In the days preceding the commemoration Monday September 22, United NationsThe agency responsible for supervising gender equality and the empowerment of women, and the Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) of the United Nations sounded: none of the targets of gender equality is on the right track.
Their report, 2025 Invad of genrewarns that 10% of women live in extreme poverty and that 351 million women and girls could still be trapped there by 2030.
Some 708 million women are excluded from the labor market by unpaid care work. Even those who work are pushed to less well paid jobs. Women are excluded from land ownership, financial services and decent jobs – they are refused the tools necessary to prosper.
And, according to the report, violence against women and girls persist: one in three women will suffer physical or sexual violence during her lifetime. In addition, 676 million live less than 50 kilometers from a conflict area the highest figure since the 1990s.
In some countries, hard gains are threatened by a unprecedented Against women’s rights and a civic space in narrowing.
Nevertheless, it is important to remember the breakthrough Fourth World Women’s conferenceHeld in Beijing in 1995, represented and why he is considered one of the most important turning point in the advancement of gender equality.
The event led to the adoption of Beijing declaration and platform for actionA plan with measures focused on key areas such as poverty, education, violence, women in armed conflicts and the exercise of power.
The governments of 189 countries have unanimously declared that equality between women and men was a question of human rights and a prerequisite for the realization of social justice, as well as a necessary and fundamental prerequisite for development and peace.
Today, there is more legal protection for women and girls around the world: 1,583 sex -based violence laws were promulgated in 193 countries, against only 12 countries in 1995. And more than 100 countries have formed the police to support survivors of violence.
In the workplace, laws prohibiting the discrimination between the sexes have proliferated, stimulating the economic empowerment of women. New services have emerged to mitigate the burden of unpaid care work, and gender gaps have closed at all levels of education.
In peace consolidation, there are now 112 national action plans on women, peace and security in the world, against 19 in 2010.
Students of the Aranhraingsei high school in Siem Reap, Cambodia
The price of progress
During the high -level event on Monday, representatives of the Member States, civil society organizations, university establishments and the private sector will discuss the manner of accelerating the implementation of the Beijing Declaration and finding resources for the measures necessary to put it into action.
For UN women, investing in women means investing in society as a whole: if governments act immediately, extreme poverty among women could be reduced by 9.2% to 2.7% by 2050, which would give an increase of $ 342 dollars to the world economy that year.
However, the call to allocate more resources to reach parity comes at a time when countries reduce funding both for these initiatives and for data collection. Only half of the ministries of women and gender equality institutions have sufficient resources.
For Sarah Hendriks From the UN women, it is a question of political will, the systems favoring war on rights and equality. “We are now living in a world that spends 2.7 billions of dollars a year on arms and does not become a price of $ 320 billion to advance and reach gender equality and women’s rights”, she underlines.
Participants attend the commission on the status of women.
Another century of inequality?
The high -level meeting will be chaired by Annalena Baerbock, president of the United Nations General Assembly since the beginning of September and only the fifth woman to occupy the post since the organization of the organization 80 years ago.
At the end of the high -level week, Baerbock will also chair the election of the person who will hold the post of Secretary General of the United Nations from 2027: despite the persistent and rising pressure of many districts, there was never a woman in the role.
Globally, women remain excluded from power and decision -making: they barely occupy 27% of parliamentary seats and 30% of management positions. 113 countries have never had a head of state. If the rate of progress does not change, gender equality in leadership would take a century to achieve.
