ILO 100 on the International Women's Day

Seminar for International Women’s Day 2019: Think equal, build smart and innovate for change

Each year International Women’s Day (IWD) creates an opportunity to explore new ways of removing barriers and accelerating progress for gender equality.

Background

Each year the International Women’s Day (IWD) creates an opportunity to explore new ways of removing barriers and accelerating progress for gender equality.

The 2019 Global IWD Theme: “Think equal, build smart, innovate for change / Hanoin ba igualdade, konstrui ho matenek, inovasaun ba mudansa”, encourages investment in gender-responsive public systems, including planning, building and maintaining services and infrastructure that make the most of government resources and help meet the economic and social needs of women and girls, as well as men and boys.

Women are often excluded from pubic investment and infrastructure planning and decision-making processes. As Timor-Leste develops plans and programs to improve its municipal urban centers, it is important to ensure that these investments address the needs of the wider society. One way to make this happen, is to ensure women and other vulnerable groups have a voice in every aspect of the development of public investments. This includes areas such as governance systems, infrastructure, water, sanitation, public service delivery, public spaces, and public transport.

This seminar showcases 4 innovative examples of how women’s voice and aspirations are already informing gender-sensitive public investments in Timor-Leste. For instance, did you know that:
  1. Women and their community leaders in collaboration with multiple government stakeholders, are designing and taking actions to build safer cities in Timor-Leste (Public Works and UN Women)
  2. In one road infrastructure program, more women owned companies are winning road construction tenders than male-owned companies (Public Works and R4D)
  3. Women vendors and the municipal authorities are collaborating to develop a shared vision to improve the efficiency, conditions, and safety of their local marketplaces. (Municipal Authorities, TOMAK & UN Women)
  4. That in many places, women are already involved in village level social and infrastructure planning in equal ratio to men (ESTATAL-PNDS)
The seminar also aims to provide a space for government and development partners to come together to look at further actions that could be taken to improve gender equality in public investments and services. Are there other opportunities where we can think equal and build smart together?

Objectives

  • To raise awareness of the importance of engaging women in all aspects of pubic investment and infrastructure planning and decision-making processes
  • To provide practical and motivating examples of how this is already happening through long term collaboration between communities, government and development partners
  • To strengthen government ownership to drive and recognize their potential to promote safe and inclusive public spaces