WIDE+ co-chaired the preparatory work on addressing economic barriers for the Women’s Civil Society Forum of the UNECE, the UN Europe and Central Asian states, review of the Beijing+25, and Sustainable Development Goals+5. The Civil Society Forum took place on 28 October 2019, in Geneva, Switzerland.
The working group WIDE+ co-chaired with Make Mothers Matter resulted in three factsheets that provides many facts, analysis and recommendations on key economic discriminations for women (and men). We looked at the problematic role of private companies in public policy and spaces, such as the UN, gender and tax policies and macro-economic policies in general. WIDE+ co-chaired the overal factsheet, and contributed to the other topical sheets.
The three factsheets:
2.3.-Structural-Economic-Barriers
2.20.-Corporate-and-Institutional-Accountability-to-the-Beijing25-process
Beijing-25-Tax-Justice-Fact-Sheet
Picture of the first panel of the WOMEN CSO Forum
These are our main recommendations
We call for a new economic order that prioritizes the well-being of people and the planet. We call for a complete overhaul of the current economic system, moving away from extractive and profit-driven capitalism, an economic model based on a broken indicator – GDP- which does not reflect our needs, and the notion of infinite growth beyond our limited natural resources.
Instead, new indicators should be developed used for a comprehensive approach with ‘carrots and sticks’ to drive a sustainable and wellbeing-oriented economy that values social progress and the protection of the environment.
Concretely we need:
- Accountable governments that promote socio-economic innovation through policies targeting SMES and other groups; for some this means excluding Transnational companies for innovation subsidies.
- To stop the impunity of Transnational companies to exploit women’s labour and natural resources.
- Care services (child care but also all other care services) should be a basic right, accessible for all. In addition, care leave and working time should be properly adapted to allow for a reasonable private life and work balance.
- To recognize unpaid care work as “work” that gives right to social protection. Policies should ensure that women are not penalized for providing work outside the formal productive sphere (In particular, care periods should be taken into account in the calculation of Pensions in order to address the huge pension gaps in most UNECE countries)
- To connect social protection and taxing systems to individual rights, moving away from household only based policies.
- To addressGenderBasedViolenceatwork:all governments should ratify the new ILO Convention No 190 on “Violence and Harassment”.