Gender issues to be discussed in Wednesday’s special session with Clinton



BUSAN ― Delegates actively participated in thematic sessions and side events on the first day of the Fourth High-Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness in Busan on Tuesday.

One of the major talks addressed how aid ownership and accountability should be made a political priority to ensure partner government executives take full responsibility in implementation of national development strategies.

“We should lift this issue to the political level and must not forget our global responsibility,” said Thomas Stelzer, assistant secretary-general for policy co-ordination and inter-agency affairs at the U.N. Development of Economic and Social Affairs.

A group of panel members including Ibrahim Assane Mayaki, CEO of New Partnership for Africa’s Development, shared the view that as many citizens as possible should participate in building robust and coherent accountability systems.

Other issues included how to move towards development effectiveness rather than aid effectiveness.

Developed and less-developed countries alike are focusing more on measuring their aid in terms of development, gauging the results and sustainable improvements.

To address this, delegates later in the day touched upon specific sectors from a rights-based approach and the role of the private sector in development.

Irina Bokova, director general of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, shared views with other panel members on the framework for country-led capacity development.

Others discussed how to better implement a rights-based approach in development, giving powerless and marginalized people the ability to exercise their national freedoms and rights. The approach also calls for the fundamental support or pressure of leaders to respect their citizens’ claims and to end discriminatory policies.

Other sessions involved Afghanistan’s deputy minister of finance Mustafa Mastoor and administrator of the United Nations Development Programme Helen Clark in the discussion of aid in fragile countries.

As a report shows that a high number of low-income countries are considered fragile, a key concern is where aid could have extremely positive or negative yields.

The report by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development shows that “nearly all low-income countries and a dozen middle-income countries are by most accounts fragile.”

Other side events included a youth forum, organized by the Foreign Ministry, Education Ministry and the Korean National Commission for UNESCO, to see how youth can voice their views on effective aid and development.

On Wednesday, there will be a special session on gender, co-sponsored by the U.S. and Korea, in which U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will speak.

It is the first time for gender to be addressed in a high-level aid forum.

“Gender equality and women’s empowerment are ends in their own right and essential for effective development,” Melanne Verveer, Ambassador-at-Large for Global Women’s Issues of the U.S., told reporters in Busan.

“As Secretary Clinton said, it is not just the right thing to do but also the smart, strategic thing to do.”

Verveer also said that Clinton will launch the Evidence and Data for Gender Equality Initiative “to improve the collection and use of sex-disaggregated data as well as to harmonize data and make it more useable.” 

By Kim Yoon-mi and Robert Lee
(yoonmi@heraldcorp.com) (robert@heraldcorp.com)