PASTORALIST FORUM ETHIOPIA: Promoting Gender Mainstreaming within Pastoral organizations and Programs Posted on September 26, 2010 at 11:14:18 PM by mb3
PASTORALIST FORUM ETHIOPIA: Promoting Gender Mainstreaming within Pastoral organizations and Programs
The purpose of this guideline is contributing to attainment of gender equality mainstreaming and empowerment of women in the process of pastoral development interventions. This gender guideline further aims highlights on conceptual and practical framework of gender and to build up common understandings on gender and issues related to the design, implementation, and effectiveness of development projects. Wider coverage is given to the topic that deals with gender mainstreaming in context pastoral development, as means of addressing critical subjects of gender in project management. The manual has been distributed to the participants in soft copy.
1. INTRODUCTION
Gender equality is a basic human right, and closing the gender gap is a key to achieving many development objectives, however development practitioners and advocates concerned with achieving gender equality are often constrained by the lack of information to justify targeting limited resources toward closing the gender gap. One of the fundamental reasons to achieve equality of women and men in development is its political and moral nature in which discrimination on the ground of sex is considered as violation of universal human rights. The second motive is economic in which genderspecific discrimination against women acts as a brake on social and economic development. Hence, ensuring gender equality remains a vital means to enhance equitable participation and representation of women and men in decisionmaking processes that affect their lives and livelihoods. This can be achieved through improving women’s access to and control over fundamental assets strengthening their decision making role in community affairs and representation in local institutions? protecting them from genderbased
violence? enhancing their well being and, securing their entitlement to basic public services.