COST OF VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN 'BEYOND CALCULATION', WARNS UN CHIEF

COST OF VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN 'BEYOND CALCULATION', WARNS UN CHIEF
New York, Mar 8 2009 11:00AM

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today added his voice to a chorus of United Nations officials calling for an end to the routine violence suffered by women and girls around the world, in a message marking the International Day for Women.

In some countries, as many as one in three women will be beaten, coerced into sex or otherwise abused in her lifetime, Mr. Ban said in his message for the Day, celebrated annually on 8 March.

"We must stop the habitual and socially ingrained violence that mars lives, destroys health, perpetuates poverty and prevents us from achieving women's equality and empowerment," he stressed.

Last year the Secretary-General launched a global campaign "Unite to End Violence Against Women" ending in 2015, the target date for the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), a set of internationally agreed objectives which include eradicating poverty, achieving universal gender
equality in education and reversing the rate of HIV/AIDS incidence.

"Violence against women is also linked to the spread of HIV/AIDS," said Mr. Ban.

He explained that not only are large numbers of women in some countries forced to have sex, but "Women and girls are also systematically and deliberately subject to rape and sexual violence in war."

"Violence, and particularly sexual and gender-based violence, is one of the defining characteristics of contemporary conflict," said Ron Redmond, the spokesperson of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees.

Mr. Ban noted that "Death, injury, medical costs and lost employment are but the tip of an iceberg. The impact on women and girls, their families, their communities and their societies in terms of shattered lives and livelihoods is beyond calculation."

To change the mindsets and socially ingrained habits of generations will not be easy and will take the collective force of individuals, organizations and governments, added the Secre
tary-General.

"We must work together to state loud and clear, at the highest level, that violence against women will not be tolerated, in any form, in any context, in any circumstance," he said, adding that "We need a positive image of women in the media. We need laws that say violence is a crime, that hold perpetrators accountable and are enforced."

In another statement, UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) Executive Director Ann Veneman underlined the significant role men and boys have to play in ending violence against women and called for putting in place programmes and activities to educate them.

Michael Sidibé, Executive Director of UNAIDS, called for gender equality to be at the core of all the world body's actions, saying that it is not only necessary for social justice but also for achieving universal access to HIV prevention, treatment, care and support.
________________

NUMBER OF UNEMPLOYED WOMEN TO SOAR AMID ECONOMIC CRISIS, WARNS UN AGENCY

NUMBER OF UNEMPLOYED WOMEN TO SOAR AMID ECONOMIC CRISIS, WARNS UN AGENCY
New York, Mar 5 2009 6:00PM

The global economic crisis will plunge a further 22 million women into unemployment and make decent work for women increasingly more difficult to find in 2009, predicted a new United Nations report issued today.

The International Labour Office (ILO) launched its annual Global Employment Trends for Women (GET) report in advance of International Women's Day on 8 March, calling for "creative solutions" to close the gender gap.

"Gender inequality in the world of work has long been with us, but it is likely that it will be exacerbated by the crisis," warned the agency's Director-General Juan Somavia.

"In times of economic upheaval, women often experience the negative consequences more rapidly and are slower to enjoy the benefits of recovery," he said, adding that "before the crisis, the majority of working women were in the informal economy with lower earnings and less social protection."

The GET report noted that of the 3 billion employed people across the world, slightly over a 40 per cent are women, and that the global unemployment rate for women could reach 7.4 per cent in 2009, compared to 7 per cent for men.

The biggest difference in unemployment rates between men and women due to the economic meltdown will be felt by women in Latin America and the Caribbean, according to the ILO report.

The new publication also projected that the ratio of women pushed into insecure jobs this year would be greater than men, with the global vulnerability employment rate ranging from 50.5 to 54.7 per cent for women and 47.2 to 51.8 per cent for men.

"Women's lower employment rates, weaker control over property and resources, concentration in informal and vulnerable forms of employment with lower earnings, and less social protection, all place women in a weaker position than men to weather the crises," said Jane Hodges, ILO Bureau for Gender Equality Director.
________________

AFRICAN WOMEN BEAR BRUNT OF GLOBAL CRISES, WARN DELEGATES AT UN CONFERENCE

AFRICAN WOMEN BEAR BRUNT OF GLOBAL CRISES, WARN DELEGATES AT UN CONFERENCE
New York, Mar 4 2009 6:00PM

The global economic, food and climate change crises have hit African women the hardest, a delegation of African and United Nations female officials attending a conference on gender equality cautioned today.

"When we look at the GDPs of all African countries, they are between five and seven per cent [in the recent past] … but this present crisis is going to erode all those gains that have been made," Isatou Njie Saidy, Vice-President of Gambia, told journalists at UN Headquarters in New York.

She pointed to the reduction in remittances to developing countries, the drop-off in the tourism sector in Africa and a fall in direct foreign investment into the continent as clear examples of how the global economic crisis affects women in Africa.

"As a result of inequalities women will feel the pinch more than men," said Ms. Saidy.

Women, who make up the majority of small-scale farmers in Africa, are disproportionately affected by the recent hikes in food prices, increased cost of fertilizer and other agricultural inputs, and limited access to fertile land and farming machinery.

Ms. Saidy said that with regards to climate change, "Africa is being punished for something it has not done. We are told that the emission rate for Africa is just 2 per cent of what is emitted in the entire world, but we are paying the price for it.

"Therefore, those who emit should definitely do something to help Africa," she said, adding that climate change is affecting agriculture and that women are the ones suffering the increase in natural disasters most of the time.

The UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) will hold a regional ministerial review in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, in October to determine how much remains to be achieved to attain equality and the empowerment of women in Africa in the 15 years since the UN's Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing.

Delegates attending the 1995 'Beijing + 15' conference prepared a Platform for Action that aimed at achieving greater equality and opportunity for women worldwide.

"We have fought so hard for women's empowerment, but now we are seeing that that the global economic, food and climate change crises are threatening to compromise our hard-fought gains," said Thokozile Ruzvidzo, who heads the ECA African Centre for Gender and Social Development.

She underscored that the Beijing +15 review is a fundamental prerequisite for progress for African women in the development of their continent.

"We need to focus on how higher food prices and how climate are impacting the lives of women. We need solutions for these challenges and we need them quickly," she stressed in a press release.

In addition to Gambia's Vice-President, more than 15 African Ministers attended the Commission of the Status of Women (CSW) in New York today. Participants at the two-week session of Commission, which opened on Monday, are discussing the progress toward ensuring the respect for women's rights across the world.
________________