From DEBRA@OLN.comlink.apc.orgSat Sep 23 09:39:19 1995 Date: Fri, 22 Sep 1995 09:04:00 +0100 From: Debra Guzman Reply to: beijing-conf@tristram.edc.org To: beijing-conf@tristram.edc.org Subject: WCW: Beijing Declaration part 12 [The following text is in the "ISO-8859-1" character set] [Your display is set for the "US-ASCII" character set] [Some characters may be displayed incorrectly] ## author : dpcsd@tempo.undp.org ## date : 21.09.95 ****************************************************************************** This document has been made available in electronic format by the United Nations. Reproduction and dissemination of the document - in electronic and/or printed format - is encouraged, provided acknowledgement is made of the role of the United Nations in making it available. ****************************************************************************** UNITED NATIONS FOURTH WORLD CONFERENCE ON WOMEN Beijing, China 4-15 September 1995 * ADVANCE UNEDITED DRAFT * Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action adopted by the Fourth World Conference on Women: Action for Equality, Development and Peace Beijing, 15 September 1995 Strategic objective F.1. Promote women's economic rights and independence, including access to employment and appropriate working conditions and control over economic resources Actions to be taken 167. By Governments: (a) Enact and enforce legislation to guarantee the rights of women and men to equal pay for equal work or work of equal value; (b) Adopt and implement laws against discrimination based on sex in the labour market, especially considering older women workers, hiring and promotion, the extension of employment benefits and social security, and working conditions; (c) Eliminate discriminatory practices by employers and take appropriate measures in consideration of women's reproductive role and functions, such as the denial of employment and dismissal due to pregnancy or breast-feeding, or requiring proof of contraceptive use, and take effective measures to ensure that pregnant women, women on maternity leave or women re-entering the labour market after childbearing are not discriminated against; (d) Devise mechanisms and take positive action to enable women to gain access to full and equal participation in the formulation of policies and definition of structures through such bodies as ministries of finance and trade, national economic commissions, economic research institutes and other key agencies, as well as through their participation in appropriate international bodies; (e) Undertake legislation and administrative reforms to give women equal rights with men to economic resources, including access to ownership and control over land and other properties, credit, inheritance, natural resources, and appropriate new technology; (f) Conduct reviews of national income and inheritance tax and social security systems to eliminate any existing bias against women; (g) Seek to develop a more comprehensive knowledge of work and employment through, inter alia, efforts to measure and better understand the type, extent and distribution of unremunerated work, particularly work in caring for dependants and unremunerated work done for family farms or businesses, and encourage the sharing and dissemination of information on studies and experience in this field, including the development of methods for assessing its value in quantitative terms, for possible reflection in accounts that may be produced separately from, but consistent with, core national accounts; (i) Review and amend laws governing the operation of financial institutions to ensure that they provide services to women and men on an equal basis; (j) Facilitate, at appropriate levels, more open and transparent budget processes; (k) Revise and implement national policies that support the traditional savings, credit and lending mechanisms for women; (l) Seek to ensure that national policies related to international and regional trade agreements do not adversely impact women's new and traditional economic activities; (m) Ensure that all corporations, including transnational corporations, comply with national laws and codes, social security regulations, applicable international agreements, instruments and conventions, including those related to the environment, and other relevant laws; (n) Adjust employment policies to facilitate the restructuring of work patterns in order to promote the sharing of family responsibilities; (o) Establish mechanisms and other forums to enable women entrepreneurs and women workers to contribute to the formulation of policies and programmes being developed by economic ministries and financial institutions; (p) Enact and enforce equal opportunity laws, take positive action and ensure compliance by the public and private sectors through various means; (q) Use gender-impact analysis in the development of macro- and micro-economic and social policies in order to monitor such impact and restructure policies in cases where harmful impact occurs; (r) Promote gender-sensitive policies and measures to empower women as equal partners with men in technical, managerial and entrepreneurial fields; (s) Reform laws or enact national policies that support the establishment of labour laws to ensure the protection of all women workers, including safe work practices, the right to organize and access to justice. Strategic objective F.2. Facilitate women's equal access to resources, employment, markets and trade Actions to be taken 168. By Governments: (a) Promote and support women's self-employment and the development of small enterprises, and strengthen women's access to credit and capital on appropriate terms equal to those of men through the scaling-up of institutions dedicated to promoting women's entrepreneurship, including, as appropriate, non- traditional and mutual credit schemes, as well as innovative linkages with financial institutions; (b) Strengthen the incentive role of the State as employer to develop a policy of equal opportunities for women and men; (c) Enhance, at the national and local levels, rural women's income-generating potential by facilitating their equal access to and control over productive resources, land, credit, capital, property rights, development programmes and cooperative structures; (d) Promote and strengthen micro-enterprises, new small businesses, cooperative enterprises, expanded markets and other employment opportunities and, where appropriate, facilitate the transition from the informal to the formal sector, especially in rural areas; (e) Create and modify programmes and policies that recognize and strengthen women's vital role in food security and provide paid and unpaid women producers, especially those involved in food production, such as farming, fishing and aquaculture, as well as urban enterprises, with equal access to appropriate technologies,transportation, extension services, marketing and credit facilities at the local and community levels; (f) Establish appropriate mechanisms and encourage intersectoral institutions that enable women's cooperatives to optimize access to necessary services; (g) Increase the proportion of women extension workers and other government personnel who provide technical assistance or administer economic programmes; (h) Review, reformulate, if necessary, and implement policies, including business, commercial and contract law and government regulations, to ensure that they do not discriminate against micro, small and medium-scale enterprises owned by women in rural and urban areas; (i) Analyse, advise on, coordinate and implement policies that integrate the needs and interests of employed, self-employed and entrepreneurial women into sectoral and inter-ministerial policies, programmes and budgets; (j) Ensure equal access for women to effective job training, retraining, counselling and placement services that are not limited to traditional employment areas; (k) Remove policy and regulatory obstacles faced by women in social and development programmes that discourage private and individual initiative; (l) Safeguard and promote respect for basic workers' rights, including the prohibition of forced labour and child labour, freedom of association and the right to organize and bargain collectively, equal remuneration for men and women for work of equal value and non-discrimination in employment, fully implementing the conventions of the International Labour Organization in the case of States party to those conventions and, taking into account the principles embodied in the case of those countries that are not party to those conventions in order to achieve truly sustained economic growth and sustainable development. 169. By Governments, central banks and national development banks, and private banking institutions, as appropriate: (a) Increase the participation of women, including women entrepreneurs, in advisory boards and other forums to enable women entrepreneurs from all sectors and their organizations to contribute to the formulation and review of policies and programmes being developed by economic ministries and banking institutions; (b) Mobilize the banking sector to increase lending and refinancing through incentives and the development of intermediaries that serve the needs of women entrepreneurs and producers in both rural and urbanareas, and include women in their leadership, planning and decision-making; (c) Structure services to reach rural and urban women involved in micro, small and medium-scale enterprises, with special attention to young women, low-income women, those belonging to ethnic and racial minorities, and indigenous women who lack access to capital and assets; and expand women's access to financial markets by identifying and encouraging financial supervisory and regulatory reforms that support financial institutions' direct and indirect efforts to better meet the credit and other financial needs of the micro, small and medium-scale enterprises of women; (d) Ensure that women's priorities are included in public investment programmes for economic infrastructure, such as water and sanitation, electrification and energy conservation, transport and road construction. Promote greater involvement of women beneficiaries at the project planning and implementation stages to ensure access to jobs and contracts. 170. By Governments and non-governmental organizations: (a) Pay special attention to women's needs when disseminating market, trade and resource information and provide appropriate training in these fields; (b) Encourage community economic development strategies that build on partnerships among Governments, and encourage members of civil society to create jobs and address the social circumstances of individuals, families and communities. 171. By multilateral funders and regional development banks, as well as bilateral and private funding agencies, at the international, regional and subregional levels: (a) Review, where necessary reformulate, and implement policies, programmes and projects, to ensure that a higher proportion of resources reach women in rural and remote areas; (b) Develop flexible funding arrangements to finance intermediary institutions that target women's economic activities, and promote self-sufficiency and increased capacity in and profitability of women's economic enterprises; (c) Develop strategies to consolidate and strengthen their assistance to the micro, small and medium-scale enterprise sector, in order to enhance the opportunities for women to participate fully and equally and work together to coordinate and enhance the effectiveness of this sector, drawing upon expertise and financial resources from within their own organizations as well as from bilateral agencies, Governments and non-governmental organizations. 172. By international, multilateral and bilateral development cooperation organizations: Support, through the provision of capital and/or resources, financial institutions that serve low-income, small and micro- scale women entrepreneurs and producers in both the formal and informal sectors. 173. By Governments and/or multilateral financial institutions: Review rules and procedures of formal national and international financial institutions that obstruct replication of the Grameen Bank prototype, which provides credit facilities to rural women. 174. By international organizations: Provide adequate support for programmes and projects designed to promote sustainable and productive entrepreneurial activities among women, in particular the disadvantaged. Strategic objective F.3. Provide business services, training and access to markets, information and technology, particularly to low-income women Actions to be taken 175. By Governments in cooperation with non-governmental organizations and the private sector: (a) Provide public infrastructure to ensure equal market access for women and men entrepreneurs; (b) Develop programmes that provide training and retraining, particularly in new technologies and affordable services to women in business management, product development, financing, production and quality control, marketing and the legal aspects of business; (c) Provide outreach programmes to inform low-income and poor women, particularly in rural and remote areas, of opportunities for market and technology access, and provide assistance in taking advantage of such opportunities; (d) Create non-discriminatory support services, including investment funds for women's businesses, and target women, particularly low-income women, in trade promotion programmes; (e) Disseminate information about successful women entrepreneurs in both traditional and non-traditional economic activities and the skills necessary to achieve success; facilitate networking and the exchange of information; (f) Take measures to ensure equal access of women to ongoing training in the workplace, including unemployed women, single parents, women re-entering the labour market after an extended temporary exit from employment owing to family responsibilities and other causes, and women displaced by new forms of production or by retrenchment, and increase incentives to enterprises to expand the number of vocational and training centres that provide training for women in non-traditional areas; (g) Provide affordable support services, such as high-quality, flexible and affordable child-care services, that take into account the needs of working men and women. 176. By local, national, regional and international business organizations and non-governmental organizations concerned with women's issues: Advocate, at all levels, for the promotion and support of women's businesses and enterprises, including those in the informal sector, and the equal access of women to productive resources. Strategic objective F.4. Strengthen women's economic capacity and commercial networks Actions to be taken 177. By Governments: (a) Adopt policies that support business organizations, non-governmental organizations, cooperatives, revolving loan funds, credit unions, grass-roots organizations, women's self- help groups and other groups in order to provide services to women entrepreneurs in rural and urban areas; (b) Integrate a gender perspective into all economic restructuring and structural adjustment policies and design programmes for women who are affected by economic restructuring, including structural adjustment programmes, and for women who work in the informal sector; (c) Adopt policies that create an enabling environment for women's self-help groups, workers' organizations and cooperatives through non-conventional forms of support and by recognizing the right to freedom of association and the right to organize; (d) Support programmes that enhance the self-reliance of special groups of women, such as young women, women with disabilities, elderly women and women belonging to racial and ethnic minorities; (e) Promote gender equality through the promotion of women's studies and through the use of the results of studies and gender research in all fields, inter alia, in the economic, scientific and technological fields; (f) Support the economic activities of indigenous women, taking into account their traditional knowledge, so as to improve their situation and development; (g) Adopt policies to extend or maintain the protection of labour laws and social security provisions for those who do paid work in the home; (h) Recognize and encourage the contribution of research by women scientists and technologists; (i) Ensure that policies and regulations do not discriminate against micro, small and medium-scale enterprises run by women. 178. By financial intermediaries, national training institutes, credit unions, non-governmental organizations, women's associations, professional organizations and the private sector, as appropriate: (a) Provide, at national, regional and international levels, training in a variety of business-related and financial management and technical skills to enable women, especially young women, to participate in economic policy-making at those levels; (b) Provide business services, including marketing and trade information, product design and innovation, technology transfer and quality, to women's business enterprises, including those in export sectors of the economy; (c) Promote technical and commercial links and establish joint ventures among women entrepreneurs at the national, regional and international levels to support community-based initiatives; (d) Strengthen women's participation in production and marketing cooperatives by providing marketing and financial support, especially in rural and remote areas, including marginalized women; (e) Promote and strengthen women's micro-enterprises, new small businesses, cooperative enterprises, expanded markets and other employment opportunities and, where appropriate, facilitate the transition from the informal to the formal sector, in rural and urban areas; (f) Invest capital and develop investment portfolios to finance women's business enterprises; (g) Give adequate attention to providing technical assistance, advisory services, training and retraining for women connected with the entry to the market economy; (h) Support credit networks and innovative ventures, including traditional savings schemes; (i) Provide networking arrangements for entrepreneurial women, including opportunities for the mentoring of inexperienced women by the more experienced; (j) Encourage community organizations and public authorities to establish loan pools for women entrepreneurs, drawing on successful small-scale cooperative models. 179. By the private sector, including transnational and national corporations: (a) Adopt policies and establish mechanisms to grant contracts on a non-discriminatory basis; (b) Recruit women for leadership, decision-making and management and provide training programmes, all on an equal basis with men; (c) Observe national labour, environment, consumer, health and safety laws, particularly those that affect women. Strategic objective F.5. Eliminate occupational segregation and all forms of employment discrimination Actions to be taken 180. By Governments, employers, employees, trade unions and women's organizations: (a) Implement and enforce laws and regulations and encourage voluntary codes of conduct that ensure that international labour standards, such as International Labour Organization Convention 100 on equal pay and workers' rights, apply equally to female and male workers; (b) Enact and enforce laws and introduce implementing measures, including means of redress and access to justice in cases of non-compliance, to prohibit direct and indirect discrimination on grounds of sex, including by reference to marital or family status in relation to access to employment, conditions of employment, including training, promotion, health and safety, as well as termination of employment and social security of workers, including legal protection against sexual and racial harassment; (c) Enact and enforce laws and develop workplace policies against gender discrimination in the labour market, especially considering older women workers, in hiring and promotion, and in the extension of employment benefits and social security, as well as regarding discriminatory working conditions and sexual harassment; mechanisms should be developed for the regular review and monitoring of such laws; (d) Eliminate discriminatory practices by employers on the basis of women's reproductive roles and functions, including refusal ofemployment and dismissal of women due to pregnancy and breast-feeding responsibilities; (e) Develop and promote employment programmes and services for women entering and/or re-entering the labour market, especially poor urban, rural and young women, the self- employed and those negatively affected by structural adjustment; (f) Implement and monitor positive public and private-sector employment, equity and positive action programmes to address systemic discrimination against women in the labour force, in particular women with disabilities and women belonging to other disadvantaged groups, with respect to hiring, retention and promotion, and vocational training of women in all sectors; (g) Eliminate occupational segregation, especially by promoting the equal participation of women in highly skilled jobs and senior management positions, and through other measures, such as counselling and placement, that stimulate their on-the-job career development and upward mobility in the labour market, and by stimulating the diversification of occupational choices by both women and men. Encourage women to take up non- traditional jobs, especially in science and technology and encourage men to seek employment in the social sector; (h) Recognize collective bargaining as a right and as an important mechanism for eliminating wage inequality for women and to improve working conditions; (i) Promote the election of women trade union officials and ensure that trade union officials elected to represent women are given job protection and physical security in connection with the discharge of their functions; (j) Ensure access to and develop special programmes to enable women with disabilities to obtain and retain employment, and ensure access to education and training at all proper levels, in accordance with the Standard Rules on the Equalization of Opportunities for People with Disabilities; 25/ adjust, to the extent possible, working conditions in order to suit the needs of women with disabilities, who should be secured legal protection against unfounded job loss on account of their disabilities; (k) Increase efforts to close the gap between women's and men's pay, take steps to implement the principle of equal remuneration for equal work of equal value by strengthening legislation, including compliance with international labour laws and standards, and encourage job evaluation schemes with gender-neutral criteria; (l) Establish and/or strengthen mechanisms to adjudicate matters relating to wage discrimination; (m) Set specific target dates for eliminating all forms of child labour that are contrary to accepted international standards and ensure the full enforcement of relevant existing laws and, where appropriate, enact the legislation necessary to implement the Convention on the Rights of the Child and International Labour Organization standards, ensuring the protection of working children, in particular, street children, through the provision of appropriate health, education and other social services; (n) Ensure that the strategies to eliminate child labour also address the excessive demands made on some girls for unpaid work in their household and other households, where practised; (o) Review, analyse and, where appropriate, reformulate the wage structures in female-dominated professions, such as teaching, nursing and child care, with a view to raising their low status and earnings; (p) Facilitate the productive employment of documented migrant women (including women who have been determined refugees according to the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees) through greater recognition of foreign education and credentials and by adopting an integrated approach to labour market training that incorporates language training. Strategic objective F.6. Promote harmonization of work and family responsibilities for women and men Actions to be taken 181. By Governments: (a) Adopt policies to ensure the appropriate protection of labour laws and social security benefits for part-time, temporary, seasonal and home-based workers; promote career development based on work conditions that harmonize work and family responsibilities; (b) Ensure that full and part-time work can be freely chosen by women and men on an equal basis, and consider appropriate protection for atypical workers in terms of access to employment, working conditions, and social security; (c) Ensure, through legislation, incentives and/or encouragement, opportunities for women and men to take job-protected parental leave and to have parental benefits. Promote the equal sharing of responsibilities for the family by men and women, including through appropriate legislation, incentives and/or encouragement, and also promote the facilitation of breast- feeding for working mothers; (d) Develop policies, inter alia, in education to change attitudes that reinforce the division of labour based on gender in order to promote the concept of shared family responsibility for work in the home, particularly in relation to children and elder care; (e) Improve the development of, and access to, technologies that facilitate occupational as well as domestic work, encourage self-support, generate income, transform gender-prescribed roles within the productive process and enable women to move out of low-paying jobs; (f) Examine a range of policies and programmes, including social security legislation and taxation systems, in accordance with national priorities and policies, to determine how to promote gender equality and flexibility in the way people divide their time between and derive benefits from education and training, paid employment, family responsibilities, volunteer activity and other socially useful forms of work, rest and leisure. 182. By Governments, the private sector and non- governmental organizations, trade unions and the United Nations, as appropriate: (a) Adopt appropriate measures involving relevant governmental bodies and employers' and employees' associations so that women and men are able to take temporary leave from employment, have transferable employment and retirement benefits and make arrangements to modify work hours without sacrificing their prospects for development and advancement at work and in their careers; (b) Design and provide educational programmes through innovative media campaigns and school and community education programmes to raise awareness on gender equality and non-stereotyped gender roles of women and men within the family; provide support services and facilities, such as on-site child care at workplaces and flexible working arrangements; (c) Enact and enforce laws against sexual and other forms of harassment in all workplaces. G. Women in power and decision-making 183. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that everyone has the right to take part in the Government of his/her country. The empowerment and autonomy of women and the improvement of women's social, economic and political status is essential for the achievement of both transparent and accountable government and administration and sustainable development in all areas of life. The power relations that impede women's attainment of fulfilling lives operate at many levels of society, from the most personal to the highly public. Achieving the goal of equal participation of women and men in decision-making will provide a balance that more accurately reflects the composition of society and is needed in order to strengthen democracy and promote its proper functioning. Equality in political decision-making performs a leverage function without which it is highly unlikely that a real integration of the equality dimension in government policy-making is feasible. In this respect, women's equal participation in political life plays a pivotal role in the general process of the advancement of women. Women's equal participation in decision-making is not only a demand for simple justice or democracy but can also be seen as a necessary condition for women's interests to be taken into account. Without the active participation of women and the incorporation of women's perspective at all levels of decision-making, the goals of equality, development and peace cannot be achieved.