Dear friend,

 

This fall, WEDO is concentrating its energy in two areas: UN Reform and Climate Change.

For more than ten years, women have been waiting for their governments and the UN system to fulfill the promises made in Beijing.  There is a consensus that the current UN system and resources are inadequate for the task. That is why WEDO is working hard on UN reform to strengthen the organization's capacity to further gender equality and the empowerment of women. WEDO is calling on Member States to adopt a new structure for gender equality within the UN system before the end of the year.

Our work on climate change continues to gain momentum. In July, after calling attention to the absence of gender in climate change discussions at the UN, a special invitation was extended to WEDO to address the General Assembly as part of the Informal Thematic Debate on Climate Change as a Global Challenge. On September 24th, the UN Secretary General will convene a High-Level Session on Climate Change. Read on to find out how WEDO is getting involved and highlighting the gender dimensions of climate change.

In other news, our good friend and champion for women's rights at the UN, Noeleen Heyzer, who held the position of Executive Director of UNIFEM since 1994, was appointed Executive Secretary of the Economic Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), with the rank of Under-Secretary-General. She is the first woman to head ESCAP, which is the biggest of the UN's five regional commissions.

We are excited to announce that WEDO Enews & Views will now be available in French and Spanish. We hope that this will help us to reach out to an even wider audience and share news and updates about our work on women's rights.

Your continued support helps us to keep up this critical work.


Sincerely,


June Zeitlin, Executive Director

On September 24th, heads of state and ministers will converge in New York to send a message to the world about the urgency of climate change. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon is convening a high-level event on climate change to ensure that the uppermost levels of government are committed to negotiating a stronger international agreement that will replace the Kyoto Protocol in 2012. As the annual climate change (UNFCCC) negotiations in Bali in December grow closer, discussions from the Secretary-General's event will send a powerful signal that "business as usual" cannot go on and that action must be taken to reduce global warming.

In preparation for the event, WEDO will host a high-level roundtable on gender equality and climate change in partnership with the Council of Women World Leaders and the Heinrich Böll Foundation North America on September 21st.  Participants will include two of the Secretary-General's Special Envoys on Climate Change-Former Prime Minister of Norway Gro Harlem Brundtland and South Korea's former foreign minister Han Seung-soo-as well as ministers and UN staff working on climate change.  The roundtable will produce recommendations to ensure that gender equality and women's participation are highlighted during the Secretary-General's event.

For more information, visit WEDO's webpage on gender and climate change, including the fact sheet Changing the Climate: Why Women's Perspectives Matter (English, French and Spanish) and the newest version of our Gender & Climate Change Resource List.

This resource draws the links between gender and climate change and details why women need to be at the center of the climate change debate and policymaking. A must-read for activists, academics and policymakers.  Check it out.

Since the 15th session of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD-15), WEDO has been consulting with a wide variety of organizations about transitioning our role as official facilitator of the CSD Women's Major Group. The CSD Secretariat asked WEDO to recommend organizations that have experience in the upcoming CSD themes of agriculture, rural development, land, drought, desertification, and Africa. Many of our CSD partners nominated organizations and helped us to ensure a fair and inclusive process. Based on the criteria set at the outset of this process, as well as consultations by email and phone, WEDO recommended the following organizations as co-facilitators: Women Organizing for Change in Agriculture and Natural Resource Management (WOCAN), African Women Leaders in Agriculture and the Environment (AWLAE) and the GRATIS Foundation, Ghana.

These three organizations have been accepted as co-facilitators by the CSD Secretariat and are now making preparations for CSD-16 and CSD-17.  These co-facilitators will also coordinate with a larger group of organizations engaged in the Women's Major Group, including PELUM Association, Women Environmental Programme (WEP-Nigeria), Energia, World Conservation Union (IUCN), Women in Europe for a Common Future (WECF), Genanet, MAMA-86, Netherlands Council of Women, and others. WEDO will continue to provide guidance to the Women's Major Group facilitators and key partners during the CSD-16/17 cycle during 2008-2009.

The listserv of the CSD Women's Major Group has also changed.  To join, visit http://csd-women.collectivex.com

We've made it easier for you to support WEDO.  Using JustGive, you can easily (and safely!) donate to WEDO online.  Just click on the button at right to support WEDO today.  Because when women lead, the world benefits.

 

As the General Assembly launches its preparations for the 2008 review conference on Financing for Development (FfD) in Doha, actions are underway by civil society groups to ensure that continued and strengthened civil society participation occurs throughout the process and that a high-level outcome emerges from the conference-- one which would help advance government commitments to gender equality, poverty eradication and sustainable development.

WEDO was among a group of civil society networks and NGOs to sign-on to a letter to newly-appointed Co-Facilitators of consultations related to the Doha conference. The letter states, "The FfD Review Conference needs its own focused preparatory process leading up to a negotiated document such as a Declaration. We propose that such a process should: 1) involve a thorough review of progress in achieving the Monterrey Commitments, 2) take stock of challenges to be addressed and obstacles to be overcome, and 3) explore new issues on financing development that have emerged or become more pressing since the Monterrey Conference, and that merit a detailed review."

In June, the General Assembly President appointed two facilitators, the Ambassadors of Norway and Egypt, to engage member states in preparations for the 2008 FfD Review Conference. These consultations are a step towards establishing the preparatory modalities and the agenda-setting process for the Doha Conference.

WEDO and colleagues will be meeting with the Ambassadors and monitoring the General Assembly process in the next few months. We will continue to keep you informed on this initiative.

The next key event leading up to the Doha conference is the General Assembly High-Level Dialogue on FfD, which will take place at UN headquarters in New York from 23 to 24 October 2007, immediately after the Annual Meetings of the IFIs in Washington DC. Register now [http://www.un-ngls.org/ffd/sign.php] for the Civil Society Hearings, taking place on October 22, and the High-Level Dialogue.

Learn more about Financing for Development and why it matters to women.