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CSW56 Recap | Panels, Side Events & Parallel Events
Click to jump to the synopsis of each event:
 Side Event | Joint U.S.-China Panel on Rural Women and Sustainable Development
On February 27, Huairou Commission's Joyce Nangobi, Director of Slum Women's Initiative for Development (SWID) in Uganda, spoke on a joint U.S.-China panel on Rural Women and Sustainable Development.
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Photo credit: UN Women/Ryan Brown
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Click to download SWID's latest newsletter
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Other speakers on the panel included Michelle Bachelet, Executive Director of UN Women; Ambassador Rosemary DiCarlo of the Permanent Mission of the U.S. to the UN; Ambassador WANG Min of the Permanent Mission of the People's Republic of China to the UN; Melanne Verveer, Ambassador-at-Large for Global Women's Issues, U.S.; Madame MENG Xiaosi, Vice President of All-China Women's Federation; Madame Jiko Luveni, Minister for Poverty Alleviation, Women and Social Welfare, Fiji; and Ms. Bineta Diop, Executive Director, Femmes Africa Solidarité .
As Joyce wrote in her blog about the experience:
"It was valuable to me to bring the rural women's voice to the attention of policy makers, donors, and intergovernmental agencies and describe barriers rural women face."
Side Event | Women and Corruption: Grassroots Experiences and Strategies
(Watch full video online here)
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Afisa Nammammoonde Bujyakumano Kayongo (UCOBAC) and Sangeetha Purushothaman (Best Practice Foundation)
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One hundred and fifty participants from grassroots women's networks, governments, UN agencies, permanent missions to the UN, and civil society attended the side event on "Women and Corruption: Grassroots Experiences and Strategies" on February 27, organized by the Huairou Commission and the Democratic Governance Group (DGG) of UNDP.
This side event presented the findings of the Lessons Learned Study on Women and Corruption, a joint initiative of the Huairou Commission and UNDP carried out by 11 grassroots organizations in eight countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America.
Huairou Commission members Sangeetha Purushothaman, Director of Best Practices Foundation in India, Afisa Nammammoonde Bujyakumano Kayongo, President of Uganda Community Based Association for Child Welfare (UCOBAC) and Haydee Rodriguez, President of the Union of Women's Producer Cooperatives Las Brumas, Nicaragua spoke about their research and data collection experiences and findings. The side event was chaired by Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi, Director of UNDP Democratic Governance Practice.
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Grassroots women's suggestions for national mechanisms to fight corruption:
- Processes to bring more women into formal leadership positions
- Mandatory community monitoring processes (such as social audits)
- Confidential spaces to report corruption
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The research study focused on understanding how women- particularly at the grassroots level- perceive, experience and cope with corruption.
Overall, the grassroots women concluded that corruption goes well beyond bribery and electoral fraud, to encompass things like illegal actions, misuse of power, and misrepresentation of finances.
Based on the research, the women concluded that corruption is a community-wide issue that impacts women greatly, that it is endemic and a waste of resources, and that existing national mechanisms to fight corruption are insufficient to address the issue and are not working in practice on the ground.
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(L-R): Mara Rodriguez of Fundación Guatemala, Haydee Rodriguez of Las Brumas, Nicaragua, and Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi, Director of DGG of UNDP
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Responding to the presentations, Winnie Byanyima, Director of UNDP Gender Team, and Jan Peterson, Chair of Huairou Commission, emphasized that the findings of the study represent the real voices of women about the importance of good governance for enhancing service delivery.
The side event not only engaged and educated the audience, but also cemented the future of the HC-UNDP partnership, which will develop into a longer project comprising actions on anti-corruption, developed from grassroots women's perspective and experiences.
Parallel Event | Empowering Caregivers to Build Healthy, Sustainable Communities
At this parallel event held on Tuesday, February 28, a panel of women who work as caregivers in rural and poor urban areas spoke to a packed room at the United Nations Church Center, sharing their success stories and recommendations for investing in organized groups of rural women to create vibrant communities led by empowered women.
Sponsored by the Huairou Commission, GROOTS International, and the International Council of Women, the event featured HC members Fati Al Hassan of the Grassroots Sisterhood Foundation (GSF) in Ghana, Violet Shivutse of GROOTS Kenya, and Joyce Nangobi of Slum Women's Initiative for Development (SWID) in Uganda, as well as participation by UN Women and UNICEF.
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(L-R) Violet Shivutse of GROOTS Kenya, Fati Al Hassan of GSF in Ghana, Joyce Nangobi of SWID in Uganda
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Violet Shivutse speaks about the importance of supporting women's organizing
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In rural and poor urban communities in Africa, Home-Based Caregivers provide critical care for people affected by HIV, people with chronic illnesses, orphans and the elderly where health care services and facilities are inadequate. It is impossible to talk about rural women without talking about the contributions of rural caregivers, as they go well beyond merely responding to health needs. The panelists highlighted the role of home-based caregivers as holistic development workers, incorporating issues of land, food security, basic services, and government accountability into their work.
Coming directly from a peer exchange in West Africa, Fati had ideas of strengthening a subregional network fresh in her mind, while Violet emphasized that funding for things like transportation to meetings, air time for phone calls, and refreshments make a major difference in her work, as opposed to the typical project-funded donor model.
The panel provided opportunities for building and strengthening relationships between women who are taking their issues into their own hands, as well as including the voices of caregivers in the Agreed Upon Conclusions. It is vital that caregivers are able to speak on their own behalf about the issues that affect them and that spaces are created to include them in dialogues.
Side Event | Rural Women's Groups and Key Stakeholders Frame Joint Actions
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(L-R) Prema Gopalan of SSP, India; Sandy Schilen, Global Facilitator of GROOTS International; and Minister Corazon Juliano Soliman, Govt. of Philippines
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The side event "Rural Women's Groups and Key Stakeholders Frame Joints Actions," held on February 28 and featuring the grassroots women of the Huairou Commission, was sponsored by the Government of Norway, Huairou Commission, GROOTS International, UN Women, UN-NGLS, Bahá'í International Community, FAO, IFAD, WFP, and Landesa.
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Nereide Segala, woman farmer, Founder of Redes Pintadas and President of Cooperative Ser do Sertao, Brazil
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Parallel Event | Grassroots Women's Solutions for Empowerment, Sustainable Livelihood and Land Justice
(Watch full video online here)
"Land is vital for sovereignty and food security and indispensable for women's empowerment. Without our resources we will not be empowered."
-Haydee Rodriguez
Recognizing that equal access to and use of land and related resources are critical for the empowerment of women and girls and poverty reduction, ninety-five participants, including grassroots women's groups, UN agency representatives, NGOs and government officials, engaged in a discussion on Tuesday, February 28 during the parallel event titled "Grassroots Women's Solutions to Empowerment, Sustainable Livelihood and Land Justice."
The parallel event was a joint collaboration by Huairou Commission's Land and Housing Campaign member groups, UNDP Democratic Governance Group Bureau for Development Policy, and UN-HABITAT. It was chaired by Olav Kjorven, Assistant Secretary General and Director of UNDP Bureau for Development Policy, Assistant Secretary General and UN-HABITAT Deputy Director Dr. Aisa Kacyira, and Huairou Commission Chair Jan Peterson.
In his opening statement, Kjorven (pictured right) applauded collective efforts to build bridges between community leaders and decision makers, and recognized that men can act as partners in women's empowerment.
In her opening statement, Dr. Aisa Kacyira (pictured left) recognized women's critical knowledge of and their role played in land issues. She stated:
"Land is a resource that defines identity, a sense of belonging, dignity and security...Land becomes more costly, it becomes very vulnerable and without land security, I do not see how we can talk about sustainable development."
Jan Peterson (pictured above, to the left of Kjorven) emphasized the importance of partnerships, stating:
"What you see in the room is an amazing gallery of practices and partnerships. We fight with the UN, we are not afraid of the UN, but we can do things they can't. We are beginning to see how this synergy may work."
After the opening statements, the panel examined the differences between issues of land justice in the contexts of Latin America and Africa, as grassroots women and government officials from both regions shared their perspectives. Panel participants shared challenges, community-driven processes, and strategies used to build partnerships with diverse stakeholders. Ultimately, the event aimed to build South-South cross learning, based on an analysis of the ways in which women are effectively addressing land injustice within formal, informal, and customary systems.
The Latin American Context:
In Brazil, Patricia Chavez (pictured left), Director of Espaco Feminista in Recife, and Mr. Francisco Correia, Manager of Engagement with Municipalities and Civil Society, Cabinet Office of the Government of Pernambuco, Brazil, emphasized a partnership strategy. Grassroots women leaders built a multi-stakeholder partnership with land professionals, benefiting more than 8,000 families in the settlement of Ponte do Maduro. Chavez also recognized the connection between rural and urban land issues, stating:
"Linking urban and rural issues is very important- we do not talk about urban issues separately from rural issues."
Also in Latin America, Haydee Rodriguez, President of Union of Women's Producers Cooperatives Las Brumas, Nicaragua described how rural women worked towards passing National Law 717 to create a Fund for the Access to Land with Gender Equality for Rural Women, which guarantees the allocation of funds from the national budget to poor women, for the purpose of purchasing land for agricultural production. She also discussed their advocacy strategies to ensure implementation of the law.
The African Context:
Within the African context, Director Ndinini Kimesera (pictured left, in blue) and grassroots leader Esupat Ngulupa (pictured left, in yellow), both of the Maasai Women Development Organization (MWEDO), discussed strategies for strengthening the implementation of the Village Land Act of 1999 at the local and customary justice levels, as well as increasing grassroots women's access to land and property in Tanzania.
Florence Shakafuswa, Director of Katuba Women's Association in Zambia, shared her experiences with informal community negotiations, mediation and customary justice used by grassroots women in their struggle to stop asset stripping and land grabbing in Zambia. The Katuba Women's Association presentation also featured member Mary Saidi.
From the government perspective, Mr. Joe Kapembwa (pictured below), Director of the Finance and Economic Section in the Division of Gender in Development Cabinet Office of Zambia, recognized that land is the most fundamental resource for any society. Land is the basis for human survival, and it is necessary to build an efficient land administration system that works for women.
He also discussed ways to work with women's groups, including:
- affirmative action in favor of women
- decentralization
- adopting progressive proposals on land ownership
- simplifying ownership procedures and requirements, and
- ensuring that traditional leadership allocates land and provide security of tenure to women.
Overall, this parallel event provided a space for dialogue, where women's groups and government officials were able to identify opportunities to address the challenges of land injustice. It also strengthened the broad partnership between the Huairou Commission, UNDP and UN-HABITAT to continue their efforts to engender development.
Additional Participation
- Prema Gopala participated in a High Level Panel entitled "Rural Women, Proverty, Crises, Rights" organized by the United Nations Non-Governmental Liaison Services, with interventions from the floor by Maite Rodriguez, Analucy Bengochea, Patricia Chavez, Nereide Segala, Fati Al Hassan, Florence Shakafuswa, Esupat Ngulupa, Ndinini Kimesera, Joyce Nangobi, Violet Shivutse, Mara Rodriguez, Afisa Nnamadoonde Bujyakumano Kayongo, Mildred Crawford, Mary Saidi, Haydee Rodriguez, Jhocas Castillo, Jane Nyokabi, and Carmen Griffiths.
- Huairou Commission delegate Mildred Crawford from Jamaica Network of Rural Women Producers spoke at a workshop with 6 other speakers from around the world (Burundi, Lebanon, Pakistan, Nigeria, USA) called Rural Women and Domestic Violence: Organizing for Prevention at the Church Center on Friday, March 2, a parallel event co-sponsored by CONNECT and the Fellowship of Reconciliation (FOR).
- Violet Shivutse, GROOTS Kenya, spoke at "Land Rights of Rural Women," sponsored by FAO, IFAD and ILC.
- Fati Al Hassan participated in the Global Fund for Women's "Measuring Change for Rural Women in Sub-Saharan Africa."
- Jhocas Castillo and Fides Bagasao participated in the "Conditional Cash Transfer and Sustainable Social Enterprises: A Key to Rural Women's Empowerment?" event, hosted by the Philippine Delegation.
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Huairou Commission (HC) members are calling for action, not merely talk, coming out of the 56th session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW). The attached 
