Proposition 54K2211

Proposition de résolution relative aux efforts fournis par la Coopération belge au Développement en vue de réaliser les objectifs de développement durable en matière d'égalité des genres et d'émancipation des femmes à l'échelle mondiale.

General information ¶

Authors

Groen Wouter De Vriendt
PS | SP Gwenaëlle Grovonius
Vooruit Fatma Pehlivan, Dirk Van der Maelen

Submission date

Dec. 5, 2016

Official page

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Subjects

sustainable development gender equality resolution of parliament development aid position of women woman

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Discussion ¶

March 15, 2018 | Plenary session (Chamber of representatives)

Full source

Mr. Speaker, Mrs. Capoen and I would like to refer to the written report.

In the general discussion, I will give the word first to the first applicant of the proposal for a resolution, Ms. Pehlivan.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Minister, colleagues, last week Thursday 8 March 2018 was the International Women’s Day. That is every year a day where little to celebrate and the more injustice to regret.

There are 28 child marriages per minute worldwide. More than three million girls are circumcised every year. 131 million girls do not receive education. These are just a few figures that we heard during the SheDecides meeting last week on International Women’s Day. Such figures are not only evidence of an indefensible injustice, they are also an obstacle to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals and to give all people, especially women, opportunities for happiness and prosperity.

Colleagues, all studies agree that commitment to welfare and women’s rights has a overall positive impact on society. It provides greater prosperity, greater security, greater security and more opportunities for children to develop. In short, investing in women is investing in change and improvement. By now consistently and ambitiously investing in African women, and in women globally, we strengthen their role in society, allowing us to have a greater impact on poverty, globally.

Fortunately, there is a strong focus on gender in Belgian development policy. I am speaking not only about the Minister’s SheDecides initiative, but also about the engagement of all parties in this Parliament. In 2013, 2015 and 2017 we unanimously adopted resolutions on this subject. Resolutions on child marriages, the importance of good healthcare and education. These were proposals from the various political families. We unanimously approved it.

This resolution builds on previous initiatives and focuses on how we can enable a stronger development policy. We ask for gender data. Gender data, the collection of data that systematically maps the gender dimension, is needed to ⁇ measurable results.

Here in Belgium we have a lot of know-how in the field of data collection and data processing. This resolution therefore calls for that knowledge, that experience we have, to be integrated into the gender strategy of our development policy. Not only to strengthen our own programs and the desired impact of those programs, but also to share with our partners that knowledge and that experience we have.

With strong black-and-white figures, women and action groups in our partner countries are stronger when they demand or demand better policies from governments. The governments in the South can then conduct a stronger gender policy.

Colleagues, without a global reinforcement of gender policies, it will be impossible for UNDP to ⁇ the Sustainable Development Goals. Therefore, we will pay the price for it, with a more unsafe but also poorer world. Therefore, it is important that the Government put the requests in this resolution into practice as soon as possible. In this way, we can work together with our partners from Belgium. We can then ⁇ results in the challenge we face. We will also ensure that the Minister quickly implements the recommendations in this resolution. Thus we can strengthen the Belgian gender policy both from the opposition and from the government in our partner countries.

We unanimously approved this resolution in the committee. I would like to thank all colleagues for their valuable contribution. There were amendments from several colleagues that strengthened the resolution. I thank them for their support. I hope that we will be able to unanimously adopt the resolution here in the plenary session as well as in the committee.

Mr. Speaker, my colleagues, I will be quite brief.

The content of the resolution has already been cited very extensively by its applicant, Ms. Pehlivan. In short, there is still inequality for girls, this from birth. It is clear that we need to take action to remove this gender gap. This should be done on the basis of the SDGs, in particular SDG 5, which stands for ⁇ gender equality and empower all women and girls. How should we do this? By measuring more, collecting data and then making that data available.

The N-VA group had relatively few comments on this resolution, as the resolution is actually in accordance with the government agreement and also in accordance with the policy note of Minister De Croo. This is also within the framework of the reforms that Minister De Croo and this government have already carried out. A greater commitment to data evaluation and digitalization can always count on our support, ⁇ in budgetarily tight times. The budget, which is often limited, can therefore be used better and more efficiently.

This topic is pressured in the room. Mrs Pehlivan has already adopted several resolutions, including the resolution on the fight against forced child marriages. I would also like to refer to a resolution on education for girls in developing countries, which I have also submitted and which, in fact, is already a concrete application of the principle of the current text.

The N-VA Group will therefore support the resolution, as amended after the committee hearings, by approving it.

Mr. Minister, dear colleagues, the recent U.S. presidential elections have had heavy consequences internally, of course, but unfortunately also internationally. I think in particular of the decision to re-establish the so-called "global shell" rule, which goes against sexual health and reproductive rights. The Trump administration’s decision leads to a $600 million annual shortage for associations involved in family planning and women’s rights in developing countries. This policy reinforces the oppositions to sexual and reproductive rights that unfortunately already exist. It will also put some of the Sustainable Development Goals, which call for universal access to sexual and reproductive health by 2030, completely out of reach.

This decision is obviously unacceptable and requires a reaction from the international community. No, sexual and reproductive rights cannot be taken hostage by the conservative policy of the United States or any other country elsewhere!

Belgium really has a leading role to play in this matter. I therefore welcome the initiatives taken by our country, ⁇ as part of the SheDecides campaign. I am also pleased to see that the SheDecides movement has mobilized approximately $450 million in additional funding, mostly from European donors.

However, this is not enough to fill the financing deficit. Indeed, if we are lucky to live in a country that has, for years, made health, sexual and reproductive rights a priority, the conservatives around the world are conducting a harsh policy against equality between men and women, but also against sexual and reproductive rights in the broad sense, denying the right of women to decide.

Such discrimination cannot be justified, neither by tradition, nor by culture, nor by religion. They are simply unacceptable. This struggle also reminds us that nothing is ever achieved, so strong are the conservative pressures, in many countries and in international forums. These conservatisms on equality, family planning or the fight against STIs undermine efforts to eradicate, for example, hunger or poverty around the world.

I therefore call on the government to make family planning not only a public health issue, but a broader development programme.

My group has always highlighted the importance of women’s rights in Belgian diplomatic and development action, as evidenced by the resolution adopted during the previous legislature on sexual and reproductive rights or during the previous legislature on early marriages.

Therefore, I think that this text, which I co-signed, is important, because it once again puts this debate at the top of our assembly’s priorities. I hope that the same will be the case for the government’s agenda, despite the budget cuts facing ⁇ the departments of development cooperation.

This text by my socialist colleague Fatma Pehlivan, which I obviously thank, calls for a series of concrete initiatives to be taken, for example, in order to evaluate the gender dimension in the Belgian Development Cooperation from a budgetary perspective, in particular. It was able to be adopted constructively in the committee, which I would of course like to welcome.

My group will support it, of course, and will always pay attention to the coherence of Belgian policies on gender equality and rights, whether in Belgium or around the world.

Thank you very much for your attention.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Deputy Prime Minister, dear colleagues, by voting today on this text, the majority proves that it is not closed to the proposals of the opposition parties. On the contrary! We support them when they are relevant and useful, as is the case in this proposal for a resolution, for which I thank Mrs. Pehlivan.

More than relevant and useful, I would even say that this proposal is primary. Today is a week after March 8th, International Women’s Day. I also regret that it is not officially named “International Women’s Rights Day,” as I have had the opportunity to emphasize it many times. On this occasion, we were able to hear numerous testimonies around the world, numerous stories demonstrating, if needed, that the situation is far from resolved in matters of gender equality and women’s emancipation.

Gender equality is a fundamental right. It is also the best way to address the global and urgent challenges we face, whether climate, economic, sustainable development, security and many more. The 2030 Agenda, to which all Member States of the United Nations have committed, through its seventeen Sustainable Development Goals, is a roadmap that leaves no one aside. Each of the seventeen points is impregnated with the will and necessity of absolute gender equality.

There can be no sustainable development without this equality. Inequality affects every dimension. Women are over-represented in the categories of the poorest people: 330 million of them, I repeat, live with less than $1.9 a day. In two-thirds of countries, women are more likely to suffer from food insecurity than men. Through the sexual violence they are cruelly subjected to, they are victims, as in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, of cruel and inhumane treatment of which they carry the stigma all their lives.

Worldwide, 15 million girls, I still recall this figure, cannot learn to read or write. In the event of a disaster due to climate change, for example, women are 14 times more likely to die than men. Unfortunately, these are only a few examples. It is therefore only through equality between men and women, between girls and boys, only by guaranteeing the rights of women and girls that we can ensure justice and inclusion, that we can preserve our environment and that we can develop economies that benefit each and every one.

Mr. Minister, if we want to move from promises to actions, we really need to move to higher speed. We can no longer content ourselves with beautiful words. We must address profound inequalities and discrimination. Effective public policies should be invested in this area. To do this, we need serious and sufficient data to evaluate their effectiveness. That is why we defend and will vote on this text with enthusiasm. I repeat, this is a primary issue for our future. We can therefore only share the requests addressed by this text by Mrs. Pehlivan to the government, whose cause I know he takes to heart.

We need data to evaluate the gender dimension in the Belgian Development Cooperation, in a transparent way. Encouraging our partners to do the same is therefore essential. Integrating this data into all future projects and programs is also, of course, so.

It is imperative to avoid any questioning of the 2030 Agenda and each of its objectives.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Deputy Prime Minister, dear colleagues, it is of these problems that go, by their importance, far beyond the majority/opposition split. Today we are facing one of them. That is why I invite each and every one of you to support this text, to show in this way the importance that this subject holds for all of us.

That is why I am sure that this proposal for a resolution will be adopted by a large majority – hopefully unanimously – by our assembly!

The fact that so many resolutions are adopted in the field of gender inequality means that there is still a problem. Gender inequality is primarily the result of political, but also social choices. Their approach is and remains a political responsibility.

On behalf of my group, I hope that this resolution, which was adopted in the committee across the boundaries of majority and opposition, will actually get a translation in the policy.

Mr. Minister, I know that you are ⁇ sensitive to the balance between men and women, so I have full confidence that work will continue. An example of this is the SheDecides campaign.

In particular, two points of attention in the resolution may require additional policy.

First, data can only be collected and analyzed to the extent that there is sufficient knowledge and capacity. Therefore, it is important that the policy keep an eye on and invest in adequate statistical services. This does not only apply to our country. I know that for twenty years the gender service has been manned by two persons and that none have been added, although the tasks are increasing. This also applies to the statistical capacity in the partner countries. Without statistical knowledge, the risk remains high that certain groups and their needs remain invisible in the statistics.

Therefore, and that is my second point, budgetary resources are also needed to invest in gender equality in developing countries. One of the questions in the resolution concerns the budgetary map of the gender dimension of Belgian Development Cooperation. This has the advantage of allowing Parliament to see whether sufficient resources are allocated to gender policies and whether those resources are used efficiently. Finally, it also provides an opportunity to assess whether SDG 5, the Sustainable Development Goal 5, on women and empowerment, is steadily complied with.

Mr. Minister, you can count on our support to map and increase these budgetary resources. Therefore, it remains important to provide specific and adequate resources for gender equality because women, especially in developing countries, are the engine of change.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to briefly express my support for this resolution.

I think most of the elements are mentioned. I have a few other points of attention. As most speakers have said, gender equality is one of the priorities of Belgian development policy. In all the analyses of the OECD-DAC, Belgium scores relatively well. About 60 % of the programmes and interventions we carry out have a gender dimension, and that percentage is much higher than the European average.

I fully agree that we need to seek more data, that we need to better track our interventions and that we need to have better gender-based and differentiated data to measure the impact of our interventions. We are absolutely willing to make additional efforts to better differentiate the data.

Gender budgeting is also mentioned in the resolution. The DGD will organize a training on this subject this year.

I am ⁇ pleased that this resolution, proposed by Mrs. Pehlivan, can be unanimously approved by Parliament. Thank you for the beautiful work.