Economic and Social Council

The use of microcredit had financially empowered millions of impoverished women in rural areas around the world, but had not been enough to improve their economic lot, a senior official of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) told the Commission on the Status of Women today as it held a panel discussion on “Economic Empowerment of Rural Women”.

Unleashing the potential of rural women — a quarter of the world’s population — was critical to ending global poverty and hunger, high-level speakers said today as the Commission on the Status of Women opened its fifty-sixth annual session. “Empowering women is not just good for women, it is good for all of us,” Michelle Bachelet, Executive Director of the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women).

The fifty-sixth session of the Commission on the Status of Women will open on 27 February at United Nations Headquarters, focused on the theme of empowerment of rural women and their role in poverty and hunger eradication, sustainable development and current challenges. The Commission will agree on urgent actions needed to make a real difference in the lives of millions of rural women.

Wrapping up what its Chairperson described as “another tough and highly intense” session, the Committee on Non-Governmental Organizations today adopted its draft 2012 report and took action on a number of outstanding matters.

The President of the Economic and Social Council today outlined the arrangements for the 54-member body’s annual Philanthropy event set to take place Monday, 27 February.

Concluding its fiftieth session today, the Commission for Social Development recommended seven draft resolutions for adoption by the Economic and Social Council, covering topics that ranged from the mainstreaming of disability into the international development agenda, to the priority theme for the next session.

Everyday people — from a Japanese oyster fisherman cultivating his business by planting trees in an estuary devastated by the 2011 tsunami, to two Michigan teenagers campaigning to ensure Girl Scout cookies and other palm oil-based products were deforestation-free — were among the panellists sharing their grass-roots approaches to forest preservation at a Headquarters press conference today.

In a brief meeting today, the Commission for Social Development considered a proposed programme of work for the Division for Social Policy and Development for the biennium 2014-2015, which was to be “more precise, transparent, and measurable” than in previous years.

The Committee on Non-Governmental Organizations today granted special consultative status with the Economic and Social Council to 10 applicants from a range of fields, including art education, the elderly and penal reform, and removed 20 applicants from its list of consideration, while approving name change requests from another dozen applicants.

People who have made special contributions towards protecting forests and forest communities will receive the Forest Heroes Award at a special ceremony hosted by the United Nations Forum on Forests (UNFF) Secretariat to mark the conclusion of the International Year of Forests, on 9 February at United Nations Headquarters in New York.