Women Changing the World

This was a title of the tenth international conference organized on 2-3 October 2003 by the St. Petersburg Socio-Economic Institute (Rector Elena Kalinina). It should be noted that this activity was included into the list of official events to mark the 300-th anniversary of St-Petersburg. The ILO Subregional Office was represented at the conference by Pauline Barrett-Reid, Director, Irina Melekh, Gender Focal Point, Rimma Kalinchenko, Programme Officer and Desk Officer for Russia, Alexei Bukharov, IPEC (St-Petersburg) Project Coordinator.

News | 03 October 2003
The Conference was technically and financially supported by different well-known foreign and international partners such as European Women’s Management Development International Network (EWMD), Swedish сompany Sprangbradan, Swedish International Development Agency (SIDA), Finnish Ministries of Labour and Economy, Nordic Council of Ministers, ILO Moscow, Russian and foreign NGOs.

The event brought together 800 representatives from more than 30 countries. There were delegations from all countries of the former USSR including the Baltic States. One could see people from different continents, of different nationality and status. The Conference was opened and greeted by Alexander Beglov, Acting Governor of St. Petersburg, Evgeniy Makarov, Deputy Representative of the President in the North West Federal Okrug of the RF, Betina Gotzenberger and Bianka Lichtenberger, Presidents of EWMD, Carin Lann, President of Sprangbrodan.

The agenda included two panel discussions - Women Changing the World in Politics and Women Changing the World in Companies - and 17 workshops. One workshop, on Decent Work, was organized by the ILO and UNDP Moscow offices.

Successful women – Margareta Winberg, Vice Prime Minister of Sweden, Sinikka Monkare, the Finnish Minister of Social Affairs and Health, Pauline Barrett-Reid, the ILO Moscow Office Director, Nagina Sharopova, Vice-Premier of Tajikistan, Ludmila Verbitskaya, Rector of the St-Pb State University, Siv Hellen, Senior Vice President of the Nordic Investment Bank, Olga Golodets, Deputy Director General of Norilsk Nikel, Maud Pagel, Vice-President of Deutsche Telecom - spoke openly about continuing gender discrimination and inequalities, about limited career opportunities for women in politics and business, about economic and social difficulties. Pauline Barrett-Reid (ILO) stressed gender equality as an integral cross-cutting theme in the decent work agenda with particular focus on the process of creating equal opportunities for women. She underlined that the the ILO decent work concept recognized that the global economy has to deliver increased employment but with improved working conditions, social protection and representation based on respect of the fundamental principles and rights at work.