From spassman@capaccess.orgWed Aug 30 10:16:09 1995 Date: Mon, 28 Aug 1995 20:45:13 -0400 From: Sidney Passman Reply to: beijing-conf@tristram.edc.org To: beijing-conf@tristram.edc.org Subject: Unesco contrib UNESCO PROMOTES EQUALITY IN EDUCATION, SCIENCE, CULTURE AND COMMUNICATION AT WOMEN'S CONFERENCE AND FORUM Paris - Since its founding 50 years ago, UNESCO has promoted equal opportunities for women in education, science, culture and communication. The Organization will emphasise their significance for attaining women's equality at the Fourth World Conference on Women and the parallel forum of non-governmental organizations this August and September in Beijing, China. Education is the key to equality, particularly for women and girls. On 8 September, International Literacy Day, UNESCO will hold a series of events in Beijing that call attention to the crucial educational needs of women and girls. Despite major advances in improving literacy, women and girls still lag behind. Today, one out of three women is illiterate. They make up two-thirds of the 885 million adults in the world who are illiterate. Of the approximately 130 million school-age children who have no access to education, two-thirds are girls. "For the millions of impoverished women in large areas of the globe, there has been little or no improvement at all," says UNESCO Director-General Federico Mayor in The Education of Girls and Women: Towards a Global Framework for Action. "If anything, the deprivation is greater than ever because of rapid population growth and the failure of governments and international agencies to give priority to basic educational services to girls and women." On International Literacy Day, UNESCO will release this 59-page document that draws attention to the educational opportunities available to women. It highlights successful programmes in several regions. UNESCO is also organizing a debate in which education experts, policy-makers, feminists and others will exchange ideas on improving education for girls and women. Panellists will include Aicha Bah Diallo, former Minister of Education of Guinea; actress Jane Fonda; and Muhammad Yunus, Chairperson of the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh. On the afternoon of 8 September, UNESCO is organizing three activities with other UN agencies. Participants will examine the role of female politicians in education policy, access to schooling and innovative teaching practices. UNESCO and the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) are holding a workshop that will focus on a manifesto, written in collaboration with UNESCO, that entreats the international community to reaffirm education as a fundamental human right of girls and women. This day will culminate with the formal presentation of UNESCO's 1995 International Literacy Prizes. Mr Mayor will present the King Sejong Literacy Prize, the International Reading Association Prize and the Noma Prize to literacy projects based in Canada, China, and Indonesia. At the Beijing conference, UNESCO is also encouraging women presidents, prime ministers, Noble Prize laureates and heads of UN organizations to sign the "Statement on Women's Contributions to a Culture of Peace." This UNESCO document emphasises the crucial link between peace, development and gender equality. A workshop at the forum on 1 September will focus on the socio-cultural shifts in women's productive and reproductive lives as a result of their increased participation in the labour market, life expectancy and a decline in their fertility. Another panel on 7 September will explore and analyse women's leadership. Women's role in the media will be the theme of a 14 September round table. Journalists and other media experts will discuss follow-up to the Toronto Platform for Action, a UNESCO document that outlines strategies for improving women's representation and leadership in the media. The Organization will emphasise the importance of gender equality in science and technology during the NGO forum. It will distribute print-outs of "The Gender Dimension of Science and Technology," a chapter from UNESCO's upcoming World Science Report. Three of the authors of this report will participate in a 7 September round table co-organized by UNESCO and the Third World Organization of Women in Science. At a round table co-organized by UNESCO on the conference's Youth Day on 11 September, young leaders from Africa, Asia, Europe and Latin America will exchange views on youth's role in developing equal partnerships between women and men in education, development and peace. UNESCO will promote women's human rights through several events at the NGO forum including the presentation of a draft convention to combat sexual exploitation. The Organization will also be involved in advancing Platform Plus, a document that calls for a broader definition of equality, reproductive rights and other issues, written last May during a meeting organized by the International Federation of Human Rights Leagues and supported by UNESCO and the European Union. UNESCO is also participating in three separate round tables that focus on women from Islamic countries, the Mediterranean basin and the Balkans. -end-