| Conferences address gender redistribution of resources through budgeting |
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According to Millennium Development Goal (MDG) 3, gender disparity in education should be eliminated by 2015 and women empowered significantly. Four years ahead of the deadline however, many women in developing countries continue to suffer from daily discrimination and are denied basic rights. So called “gender-responsive budgeting” (GRB), the allocation of public resources in ways that contribute to advancing gender equality and women’s empowerment, are thus increasingly perceived by experts as a useful instrument to ensure the implementation of gender-related laws. The support of GRB as a means to increase accountability of gender related policies in developing countries was discussed at two UN Women High Level meetings, held this month. Participants re-iterated the importance to support planning and budgeting measures in a gender responsive way and adopted policy recommendations that are to feed into the Fourth High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness, to be held in South Korea, in November. “No matter how progressive laws to promote equality between men and women may be, without budgets with a gender perspective that allocate resources differentially, inequality will persist…”, Raquel Coello, adviser to UN Women, stresses in an interview with IPS. If a budget is drawn up, the different effects of public policy measures on men and women should be analysed and the budget allocated according to the respective needs. “When designing an employment policy, it should be taken into account that unemployment is higher among women than among men, and attention should be paid to that difference”, Coello continues. While several developing countries, such as Ecuador and Peru, have already started to use GRB as a means to advance gender responsive redistribution of resources, much remains to be done, she notes. “Gender equality is an intrinsic part of development. A society cannot develop if only half of its population is getting ahead. Democracies must ensure a fair redistribution of their resources”, Coello concludes. Read the full interview here: IPS: Inter Press Service Sources:  |
