WUNRN
WOMEN & POVERTY
UN-INSTRAW: Women & Poverty: New
Challenges
More than 1 billion people live in
poverty around the world, and a great majority of them are women. Women’s
poverty is a violation of their human rights to health and well-being, food,
adequate housing, a safe and healthy living environment, social security,
employment and development. Poverty can also be the result of human rights
violations when women are denied equal access to employment opportunities, are
paid less than men for equal work, are prevented by law or custom from owning
or inheriting land, or when women become the victims of physical and sexual
abuse. When women are denied equal access to education, when they do not have
the right to decide on the number of spacing of their children, or when they
face an unequal share of the responsibility for raising children, their ability
to earn an income and to be protected from poverty is greatly compromised.
UNIFEM - Reducing Women's Poverty
& Exclusion
Since
poverty traps women in multiple layers of discrimination and hinders their
ability to claim their rights, ending feminized poverty has always been a core
UNIFEM priority. Not only do women bear a disproportionate burden of the
world's poverty, but in some cases, globalization has widened the gap, with
women losing more than their share of jobs, benefits and labour rights.
>From tax systems to trade regimes, however, economic policies and
institutions still mostly fail to take gender disparities into account. With
too few seats at the tables where economic decisions are made, women themselves
have little chance of rectifying the deepening of existing inequalities.
____________________________________________________________
International Day for
the Eradication of Poverty
17 October
|
|
In recognition of the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the theme for this year's observance of the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty is "Human Rights and Dignity of People Living in Poverty". The struggle against poverty has evolved more and more visibly into an overarching development goal of the international community. Poverty eradication, however, is not only a development goal; it is also a central challenge for ensuring world-wide recognition of human rights. The international community has acknowledged that poverty is a violation of human rights and that promoting human rights can reduce poverty. The world-wide persistence of poverty can be attributed in part to the violations of human rights. In fact, human rights violations can be both a cause and a consequence of poverty. People living in poverty are excluded from society, and their ability to secure their own rights is particularly limited by their predicament. Poverty can be seen as a human condition of deprivation of resources, capabilities, choices, security and power necessary for the enjoyment of an adequate standard of living and other civil, cultural, economic, political and social rights. Under the core human rights instruments, human beings are guaranteed among others, the rights to life, liberty and security of person, the right to the highest attainable standard of health, the right to just and favourable working conditions, the right to adequate food, housing and social security, the right to education and participation in the democratic process. Securing those rights for all would bring us closer to poverty eradication. Human rights based approach to fighting poverty links poverty reduction to the question of obligation, rather than charity and compels policymakers to implement strategies helping the most vulnerable individuals and groups escape poverty and destitution. For more information on poverty as an issue of human rights and human rights as a tool to eradicate poverty see the report of the Secretary-General on the Observance of the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty (A/61/308). |
================================================================
To contact the list administrator, or to leave the list, send an email to: wunrn_listserve-request@lists.wunrn.com.
Thank you.