthened in order to achieve its goal of ensuring that gender was mainstreamed in development at all levels of society. There was also a need to address gender awareness and to change culturally entrenched attitudes. While a number of attempts had been made, their impact in terms of changing behaviour towards women, had yet to be felt.

Also this afternoon, the Commission resumed it general discussion of follow-up to the Fourth World Conference on Women. Speaking on that topic were the representatives of: Colombia, United States, Philippines, Iran and India.

The Commission will meet again at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, 3 March, to hold a panel discussion and dialogue on the topic of women and health.

Commission Work Programme

The Commission on the Status of Women met this afternoon to hold a structured dialogue on national machineries and good practices. It also planned to continue its general discussion on the follow-up to the Fourth World Conference on Women. (For background information, see Press Release WOM/1102 from this morning.)

Dialogue on Institutional Mechanisms for Advancement of Women

TERESA RODRIGUEZ (Chile), speaking on behalf of the member States of the Group of Latin American and Caribbean countries, said her region had been a pioneer in the creation of national mechanisms, in response to the First World Conference on Women held in Mexico in 1975. As indicated in some studies, those mechanisms responded to the objectives and demands of the women's movement in the decade of the 1980s. Commitment to that issue at the regional level had been maintained for more than 20 years, as promulgated in the regularly held Regional Conference for Women in Latin America and the Caribbean. The latest one had been the seventh, held in Santiago, Chile, in 1997, where the follow-up to the agreements in Beijing had been promoted.

She noted that the Beijing Platform for Action recommended that the national mechanism be "at the highest level" of the State's hierarchy of institutions in charge of promoting equality of opportunities between men and women. As a result, her region had created: autonomous organizations which were part of the State's apparatus; national offices or institutes assigned to the Presidency of the Republic or the Office of the Prime Minister, or incorporated in ministries in charge of women's issues; offices, departments, councils and divisions for women located in sectorial ministries; and focal points with one responsible person. The legal mandate of mechanisms varied with constitutional mandates or laws.

Although there was no absolute relationship, she said, the legitimacy of the mandate of the authority in charge of promoting the advancement of women and equal opportunities exerted a clear influence in the State apparatus. It could also be said that personal authority was a factor that had played an important part in the functioning of the offices for women in various countries.

She then elaborated on issues such as human resources, financial resources, functions, coordination, institutionalization and monitoring, which were all key issues in an examination of mechanisms. She concluded by saying that in almost 60 per cent of the region's countries, a process of institutionalization of the gender perspective had been initiated in sectorial ministries outside the national mechanisms. That was an important key in the promotion of a new order of gender.

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SUNG-JA CHANG (Republic of Korea) said the new administration in her country had made the promotion of women's rights a priority. It sought to create a society where gender-equal participation and the division of responsibilities in all political, social, economic and cultural spheres were guaranteed. In order to achieve that goal, the Government had prescribed a range of specific policies, over the next five years, aimed at further development opportunities for women and at preparing them to meet the changes of the next millennium's new socio-economic environment.

She said the Presidential Commission on Women's Affairs was the central administrative body in her country for women's issues. It was charged with monitoring the implementation of women's programmes by relevant government ministries and local self-governing bodies. That practice had enabled the coherent and effective development, implementation and tracking of women's policies. The Presidential Commission also served to institutionalize the formulation and coordination of women's policies and to initiate research on specific gender-discriminatory practices and their respective remedies.

As part of the follow-up to the outcome of the Beijing Conference, the Government had identified 10 policy priorities for the advancement of women, she said. They included: the enactment of the Women's Development Act; the expansion of childcare facilities; the standardization of lunch programmes; the introduction of a female government-employee target system; and the establishment of a women's information network. In 1995, the Women's Development Act had been enacted to consolidate a legal basis for taking adequate institutional and financial measures in support of women's participation and gender-equality at all levels of society.

Despite continued efforts to advance the status of women, she said, her country was faced with difficulties arising from the economic crisis sweeping across Asia. To keep the crisis from unfairly burdening women, the Government had taken a number of steps, including the establishment of the Women Enterprise Assistance Act, to promote the establishment of businesses by women. There was also a plan to deal with the unemployment of the highly educated and a plan to deal with job security of part-time women employees.

DANIELA ROZGONOVA (Slovakia) said the governments of the Eastern European Group of States, committed to democratic reform, recognized the importance of empowering both men and women to become partners in correcting the gender disparities inherited from the past and in promoting gender balance. After the political changes of the late 1980s in her region, countries there had to find their individual way of economic and social transformation. That transformation process, however, was under an unprecedented pressure of time and historical/political circumstances and was taking place at a great psychological and social cost for the whole society and specifically for women. After the fall of communism, the enthusiastic anticipation of freedom had turned into a complicated reality.

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In that reality of conflicting priorities, she continued, governments often had no clear policy for gender equality. Moreover, in the new reality, equal opportunities and equal rights did not count as priorities in policy- making processes. According to the lessons learned in her region, positive and negative elements in the short existence of national mechanisms could be found. The main positive aspect in establishing national machineries was the awakening of gender awareness at the governmental level. Moreover, currently, most of the countries of the region had started at least some of the processes concerning legislative reforms benefiting women. The majority had also completed national action plans and had initiated various activities at local levels as well.

National machineries, however, were facing several obstacles which were slowing down real progress in the implementation of gender equality. Those obstacles were: vulnerability to political changes; insufficient mandates and human and financial resources; marginalization of women's issues which were not considered real concerns; lack of consistency and sustainability of government planning; and absence of a clear concept for public enlightenment, education and cooperation. In an approach taking into account the lessons learned over the last 10 years, all of those negatives must be corrected if basic steps were to be made in the region for the future.

FIONA REYNOLDS, Director of the Women's Unit Cabinet Office, United Kingdom, said that, while institutional mechanisms were important, whether they truly delivered real change depended critically on whether there was political support for their goals. Her country had, therefore, sought to build, in tandem, both new institutional mechanisms and political support. That meant positioning the work of the Women's Unit and the Ministers for Women in a way which was designed to demonstrate not only the benefits to women, but to society as a whole, of taking women's interests seriously.

She said that her country was also developing new approaches to long- standing policy issues which would open up opportunities for practical advancement. One example was a project on women's incomes over a lifetime. That project was intended to address how the pattern of women's lives differed from that of men, and equally how what women do benefited society as a whole. Through that approach, it was hoped that a new constituency of support would be developed for addressing issues such as the pay gap, the economic impact of unpaid work, and poverty in old age.

Although it was in its early stage, she said, that example showed how institutional mechanisms needed to be positioned effectively within a wider context for them to have a real impact and bring real benefits to women. She hoped that perspective would help the Commission as it considered how best to prepare for the General Assembly special session next year, where a topic such as women's incomes across a lifetime might commend itself to others.

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In the area of policy-making, she said, the Cabinet Secretary had circulated policy-appraisal guidance on how to ensure that policy making and service delivery took women's interests into account. Such a step would include, through the use of gender-impact assessment, drawing up a checklist for policy makers on how to consider the needs and requirements of women and identifying focal points for women issues within departments.

AUXILIA PONGA, Gender in Development Division, Office of the President, Zambia, said that, in 1990, the Women in Development Department had been given the status of national machinery to facilitate the advancement of the status of women in her country. Zambia prided itself in having achieved a strategic position for the placement of the institutional mechanism at the apex of government authority. That allowed for gender mainstreaming within the Government's institutional structure and assisted with the implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action.

The Development Division was also charged with the task of liaising and networking with other bodies relevant to gender issues at national, regional and international levels. The ultimate goal of all the activities was to ensure a gender-responsive development process. The entire process was new in Zambia, and necessary strategies and resources were required to make it effective.

She added that Zambia faced a number of challenges in regard to its national machinery for women. The national machinery needed to be strengthened in order to achieve its goal of ensuring that gender was mainstreamed at all levels of society. For that to happen, the Division needed human and financial resources. Although gender focal points were being established, there was the challenge of equipping them with the necessary training and needed analytical skills.

There was also a need to address gender awareness and change culturally entrenched attitudes in Zambia, she said. While a number of attempts had been made, their impact in terms of changing behaviour and attitude towards women in society had yet to be felt. Another challenge was the need to form a strong and sustainable link between the grassroots level and the international scene. Such a link would ensure the flow of information from international forums to ordinary people in the villages, and vice versa.

Responses to Questions

MS. RODRIGUEZ, responding to questions from delegations, said that the basis for work in her region had been regional conferences held over the last 20 years that had enjoyed support from presidents, prime ministers and foreign ministries, while seeking to create national mechanisms.

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Replying to a question on her region's mechanisms, she said those had to be instituted at the highest level. Asked about working tools, she said the region's countries were using tools such as equal opportunity plans to implement policies. Addressing the question of indicators, she said those were being developed to evaluate the impact of regional programmes.

Human resources and training was another important point to which great importance was attached, especially in her own country, Chile. She said work on public policy had received cooperation from the international community, especially from the Scandinavian countries, as well as Germany and Canada. Regarding the issue of inter-sectoral work, she said that women's issues were not restricted to one level, but were trans-sectoral. In that way governments and non-governmental organizations had worked very well together.

MS. CHANG, responding to a question on the women's development fund in her country, said that the fund could draw from private sources, but until this year it had collected from the Government. Non-governmental organizations and individuals could apply to the fund. Each year, priority themes were established and women non-governmental organizations could apply in relation to those themes.

Addressing a question on changing stereotypical thinking that was influenced by cultural traditions, she said her country relied on the education system in that regard. One example was children's textbooks. If they created cultural biases against women, they were revised. Women non- governmental organizations also offered educational programmes to members and to grass-roots people. Some broadcast systems were also helping out in that education process.

The number of women in decision-making positions was one of the biggest challenges to the Republic of Korea. The focus was on making sure that by the year 2002 women would constitute at least 30 per cent of Government committees. It was also difficult to get women into elected positions. In the year 2000 there would be a national election. Women non-governmental organizations were preparing to educate voters and change negative attitudes to women running for elected positions. There were also educational and training programmes for potential women candidates.

MS. ROZGONOVA, responding to questions on NGO activities and links, said that in her country's experience, the Coordinating Committee for Women's Issues was made up of representatives from all parts of society, including non-governmental organizations specializing in advocating women's issues. That was one way of activating non-governmental organizations. In the last five years, Slovakia had seen an incredible growth and coming to life of non- governmental organizations. Thirty were active at the national level and several times as many at the local level. Many of the nationally active ones were direct members of the Committee. That was the link between the

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Government and non-governmental organizations. The National Centre for the Equality of Women and Men was funded by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Slovak Government. That project has been set up to show non-governmental organizations how to develop and write good projects and raise funds.

Ms. PONGA, in response to a question on the role of non-governmental organizations (NGOs), said that NGOs and government had begun working together on common goals and concerns and that had been a very beneficial relationship in Zambia. On creating a ministerial position dedicated to women's issues, she said her country had decided that there should not be a single minister responsible for gender issues. Instead, a Cabinet Division Office had been created to address gender issues on a policy level. On the issue of resources, every ministry had a budget line for gender issues -- while those amounts were very minimal, that was still a positive development.

On the issue of training, she said the lack of confidence among gender focal points was the reason why training for them was so important. On gender awareness, she said there had been training for Government officials which they could use in their day-to-day work. That extended not only to professionals in Government, but also to the support staff.

MS. REYNOLDS, in response to a question on public appointments, said the number of women ministers in Parliament had risen from 10 per cent to 18 per cent in the last twenty years. There had also been increases in the appointments of women in a number of other areas of Government. The United Kingdom's Government did not operate with quotas. Those increases were due to voluntary efforts to increase the number of women in public life. On the question of improving awareness of gender areas, the Government had tried to spread the message that society as a whole benefited from the promotion of women's rights.

On coordination efforts, she said there was a very strong Cabinet structure in her country for decision-making that did not allow an individual minister to make a policy decision on his or her own. There were a number of units in the Cabinet, however, that were trying to address gender issues. On reaching down to the grass-roots level, there were attempts to work with NGOs by the Government, but many women were not members of NGOs and their voices were not being heard. There was a commission to try to reach out to those women.

Statements

SOFIA GOMEZ (Colombia) said women and health was an important issue for her country. Reform of the social security system had included collective actions for promotion and prevention. Current social security priority programmes were aimed at the poorest in Colombia, including women and

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children. Prioritizing women's health included their participation in the process as well. Violence against women was viewed as a health threat, she added.

She said Colombia's Ministry of Health was currently considering strategies to improve women's health during all stages of their life. The national plan also promoted protection for safe, healthy, sexual practices, so as to mitigate against sexually transmitted diseases such as HIV/AIDS and prevent unwanted pregnancies. There was also need to increase health coverage to reach women, since over 4 million had been left out of it so far. Initiatives had also sought to include women in public and economic life.

LINDA TARR-WHELAN (United States) said that many governments and organizations now had policies on gender mainstreaming in place. However, those policies were not necessarily being implemented. Therefore, as a first step, the existing policies should be implemented and existing structures should be strengthened. Also, governments and organizations could expand existing policies and structures, recognizing the broad institutional changes that were required to effectively ensure gender integration. For example, her country's Agency for International Development had adopted a Gender Action Plan immediately after the Beijing conference.

She added that recent economic turmoil in Asia, the Russian Federation and Latin America had some people questioning the desirability of free markets and the increasing interdependence of national economies. However, the world should not allow the problems it was facing today to define the meaning of globalization. The challenge of the Commission was to identify ways to allow everyone -- women and men -- to benefit from globalization. The Commission should encourage the increasing number of women entrepreneurs by helping them gain access to capital and credit, government contracts, and developing the capacity to engage in international trade. There was a need for more and better jobs for women, better wages and working conditions, equal pay and education.

AMELOU BENITEZ-REYES, Chairperson, National Commission on the Role of Filipino Women of the Philippines, said institutional mechanisms receptive to the gender and development agenda had been put in place in her country. The implementation of the Philippine Plan for Gender Responsive Development (1995-2025) was being actively pursued. That was also her country's vehicle for implementing the Beijing Platform For Action. Since 1995, the Philippines had started to implement a gender and development budget policy, mandating all divisions of the Government to set aside a minimum of 5 per cent of their total annual budget for gender issues. Although implementation of that policy was experiencing a number of problems, it had succeeded in generating action among agencies that used to have no programmes for gender and development.

To make the Beijing Platform For Action felt at the field level, her

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Government had piloted strategies to mainstream gender and development in the regional and local development planning processes, she continued. "Since then, we have expanded from three to seven regions, mostly in the central and southern parts of the country where poverty and development are more profound". "Herstory", a term coined at the International Congress on the Role of Women in History and Nation-building, which had been held in Manila in December 1998, was the feminist reconstruction of history and the transformation of gender relations from domination and subordination to equality and empowerment. Women needed to advocate the inclusion of "herstory" which could embody the values and virtues of women's empowerment.

PAIMANEH HASTAIE, Director of the Department of International Social and Women Affairs, Iran, said the world should recognize that both men and women were valuable components of humanity and equally possessed the potential for intellectual, social, cultural and political development. The world should also recognize that comprehensive and sustainable development was only possible through the active participation of both men and women in social life. In that context, Iran believed the Beijing Platform for Action provided a common strategy at the global level to ensure full participation of women in the political, social and economic affairs of their societies.

She added that the family was the basic unit of society. Comprehensive protection and support for the family required provisions of necessary social, political, economic and cultural environment. The institution of the family must be preserved and must continue to function as the breeding ground for healthy, cultured and socially productive individuals. From an international perspective, the world community needed to address the problems collectively. Among the problems impacting the family were: war, poverty, violence, moral decadence and the disruptive impact of social changes in societies. Her delegation supported enhanced efforts to improve economic and social conditions of the family.

KIRAN AGGARWAL, Secretary, Department of Women and Child Development of India, said the Constitution of India not only granted equality to women, but also empowered the State to adopt measures of positive discrimination in favour of women. Above all, the Constitution imposed a fundamental duty on every citizen to renounce practices derogatory to the dignity of women. The Government was also considering the demand of certain groups to set aside a percentage of vacancies in the Government for women.

She added that her country had initiated several constitutional and legislative measures and had enunciated and implemented several policies and programmes. There still existed, however, a wide gap between attainments and aspirations, particularly in the sector of health. Through various interventions, India had made considerable progress in improving maternal and infant mortality rates, which were approximately half what they had been before India's public health system network had begun its effort to reach out to all groups. * *** *