Press Conference on 2009 World Survey on the Role of Women in Development

The World Survey on the Role of Women in Development points to long-standing inequalities in access to economic and financial resources, which had placed women at a disadvantage in relation to men in economic development, the Director of the Division for the Advancement of Women said at a Headquarters press conference this morning.

Carolyn Hannan said the report’s introduction provided a very important opportunity to raise critical gender-equality issues in relation to economic development.  The publication is being launched at the United Nations later today, with participation of six experts, each focusing on one of its six chapters.  The survey comes out every five years, for presentation to the Assembly’s Second Committee (Economic and Financial).

This year, the report was devoted to women’s control over economic resources and access to financial resources, including microfinance, Ms. Hannan continued.  Among the issues analyzed were:  resources generated at national level through budgets, trade and development cooperation; financial resources, such as credit, savings, remittances and insurance; and employment and social protection, as well as land, property and other productive resources.  The report also spotlighted the links between different types of economic and financial resources.

The survey showed that progress on women’s economic empowerment and increasing women’s access to resources had been slow and uneven, she said.  The starting point in the survey was that gender equality in access and control of resources contributed to economic development, with strong multiplier effects in relation to a range of goals, including poverty eradication.  There was also a strong inter-generational impact, which significantly affected the well-being of children.

Also speaking to the press today were two of the authors of the survey, Naila Kabeer of the Institute of Development Studies ( United Kingdom), and James Heintz of the Political Economy Research Institute, at the University of Massachusetts.

Ms. Kabeer said that the authors of the report had looked at all the areas in which the question of access to resources was important, including labour markets and employment, and asked what should be done to promote women’s progress –- not just for poor women, but educated and better-off women as well.  Inequalities were not peculiar to poorer countries alone but were also present in developed countries.  For that reason, it was important to look beyond some of the real gains that women had made in the labour market and education and ask about the nature of constraints that kept women in inferior positions in the labour market and therefore dependent “on sometimes unreliable husbands and sometimes on unfair States”.

The report responded to various commitments that had been made over time to address gender inequalities and provided the rationale for why those commitments must be taken seriously, she continued.  The conclusion of the report was that the promotion of women’s access to economic and financial resources was likely to become an investment in the welfare of the next generation.  Women who had access to resources were much more likely to be more productive, and their activities were more likely to yield higher returns.

Women’s unpaid care responsibilities were at the heart of the asymmetrical way in which macroeconomic policies were developed, since those did not recognize women’s unpaid work, she continued.  Also addressed in the survey were issues of:  natural resources, including land and water; various types of property; financial services; and social protection, which was particularly important at the times of economic and financial crises.  It sought to show that single interventions did not go very far.  A comprehensive package was needed that would look at the connections between paid and unpaid work, production and reproduction, formal and informal sectors, and the situation in the North and the South.

Mr. Heintz said that the current global financial crisis had fundamentally changed the macroeconomic environment, and the report looked at some of the implications of present and past macroeconomic policies from the gender perspective.  It also investigated the relationship between gender equality and economic growth.  The degree to which growth benefited women was determined by the policy environment.  For that reason, the report presented concrete policy suggestions in terms of fiscal policies, including gender-responsive budgeting; and monetary policies.  The document also looked at “incredible under‑representation” of women in governance structures of the institutions that determined macroeconomic policies, such as central banks.

In terms of employment and labour-market issues, the focus of the report was on women’s control over resources, he continued.  Among the factors examined in detail, he mentioned labour-market segmentation, concentration of women in the informal and non-standard forms of employment, continuing persistence of discrimination, and unequal distribution of unpaid care work within households.  The report’s central message in terms of employment was that it was critical to make gender-equitable employment policy a core component of all national development strategies as a way of meeting development and poverty-reduction goals.

Responding to several questions about the report’s preparation, Ms. Kabeer said that while no new surveys had been carried out, its authors had examined “as much up-to-date material as we could find”.  The value of the report was bringing it all together in a way that showed interconnections between different kinds of resources, activities and elements of macroeconomic policy.  That value lay in the synthesis and show some of the similarities and differences between the affluent and poor countries.

Mr. Heintz added that the report brought a large volume of research and policy work together.  It drew on numerous government and agency reports, as well as some cutting-edge academic research.

Ms. Hannan stressed the importance of the recommendations contained in the report, expressing hope that they would be reflected in the resolution on women and development that the Second Committee was expected to adopt during this session.

To a question about microfinance, Ms. Kabeer said that while very effective in promoting entrepreneurship among poor people, that tool should be adapted to local circumstances and take into account the constraints that women faced.  Microfinance was likely to be successful for women’s economic empowerment when it recognized the kinds of constraints that prevented women from expanding their businesses, when it addressed training, linked them up to markets, provided childcare support and addressed women’s family situation.  Microfinance should be embedded in a package of services that spoke to the constraints that women faced.

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For information media • not an official record