Cabinet updates gender policy

GOVERNMENT will revise and update its gender policy to accommodate new issues like climate change and globalisation, which have an impact on women and girls.

During the implementation of the 1997 National Gender Policy, it was discovered that there were new and emerging issues at national, regional and global level which have implications for the promotion of gender equality in Namibia. Such issues include the worsening situation regarding HIV-AIDS, international economic development, globalisation and climate change. ‘All of them have a disproportional impact on women and girls, presenting challenges, but also opportunities through which to address issues of gender equality,’ a Government statement on the latest Cabinet decisions said. To tackle the emerging challenges, the Ministry of Gender Equality and Child Welfare together with relevant stakeholders embarked upon revising the National Gender Policy to bring it in line with the various international instruments like the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), the SADC Declaration on Gender and Development and its Addendum on the Prevention and Eradication of Violence against Women and Children.It was also aligned with the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa, the UN Convention against Transnational Crime and the UN Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, especially Women and Children. This is also called the Palermo Protocol. The first National Gender Policy in Namibia was developed in 1997. It drew from the provisions of the Namibian Constitution, as well as the direction provided by the First National Development Plan and the Fourth World Conference on Women (1995). Its main purpose was to identify ways and means through which Government can encourage and value the contribution of women in national development efforts.The revised Gender Policy seeks to create an enabling environment for different sectors to mainstream gender in line with the national development plans, Vision 2030 and the Millennium Development Goals (MDG). The revised National Gender Policy framework creates mechanisms and guidelines for all sectors and other stakeholders for planning, implementing and monitoring and evaluating gender equality strategies and programmes in order to ensure effective strategies for gender equality and women’s empowerment. The priority areas in the revised policy are poverty and rural development, education and training, health, reproductive health and HIV-AIDS, gender-based violence, trade and economic empowerment, governance and decision-making, media, information and communication.Other new additions include environmental issues, peace-building and conflict resolution, natural disaster management, legal affairs and human rights as well as gender equality in the family context.A national gender plan of action is being drawn up to speed up the implementation of the revised gender policy.