UNIS/OUS/RI/004
19 September 2008

Governments and Multilateral Organizations Must Do a Better Job of Answering to Women for Commitments Made, Says New UNIFEM Report

Stronger accountability needed to move from commitments to results, including achievement of the Millennium Development Goals. Women must be included in all oversight processes; gender equality must become standard against which public performance is assessed

VIENNA, 19 September (UN Information Service) - Ahead of a highlevel meeting of world leaders on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) next week, a new report, Progress of the World's Women 2008/2009, Who Answers to Women? Gender and Accountability, released by the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM), reveals that much stronger accountability mechanisms for tracking progress on gender equality are needed in order to meet national and international commitments to women's rights. Accountability to women begins with increasing the number of women in decision-making positions, but it cannot stop there.

Implementation still has a long way to go in translating commitments to women's rights into changes in women's lives. To date, women are outnumbered 4 to 1 in legislatures around the world; over 60 percent of all unpaid family workers globally are women; women still earn on average 17 per cent less than men, and about one-third of women suffer gender-based violence during their lives. In some parts of the world, 1 in 10 women dies from pregnancy-related causes even though the means for preventing maternal mortality are cost-effective and well known.

Gender gaps on this scale are symptomatic of an accountability crisis. Governments and multilateral organizations have a responsibility to do a better job of answering to women. Progress 2008/2009 points out that accountability mechanisms work for women when they can ask for explanations and information from decision makers, and, where necessary, initiate investigations or get compensation. Women must be included in oversight processes, and advancing women's rights must be a key standard against which the performance of public officials is assessed and, if necessary, sanctioned.

"If any man asks why I support better accountability to women, here's my response: because a government that answers to women will answer to you too," said UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

"As world leaders convene to discuss the Millennium Development Goals next week, Progress 2008/2009 shows us that backing international commitments made to women with stronger accountability measures would bring us a lot closer to achieving the MDGs," said UNIFEM Executive Director Inés Alberdi. "This report highlights the challenges that remain for gender equality to be realized in practice, but it also draws attention to the efforts of millions of women who expose discrimination, demand redress and have changed the meaning of accountability. It emphasizes the important role that multilateral organizations must lay in improving their own accountability and in racking investments in gender equality," she added.

Progress of the World's Women 2008/2009 provides an assessment of each of the Millennium Development Goals from a gender perspective and focuses on five key areas where urgent action is required to strengthen accountability to women: politics and governance, access to public services, economic opportunities, justice, and the distribution of international assistance for development and security. In each of these areas the report details means of building state capacity-or good governance - form a women's rights perspective."

Good governance needs women, and women need good governance," said Anne Marie Goetz lead author of the report. "Women have a different perspective on accountability because they often experience accountability failures differently from men. This report argues that good governance needs women's engagement - just as gender equality requires states that are accountable and capable of delivering on promises of women's rights."

Key findings and recommendations are:

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Media Inquiries:

Jonathan Rich
Telephone: (+1-347) 262-9115
Email: jonathan@jcrcommunications.com

Oisika Chakarbarti
Telephone:(+1-212) 906-6506
Email: oisika.chakrabarti@unifem.org

For more information and access to the full report, please visit: www.unifem.org/progress/2008