Welcome to Phase II of the blog on “Gender equality and empowerment of women.” This phase will focus on women’s full participation in decision-making and ways to increase women’s economic independence, including their access to and control over resources.

As with the initial phase of this blog (which focused on the implementation of MDG3 and measures to eliminate violence against women), participants are encouraged to highlight the types of commitments required to ensure the full implementation of MDG3 in all countries by 2015.

Women’s full participation in decision-making
The full participation of women in political decision-making at all levels, including their involvement in measures to achieve all other MDGs, is of paramount importance to achieving gender equality and the empowerment of women. In addition to the political arena, women’s full participation in decision-making positions in the private sector, academia, civil society and the media is also crucial to build synergies across different sectors. Women’s public participation is a human rights issue; women have a right to be represented. Increased women’s participation also ensures that women’s interests are represented in decision-making and their participation widens policy debates and priorities. Research has shown that increased participation of women in decision-making has a positive impact on development priorities and poverty reduction, and that, when empowered, women make decisions that not only have a positive effect on themselves, but the lives of their families and communities as well. Progress in increasing the political representation of women in national parliaments has been increasing at a steady but slow pace, but growth has been uneven across regions. Insufficient data are available on women’s role at local government level as well as on their role in senior positions in other areas, such as the private sector and civil society.

Women’s economic independence
Women’s economic independence is critical to achieving all MDGs, not only MDG3. Even though women’s participation in paid employment outside agriculture has increased, women’s work continues to be characterized by a concentration in low status and low pay jobs, which are often temporary and informal. Globally, gender wage gaps exist and unemployment rates for women are higher than for men. While inequalities continue to define the quality, conditions and characteristics of women’s labour market participation, they also shoulder a disproportionate share of responsibilities at home. Women perform the majority of unpaid work which restricts their access to employment opportunities outside of the home and reinforces the traditional division of labour between women and men. Increasing women’s participation in paid employment is one of the most important strategies for poverty reduction, as is the promotion of women’s entrepreneurship. However, the employment must be based on decent work principles such as labour standards, social protection and recognition of workers’ rights. In addition, it is important to recognize the value of women’s unpaid work, and develop and promote policies that facilitate the reconciliation of employment and family responsibilities for all workers, women and men.

In addition, women’s access to and control over productive and economic resources is central to their empowerment and must be expanded if gender equality is to be achieved. Women’s access to land and property, including through inheritance, is critical to their economic empowerment. Land ownership has direct economic benefits, for example as a source of income, as a key input for production, and as collateral for credit. Without equal access to credit and other financial services, such as insurance or savings, women’s economic empowerment will remain limited.

Issues for discussion

1. What good practices exist to increase women’s access to decision-making positions at all levels?
2. What measures need to be taken to increase women’s access to employment opportunities, and access to and control over productive resources?
3. How can measurement of progress in these areas be strengthened?

9 September to 21 September

1. The last few years have witnessed a remarkable expansion in the global economy. However, there has been a raging debate on the benefits of globalization and growth. Opponents of globalization contend that its benefits have largely accrued only to a few countries at the expense of low-skilled workers in both developed and developing countries. They also note that despite strong growth in many developing countries, this has not translated into enough jobs to significantly reduce poverty. On the other hand, proponents of globalization contend that globalization, particularly trade, advances the social agenda such as improving the wages of both men and women. Given these concerns, how can we ensure that globalization does not undermine job security but leads to the generation of better and more productive jobs, especially for the poor and what options are available for promoting better global economic governance that will help developing countries achieve productive employment and decent work for all?
2. What are the policy options for national governments and their development partners to stimulate economic growth with productive employment creation?
3. Micro-credit has been one of the successful schemes to generate employment opportunities for the poor, particularly women. Based on experiences, what are the potentials as well as limitations of micro-credit related employment creation in terms of sustained long-term poverty reduction?

9 September to 21 September

Biodiversity loss and degradation of ecosystems are attributable to multiple causes and measures to reverse these trends need to be based on sound, situation-specific diagnosis. While there is a growing recognition by governments and other stakeholders of the importance of conserving natural assets, valuing ecosystems and their multiple services remains a very imperfect science. Decisions based on incomplete valuation tend to favour uses which are often incompatible with maintaining those ecosystem services and which may undermine sustainable development.

Global cooperation is essential to combat climate change. The costs of inaction are very unevenly distributed, with poor, vulnerable countries bearing the greatest burden while having contributed little to the problem. The long-lasting effects of greenhouse gas emissions compound the problem, as current generations may bear the costs of urgent climate change mitigation actions, but future generations are the main beneficiaries.

1. How can we strengthen the knowledge base of decision making relating to conserving the natural resource base?
2. What policies and institutions can help societies value more accurately ecosystems and their services?
3. What measures, actions and/or commitments should countries be expected to make to combat climate change (e.g., on lifestyle changes, technology development and transfer, financing, capacity building) and how should these commitments be implemented and enforced?
4. What measures, actions and/or commitments should be expected from the private sector to combat climate change (e.g. corporate social responsibility)?

9 September to 21 September

Meeting the MDG health targets

Worldwide, under-five mortality declined from 93 to 72 deaths per 1,000 live births between 1990 and 2006. Nevertheless, in 62 countries, under-five mortality is not declining fast enough to meet the Millennium Development Goal 4 target of reducing by two thirds the mortality rate for children under 5 years of age. The reduction of maternal mortality also remains a challenging task; the Millennium Development Goal 5 target of reducing the maternal mortality ratio by three-quarters between 1990 and 2015 is the area of least progress among all the MDGs. In many countries, malnutrition, and lack of access to quality primary health care and basic infrastructure, including water and sanitation, continue to be major causes of ill health and death among mothers and children. Having fewer pregnancies and spacing births increase the survival rate of both women and their children, underscoring the importance of the Millennium Development Goal target of universal access to reproductive health.

Infectious diseases continue to inflict a huge burden on developing countries. Globally, about 33 million people were living with HIV/AIDS in 2007. Malaria causes 1 million deaths annually along with 300-500 million episodes of illness. Sub-Saharan Africa bears a disproportionate share of the burden of both these diseases. Affordable access to essential medicines in developing countries is far from adequate. Concerns about global health have sparked a large increase in donor funding since 2000. International health partnerships and funds, such as the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria and the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization, are an increasingly important mechanism to pool and channel public and private funds.

MDG 7, target 3 stresses the importance of adequate water and sanitation for sustainable development. They are also vital inputs to improving health, although they are generally outside the purview of the health sector. Current trends suggest that the world may meet the drinking water target, but not that for sanitation.

Issues

1. Strengthening health care systems, including sustainable funding, human resource training, improvement of aid effectiveness and harmonization with country priorities.
2. Provision of integrated services – primary care, reproductive health, continuum of care for mothers and children, HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment, child health and malaria interventions.
3. Strategies to meet the needs of vulnerable populations, especially rural populations and the urban poor.
4. Infrastructure needs for health care, water and sanitation.
5. Affordable access to essential medicines in developing countries.

The international community has an invaluable role to play and a responsibility to live up to its commitments. The possibility of achieving the Millennium Development Goals by 2015 largely depends on building stronger global partnerships. Goal 8 of the Millennium Development Goals embodies the global partnership for development in the fight against poverty and hunger, and in support of human development and good governance. Donor countries and the private sector have committed to support the efforts of developing countries through more ODA, fairer trade, debt relief and improved access to essential medicines and technology.

While important progress has been achieved in several areas significant gaps remain in the delivery of the commitments made by member states. At the request of the UN Secretary General, the MDG Gap Task Force prepared a report - Delivering on the Global Partnership for Achieving the MDGs – aimed to track international commitments on aid, trade, debt and to follow progress on access to essential medicines and technology. It identifies the areas where additional actions still need to be taken.

Discussion Phase 1

Large debt relief to the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries exemplifies the contribution that a strong partnership for development can make to increase investments for human development. In other areas, however, there is an urgent need to strengthen the global partnership for development by closing some of the remaining gaps. In particular:

1. Increasing ODA by 18 billion dollars a year in order to meet the 2010 target set at the G-8 Summit in Gleneagles in 2005.
2. Re-commencing trade negotiations immediately to reverse the damage made by their recent collapse on the promise to give a development focus to trade negotiations
3. Improving access to essential quality medicines, especially in the public sector, to make them available to the poor
4. Accelerating the diffusion of new technologies for development and increase investment in infrastructure, especially electricity

Questions/Issues:

1. What should be done to close these gaps? In the coming weeks we would like to stimulate debate on what can be done to move the international community to live up to their commitments.
2. The first focus is on aid. Over the past two years aid (after correcting for inflation) decreased, while at the same time demands for additional assistance have been increasing in order to allow countries to address new challenges, including support to overcome the food crisis and meet the climate change challenges. What more can be done to convince the donor community to accelerate their follow through on commitments?
3. How can aid be made more effective to support achievement of the MDGs?