For more information, check out this infographic!

From http://www.theatlantic.com/sponsored/connections/archive/2012/12/265895/#.UNd5gEAx1ZQ.tumblr

Key policy messages are as follows:
-Greater gender equality in educational attainment has a strong positive effect on economic growth;
-Stereotyping needs to be addressed in educational choices at school from a young age. For example, adapt teaching strategies and material to increase engagement of boys in reading and of girls in maths and science; encourage more girls to follow science, engineering and maths courses in higher education and seek employment in these fields;
-Good and affordable childcare is a key factor for better gender equality in employment. But change also has to happen at home as the bulk of housework and caring is left to women in many countries. Policy can support such change, for example, through parental leave policies that explicitly include fathers.
-Support policies for women-owned enterprises need to target all existing firms, not just start-ups and small enterprises. Equal access to finance for male and female entrepreneurs needs to be assured.

From http://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/social-issues-migration-health/close-the-gender-gap-now_9789264179370-en

Watch this inspiring TED talk, given by Nobel Peace Prize winner Leymah Gbowee.

Opinion

Gender inequality is HIV’s best friend. Fortunately, the converse is also true – gender equality is HIV’s nemesis. And by fighting HIV through advancement of gender equality, we reap all kinds of additional benefits.

Women account for slightly more than half of all people living with HIV, and the majority contract it through sex with long-term partners.

Young women account for nearly 75 percent of infections among people ages 15-24 in sub-Saharan Africa. Girls who bear the brunt of two classic symptoms of gender oppression – being married off young or kept out of school – are particularly vulnerable to HIV.

Gender violence – whether it’s rape used as a weapon of war, physical violence in the home that takes away women’s power to suggest condom use, or emotional violence that keeps women silent and untreated if they are diagnosed with HIV – is like gasoline to the spread of HIV.

Some of the most promising solutions to the spread of HIV reside in stripping away the layers of oppression from the lives of women and girls. Access to comprehensive, rights-based sexual and reproductive health services is a critical first step.

Such care allows a woman to control the number and spacing of her children, and to confidentially test her HIV status. It gives her tools to protect herself – tools like female condoms, effective in preventing both HIV and unintended pregnancy.

And such care gives her the ability to stay healthy during pregnancy and childbirth, regardless of her HIV status. By linking these services together and infusing them with a respect for the dignity of each woman and girl, we greatly improve the likelihood that she will benefit from the highest attainable standard of health care.

Efforts beyond the formal health sector also present possibilities.

Programs such as microfinance and cash transfers that bolster economic opportunity and educational access for women and girls are proven to reduce their risk for HIV.

Outreach to men and boys, to combat gender violence and change gender norms, is also creating impact. Weakening HIV’s grip on women and girls by improving their legal, social, and economic status is absolutely essential.

If we fail to understand how deeply HIV’s roots are intertwined with the violation of women’s rights we may end up winning battles but we are certainly losing the war. The woman living with HIV who is mistreated by health care providers is unlikely to seek tools to prevent a pregnancy, or care during a pregnancy.

Condom promotion is useless where violence takes away a woman’s right to protect herself. Maternity wards that put multiple women in each bed and lack basic life-saving supplies help drive women to give birth at home – endangering their lives and leaving them untested for HIV.

The global AIDS response must promote:

Women’s rights: HIV depends on gender inequalities that prevent women from supporting themselves financially and making decisions about their sexual activity. Women’s rights need to be recognized, respected, and promoted if we are going to end HIV.

Women’s participation: The clearest way to ensure that policies and programs are advancing gender equality is to includewomen in decision making.  Living these realities, they are best equipped to pinpoint what meets their needs. There are women’s rights groups in every country on the planet, and we cannot accept any more excuses for not including women at the table.

Woman-controlled prevention: We have to increase funding and policy support for female condoms, in additional to male condoms. They must be a mandatory component of all programs that prevent and treat HIV.

Integration of sexual and reproductive health: HIV, family planning, and maternal health are intrinsically linked, and services need to reflect that.

Gender equality is AIDS’ nemesis. We cannot create an AIDS-free generation without it.

Mary Beth Hastings is vice president, Center for Health and Gender Equity

From http://allafrica.com/stories/201212050084.html?viewall=1

The Taliban’s most fearsome enemy in Pakistan isn’t U.S. drones or the military’s tanks: It’s a 15-year-old schoolgirl. Malala Yousafzai’s tool of defiance? Her own bravery in speaking out for the simple idea that girls should have access to the same education as boys. That shouldn’t be a radical notion in 2012, but even as Pakistan bristles with roughly 100 nuclear warheads, up to 60 percent of women are still illiterate and two out of every five girls fail to finish primary school. Challenging the tyranny of those low expectations can get you killed in today’s Pakistan.

In October, as Malala headed home after an exam, a Taliban gunman stopped her school bus andannounced that she must be punished for insulting “the soldiers of Allah.” Then he shot her in the head.

Armed only with her convictions and the firm support of her father, who runs a private girls’ school, Malala refused to be silenced. She became a celebrity in Pakistan through her outspoken interviews, chaired a “child assembly” that aimed to expand opportunities for youth in the Swat Valley, and pleaded with late U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke to help halt the Talibanization of her country. “I shall raise my voice,” she said last year. “If I didn’t do it, who would?”

It’s a lesson in courage that is inspiring others to stand up to the forces of barbarism in their midst. Too bad it took a tragedy to do it.

From http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/11/26/the_fp_100_global_thinkers?page=0%2C5

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is leading a United Nations call on world leaders to “make good” on pledges they have made to end violence against women, a scourge that affects millions of women and girls worldwide.

“Up to 70 per cent of women experience physical or sexual violence at some point in their lifetime (and) as many as a quarter of all pregnant women are affected,” Mr. Ban said in message to mark the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women.

“Millions of women and girls around the world are assaulted, beaten, raped, mutilated or even murdered in what constitutes appalling violations of their human rights,” he added.

The UN General Assembly designated 25 November as the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women in a 1999 resolution inviting governments, international organizations and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to “organize activities designed to raise public awareness of the problem on that day.”

The day harks to the 25 November, 1960, assassination of the three Mirabal sisters, who were political activists in the Dominican Republic, on orders of Dominican ruler Rafael Trujillo.

“On this International Day, I call on all governments to make good on their pledges to end all forms of violence against women and girls in all parts of the world,” Mr. Ban said.

The call reinforces a similar appeal made by the head of the UN agency committed to gender equality and the empowerment of women. UN Women Executive Director Michelle Bachelet used a video message to announce the launch of COMMIT, an initiative asking governments to make national commitments that will be showcased globally.

“We must do better to protect women,” Ms. Bachelet urged, as the agency noted in a press release that 603 million women live in countries where domestic violence is still not a crime.

UN Women also administers the UN Trust Fund to End Violence against Women, which is the world’s leading global grant-making mechanism exclusively dedicated to addressing violence against women and girls. This month, it announced plans to disburse $8 million to local initiatives in 18 countries.

In his message, Mr. Ban took the opportunity to shine a spotlight on additional outreach initiatives launched in his name. One is his landmark UNiTE to End Violence against Women campaign, launched in 2008. It gathers a host of UN agencies and offices to galvanize action across the UN system to prevent and punish violence against women.

“All too often, perpetrators go unpunished (while) women and girls are afraid to speak out because of a culture of impunity,” said Mr. Ban, adding the initiative was “engaging governments, international organizations, civil society groups, the media and ordinary citizens.”

He said his Network of Men Leaders initiative – which supports the work of women around the world to defy destructive stereotypes, embrace equality, and inspire men and boys everywhere to speak out against violence – was expanding.

The shooting last month of Malala Yousufzai, a 14-year-old Pakistani girl known for opposing Pakistani Taliban restrictions on female education, is spotlighted in the messages from the UN human rights chief and the head of the UN agency mandated to advance education worldwide.

“The sad truth is that Malala’s case is not an exceptional one and, had she been less prominent, her attempted murder might have passed more or less unnoticed,” UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay said in a news release issued from her Geneva-based office.

“Despite all the advances in women’s rights around the world, violence against girls and women remains one of the most common human rights abuses – and the assault on their fundamental right to education continues in many countries,” she added, stressing how violence against women and denying them education were often “closely related.”

From the Paris headquarters of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), Director-General Irina Bokova said Ms. Yousufzai’s story was “sadly, far from unique.”

“Across the world, girls and women face violence as they try to exercise their basic rights,” she stated in a press release. “Violence, and its threat, is one of the key factors forcing girls to drop out of school.”

UNESCO will stage on 10 December a high-level advocacy event aimed at mobilizing a “deeper commitment” to educating girls and celebrating the “courage of young girls like Malala Yousufzai,” Ms. Bokova said.

From http://allafrica.com/stories/201211260151.html?viewall=1

The World Economic Forum’s latest Global Gender Gap Report 2012 attempts to quantify the progress that has been made across 135 countries, and in particular where more needs to be done. It combines data on health, education, economic participation and political empowerment, with the hope of painting a comprehensive picture of where gender gaps are widening and narrowing.

What does it tell us? For one thing, globally about 93 percent of the gap in education between men and women has been closed. In other words, looking at metrics such as literacy rates and the ratio of girls and boys in school and college, women lag men by 7 percent. It sounds like much has been achieved and it has, although Malala’s story vividly demonstrates how meaningful such a small-sounding gap can be.

The data also show where most progress remains to be made: only around 60 percent of the gap in economic participation has been closed, and even less — 20 percent — of the gap in political empowerment.

However, global figures disguise wide disparities among countries. It is sadly no surprise that Pakistan — Malala’s homeland, and my own — comes in low on the rankings, having closed only 55 percent of its gender gap when combining data from the four fields into a single figure. This puts it in 134th position, ahead only of Yemen.

At the top, Iceland has closed over 86 percent of its gap, with Finland, Norway and Sweden the only other three countries to top 80 percent. But this is not a simple story of wealthy countries doing the most for women. The report’s methodology accounts for a country’s levels of resources and opportunities, and looks at how equitably it shares those opportunities.

As a result, some high-ranking countries are not the ones you might expect. The Philippines and Nicaragua both make the top 10. Lesotho, Latvia and South Africa feature in the top 20. Kazakhstan comes in at 31, between Bolivia and Argentina. All have markedly smaller gender gaps than the likes of France (57th), Italy (80th) and Japan (101st).

National wealth is clearly not a prerequisite for narrowing the gender gap. Indeed, the data show convincingly that the reverse is the case: narrowing the gender gap is one of the smartest things a country can do to make itself more prosperous.

Six of the 10 most economically competitive countries in the world — according to the Global Competitiveness Index, another World Economic Forum initiative — are also among the top 20 countries with the smallest gender gaps. Across the board, the correlation is strong. Gender gaps undermine the growth, stability and competitiveness of entire economies.

The reason is hardly mysterious. Women make up one-half of any nation’s human capital, and when half of the population faces obstacles to achieving their full potential, there is an immense waste of talent and subsequent losses in competitiveness.

Our seven years of data show that the direction of change is positive, but its pace is slow. Despite the challenging economic times, 64 percent of countries narrowed their economic gender gap last year, including three of the world’s biggest four economies. Across all indicators, the gender gap has narrowed over the last seven years in 85 percent of countries we have tracked.

Only six of those countries have improved their overall score by more than 10 percent, however, with most improving by less than 5 percent. And the global educational gender gap remains stubbornly difficult to close, having narrowed by barely one percentage point in seven years.

The anger with which many people in Pakistan and now around the world have reacted to Malala’s shooting shows how widely and fervently further progress is desired. Encouragingly, the data show how quickly it can happen, even in the most unexpected places — among the highest movers are countries such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. We hope the Global Gender Gap Report 2012 will help to spread understanding of why gender gaps must be narrowed, and how it can be done.

Girls in Muhuru Bay are bombarded by these social messages. WISER held a body mapping workshop in January 2012 in order to help girls remember their power, voice, and dreams in the face of ubiquitous social messages that try to limit their potential. Body mapping has girls outline their bodies on cloth and identify the external, negative social messages they receive. These messages are countered by writing inside their body outline what they really believe about themselves and the value of a girl: “I have a right to education.” “I have power in my mind.””I am a quality woman, more than the quantity of two cows.” “Girls are courageous.” “Girls can make their own choices.” “Girls have the right to express themselves.” Completed body maps will be featured on our website and auctioned to raise funds for girls’ scholarships. Stay tuned!