Achieving Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment Engendering National Planning Processes,

Policies and Interventions

Caren Grown, ICRW November 19, 2003

Organization of the Talk•Brief Overview of Task Force 3 on Education and Gender Equality•TF3’s Main Messages•“Best Practice” recommendations• Interventions that work:

– Quotas for political participation– Strategies to increase girls’ education

OVERARCHING MESSAGES•Gender equality and women’s empowerment are fundamental to the achievement of ALL MDGs

•Investing in the education, health, safety and economic well-being of adolescents, especially girls, is a priority.

•Reducing women’s and girl’s time poverty through infrastructure investments (roads, energy, water and sanitation) and public policies that support women’s care responsibilities are critical.

•Sex-disaggregated data are key to catalyzing and monitoring progress toward the MDGs.

AREAS OF PRIORITY FOR THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY AND NATIONAL GOVERNMENTS

•Capability– Emphasize secondary education as a precondition for

women’s empowerment– Sexual and reproductive health and rights

•Opportunity– Property and inheritance rights– Addressing informal employment and conditions of work

•Security– End violence against women

Trends in Political Participation

Countries at 30% or more in 2002

• South Africa• Mozambique• Argentina• Netherlands• New Zealand• Sweden• Germany• Denmark• Norway• Finland• Iceland

Countries at 20-29% in 2002

• Lao People’s Democratic Republic• Namibia• Australia• Canada• Spain• Bahamas• Barbados• Trinidad• Switzerland• Uganda• Tanzania• Turkmenistan• China• Austria• Seychelles• Vietnam• Bosnia• Cuba

For More Information on Task Force 3

Promises to Keep: Achieving Gender Equality

and Women’s Empowerment

www.unmillenniumproject.org