How can women contribute to a new model of sustainable development? Should the demands for equal rights and opportunities go beyond the prevailing growth model? These are some of the questions the annual IPU Women Speakers of Parliament meeting will try to answer in New York on 12-13 November. The aim of the event is to highlight the gender dimension of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the new development framework that is to emerge in 2015 when the current Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) expire. This, the 8th such IPU annual meeting, is an opportunity to examine strategies on mainstreaming basic rights for women into all SDGs. Women represent more than half of the world’s population, but remain by far the most disadvantaged group in all spheres of life. In the political sphere, they represent just 21.4 per cent of all parliamentarians in the world, and just 14.7 per cent of all Speakers of parliament. The outcome of the meeting will not only follow the conclusions of IPU’s 128th Assembly in Quito earlier this year, but will also feed into the debate at the annual Parliamentary Hearing at the United Nations, jointly organized by IPU and the UN, which takes place immediately after.
How can women contribute to a new model of sustainable development? Should the demands for equal rights and opportunities go beyond the prevailing growth model? These are some of the questions the annual IPU Women Speakers of Parliament meeting will try to answer in New York on 12-13 November. The aim of the event is to highlight the gender dimension of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the new development framework that is to emerge in 2015 when the current Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) expire. This, the 8th such IPU annual meeting, is an opportunity to examine strategies on mainstreaming basic rights for women into all SDGs. Women represent more than half of the world’s population, but remain by far the most disadvantaged group in all spheres of life. In the political sphere, they represent just 21.4 per cent of all parliamentarians in the world, and just 14.7 per cent of all Speakers of parliament. The outcome of the meeting will not only follow the conclusions of IPU’s 128th Assembly in Quito earlier this year, but will also feed into the debate at the annual Parliamentary Hearing at the United Nations, jointly organized by IPU and the UN, which takes place immediately after.