Reporting the underreported about the plan of action for People, Planet and Prosperity, and efforts to make the promise of the SDGs a reality.
A project of the Non-profit International Press Syndicate Group with IDN as the Flagship Agency in partnership with Soka Gakkai International in consultative status with ECOSOC.
![Women UN Gathering To Call for Robust and Urgent Actions to Advance Gender Equality By Caroline Mwanga NEW YORK (IDN) – Twenty-five years after its adoption the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, member states and observers, civil society organizations, gender equality leaders, CEOs, and heads of academia will gather virtually on July 21 in a multi-stakeholder hearing. The purpose is to bolster priority actions at the global and national level that will address the challenges that threaten the bold vision of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action. The Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action remains today the most comprehensive and transformative global agenda for the achievement of gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls. Since its adoption, significant progress has been made on women and girls' rights. However, the UN Secretary-General's report on the Review and appraisal of the implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and UN Women’s report, "Women's Rights in Review 25 years after Beijing" warned that despite many advances, progress towards gender equality has been faltering and hard-won advances are being reversed today. "By working together – girls and boys, women and men – we can galvanize multilateral action to realise human rights of all women and girls,” said the President of the UN General Assembly Tijjani Muhammad-Bande in a video message to commemorate this year's International Women’s Day. With the support of UN Women, Mr. Muhammad-Bande is convening an interactive hearing to call for a stronger multilateral commitment to implement the Beijing Platform for Action to advance the rights of women and girls, intensify efforts to build back better from the pandemic and set the stage for the High-Level Meeting of the UN General Assembly on the margins of the High-Level Week. The High Level Week will focus on the theme "Accelerating the realization of gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls". The virtual gathering on July 21 will provide an opportunity for all stakeholders to exchange experiences, lessons learned and good practices to advance the full, effective and accelerated implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action. UN Women Executive Director Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka said: "It’s up to us to make sure that we use the power of multilateral investment and commitment to realize the potential gains from radical, positive action to redress long-standing inequalities in multiple areas of women’s lives." She asked, "governments and all other service providers including the private sector to take this opportunity to plan their response to COVID-19 as they have never done before, include women in its design, and fully take a gender perspective into account.". COVID-19 has laid bare pre-existing inequalities. Across every sphere, from health to the economy, security to social protection, women and girls are disproportionately affected. UN Women points out that: While women's political representation has doubled since 1995, men still control more than three quarters of the seats in the single and lower houses of parliaments around the world. Nearly a billion women and girls 15 years and over lacked basic reading and writing skills in 2018. Women 25 to 34 years old are 25% more likely than men to live in poverty. It is the most marginalized women who have least contributed to the climate crisis who are most affected by environmental degradation and natural disasters. After years of progress, the proportion of peace agreements that included references to women dropped from 32 per cent between 2011 and 2015 to 7.7 per cent in 2018. Priority Actions The progress review of the visionary agenda takes place for the first time in the context of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The 2030 Agenda, including SDG 5 on achieving gender equality and empowering all women and girls, highlighted the centrality of gender equality to progress across all the Goals and targets. The Decade of Action for the Sustainable Development Goals, called for by world leaders at the SDG Summit in 2019, recognized the value in strengthening international cooperation to tackle both emerging and existing gaps in the realization of gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls. In addition to a stronger multilateral approach, priority actions for advancement of gender equality include repealing discriminatory laws, the provision of adequate financing, closing gender data gaps, harnessing the potential of technology and innovation and eliminating gender stereotypes. [IDN-InDepthNews – 18 July 2020] Image credit: UN Women IDN is flagship agency of the Non-profit International Press Syndicate Group. Visit us on Facebook and Twitter. This article is published under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence. Feel free to share, remix, tweak, and build upon it non-commercially. Caroline Mwanga SUSTAINABILITY Gender Equality 18 July 2020 Prev Next UN News This interactive WHO dashboard/map provides the latest global numbers and numbers by country of COVID-19 cases on a daily Basis. Search Newsletter No fake news. Facts and in-depth analysis. On issues that impact our interconnected world. Donate €5 or $5 upwards. Help guarantee an adequate fee for our colleagues. IDN is the flagship of non-profit International Press Syndicate. Amount PARTNERS SDG Media Compact UN WOMEN RELATED WEBSITES International Press Syndicate](/images/ACTIVISM_cropped.jpg)
By Caroline Mwanga
NEW YORK (IDN) – Twenty-five years after its adoption the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, member states and observers, civil society organizations, gender equality leaders, CEOs, and heads of academia will gather virtually on July 21 in a multi-stakeholder hearing. The purpose is to bolster priority actions at the global and national level that will address the challenges that threaten the bold vision of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action.
By Santo D. Banerjee
NEW YORK (IDN) —Latin America is scrambling to contain surging COVID-19 infections while confronting near-certain recession and related impacts. But polices that prioritize poor and vulnerable people can help mitigate the region’s already extreme poverty and inequality, says a new study by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
Before the pandemic, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) projected only 1.6 percent economic growth for the region in 2020, with recessions in several countries. In April, it projected a contraction of 5.2 percent, with almost every country in recession. However, tourism-dependent Caribbean nations could see GDP plunge between 5 and 10 percent—worsening the region's chronic poverty, inequality, and insecurity.
Viewpoint by Rhoda Peace Tumusiime
The writer is a member of the Malabo Montpellier Panel and former AU Commissioner for Rural Economy and Agriculture at the African Union Commission (AUC).
ENTEBBE, Uganda (IDN) – Livestock have long been the insurance policy of Africa’s poorest, with even a single goat or a chicken providing a buffer against economic hardship and hunger.
But as Covid-19 forces many to fall back on these safety nets, the need for more long-term support of the continent’s livestock sector is laid bare.
UN Academic Impact Talks to Students from Several Countries
By Santo D. Banerjee
NEW YORK (IDN) – COVID-19 pandemic has forced more than 1.5 billion students in 165 countries out of school, enforcing the global academic community to explore new ways of teaching and learning, including distance and online education, according to UNESCO estimates.
This has proven challenging for both students and educators, who have to deal with the emotional, physical and economic difficulties posed by the illness while doing their part to help curb the spread of the virus, notes United Nations Academic Impact (UNAI). (P11) CHINESE | JAPANESE TEXT VERSION PDF | PORTUGUESE
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network
NEW YORK (IDN) – As Americans explore the renaming of army bases, statues, streets, and schools that honour racist slave-holders or portray demeaning relationships between whites and Black, Brown and Latinx citizens, similar efforts are underway in Senegal and Liberia most recently.
Goree, an island in Senegal linked closely with slave trade, has decided to rename one of its main squares in response to the anti-racist movements around the world.
The island’s municipal council unanimously agreed to rename Europe Square as “Liberty and Human Dignity Square.”
By Ramesh Jaura
BERLIN | TOKYO (IDN) – Togo in West Africa is the venue of a milestone project between Soka Gakkai, a global community-based Buddhist organization and the International Tropical Timber Organization (ITTO). The two have signed a memorandum to launch a reforestation project offering income opportunities for women's groups in two rural areas of Togo.
The memorandum involving a donation of 10 million yen (US$93,300) for the initial one-year phase of the project was signed on July 1 at the Soka Gakkai (SG) headquarters in Tokyo. The project will kick off on September 1. (P10) GERMAN | JAPANESE TEXT VERSION PDF | SWAHILI
Viewpoint by Nick Engelfried*
BELLINGHAM, Washington (IDN) – As the Trump administration neared the end of its first year in office in 2017, it seemed environmental activists had lost one of the most hard-fought battles in the movement's history. Thanks to a last-minute manoeuvre by Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, Congressional Republicans succeeded in passing legislation allowing oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). Some of the worst fears of environmental and Indigenous rights groups for what might happen under the administration appeared to be coming true.
Viewpoint by Inge Kaul
The writer, Dr Inge Kaul, is Senior Fellow, Hertie School, Berlin and Non-resident Senior Fellow, Center for Global Development, Washington, DC.
BERLIN (IDN) – European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen organized two spectacular fund-raising events, one on May 4 and the other on June 27, 2020. The first drive collected €9.8 billion and the second €6.15 billion, including €4.9 billion announced together by the EU and the European Investment Bank.
According to official pronouncements, the funds will be used to make coronavirus vaccines, testing and treatments available worldwide, notably in low and middle-income countries.
Viewpoint by Alfredo Saad Filho*
LONDON (IDN) – The COVID-19 pandemic has stress-tested countries, economies and political systems like never before. Nowhere has the outcome been more devastating than in Brazil, arguably the country with the worst pandemic response in the world.
Brazil’s vulnerabilities are visible in the mass graves in São Paulo and Manaus. The country is competing with the USA for the largest number of diagnosed COVID-19 cases (more than one million) and the highest number of fatalities (above 50,000 – but likely to be a vast undercount). Disturbingly, there is no sign that Brazil’s cases or deaths have peaked yet.
