WUNRN
The Global Economic Crisis and the Empowerment of Women
Special Presentation by Mayra Buvinic
Director of the Gender in Poverty Reduction
Vice Presidency of
the World Bank
4 November 2009,
In preparation for the Beijing+15 54th Commission on the Status of Women
in 2010, the World Bank in Geneva and the CoNGO Geneva NGO Committee on the
Status of Women (NGOCSW) invited Ms. Mayra Buvinic to present the Bank’s
strategy and policy in approaching the financial and economic crisis from a
women’s empowerment and gender equal perspective and to address how gender
equality is mainstreamed in the Bank.
She was asked particularly to speak to the NGOs present on how the World
Bank is tackling the economic and financial crises from the angle of women's
rights, including the right to development, to women in decision-making and
capitalising on their creativity and as agents of change, as added value not as
welfare beneficiaries or victims in macroeconomic policies to get them out of
poverty. She was also asked to describe
how the World Bank is strategically mainstreaming gender equality in its
policies, programmes and projects that are sustainable, taking into account the
asymmetries in power structures of institutions, politics, the labour
market, corporate responsibilities, paid and unpaid work, cultures
and mind sets.
Introduction
Progress in gender equality and women's
empowerment has been uneven. Concerted
country efforts have helped raise girls' enrolments significantly in the past
decade, reaching gender parity in primary school enrolments in most (83 of 106)
developing countries. Yet, in the same period, the increase in women's
participation in the economy and in political decision-making has been modest
at best. The 2007 Global Monitoring
Report: Confronting the Challenges of Gender Equality and Fragile States on the
Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) calls attention of the international
community to scale up strategies for reaching the eight Millennium Development
Goals. While progress on the first goal of halving poverty is on track
everywhere except in Sub-Saharan Africa, efforts to attain goals related to
child mortality, disease reduction, and environmental sustainability are
falling. The report recommends a
stronger role for donors and IFIs in monitoring gender equality and in
scaling-up women's access to opportunities, rights, and voice. The report
stresses that investing in gender equality is smart economics.
The World Bank’s New Approach to Gender
Equality and the GAP
In opening her presentation, Mayra Buvinic said that
the Bank had admitted it had done a bad job in the past in integrating women’s
issues in the economic sector, which was relatively low compared to other
aspects as education and health. Six
years earlier, when Karen Mason, former director of the Gender Department of
the Bank, came to Geneva in 2002 at the invitation of the NGO Committee on the
Status of Women, she informed an audience of over 150 that the Bank had
recently introduced gender equality strategic objectives, but had no
institutional policy. Now, Ms Buvinic
confirmed that the Bank not only had laid out a policy on gender equality, but
had also a specific four-year “Gender
Action Plan” (GAP) from 2007-2010 and an
adequate budget to carry out its mandate over the four years.
The Bank’s former strategy had been on social
outcomes, e.g. parity in education or in the health of mothers to reduce
maternal mortality, but it sadly lagged behind in opportunities to make women at all age levels participate
in the economic growth and development of a country, . The Bank staff was therefore
sensitised to the importance of providing opportunities to use the comparative
advantage of their economic expertise to ensure that the GAP would serve as a
tool to increase economic opportunity for adolescent girls and young
women. Since statistics have shown that
progress in education has not been matched by higher labour force
participation, it is critical that more policy attention go to equality in
economic opportunity, especially the transition from school to work and
building on girls’ and adolescents’ achievements in education and sustaining
them in later stages of life.
Besides
training and measuring indicators, the Bank now looks at business reports and
copying models on how they do business for women. The Bank also cooperates with large private
sector leaders to expand gender equal opportunities. Technical staff of the Bank have increased
their attention to gender issues from 55% to 72%. The GAP’s aim is to change the way the Bank
is doing business on gender equality and to build evidence of accomplishments
over the long term through cases in order to have an infrastructure framework,
a sustainable policy and a market to work for women.
The World
Bank is also lobbying for the next theme of the Development Marketplace (a
global competitive grant programme to fund innovation in development) in 2011
to be on “Gender Equality and Women’s Economic Empowerment”. Ms-Buvinic asked that NGOs campaign for this
to pass the World Bank Board by sending as many messages as we could garner and
send it to the World Bank urgently. She
also said that, as GAP is finishing
soon in 2010 and was not yet fully institutionalised, the transition plan was
for GAP to focus on reproductive health.
Questions and Answers
In answer to the question of how the World Bank looks
at gender equality and women’s rights
and empowerment, Ms Buvinic confirmed
that gender equality to the World Bank means women’s right to economic
opportunities that would empower women on the same footing as men and that it
was not only a right but a smart business strategy.
Ms Buvinic
also called attention to the fact that since
As to the question of conditionality to deal with the GAP, Ms. Buvinic emphasized the importance of government being in the driver’s seat and claiming ownership. As safeguards, however, of misappropriation, the receiving country is required that the use of the loan be results -oriented in its operations; must serve the indigenous needs and that the beneficiaries must be women, as a temporary measure to reach an even level field. Language of rights, a term which the Bank hesitates to use, is nevertheless translated in practical terms for women’s rights and not just rhetoric.
Conchita
Poncini
November 2009
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