On 24-26 July 2013,WOCAN, FAO and ADB conductedthe Asia and the Pacific Regional High-level Consultation on Gender, Food Security and Nutrition: Ensuring the Other Half Equal Opportunities in Bangkok, Thailand. The three-day regional meeting brought together more than 70 representatives from some 18 Asia-Pacific countries, representing government, INGOs and CSOs, in an effort to boost food security by improving gender equality, particularly in agriculture sector and food production.Dr. Olivier de Schutter, UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, gave the keynote address.
According to Hiroyuki Konuma, FAO Assistant Director-General and Regional Representative for Asia and the Pacific, ‘The consultation is an opportunity to share experiences and learn from lessons of each other, and identify priority actions to reduce hunger and poverty at country and regional levels in Asia and the Pacific, helping to reach our goal of eradicating hunger.’ In the opening remarks Jeannette Gurung, WOCAN Executive Director said, ‘In the last few years, we have seen an increasing recognition of the importance of gender equality for food security; but we still need to work on changing the way we think about gender and enact those changes in appropriate policies. While we do agree that the time to invest in women is now, we believe that it was also time about 20 years ago. As the saying goes, ‘the best time to plant a tree was yesterday, but the next best time is today.’
ADB/FAO report entitled: Gender Equality and Food Security – Women’s Empowerment as a Tool against Hunger was also launched during the consultation. The author, Dr Olivier de Schutter, UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, presents compelling evidence that gender equality needs to be improved if hunger is to be reduced. Dr. Schutter highlighted, during his keynote speech that three concerns need to be combined to assure gender equality; Recognize: the time and mobility constraints of women, Relive: provide services that can relieve women from their reproductive and productive work, Redistribution: challenge the gender-roles and involve men in the change. Dr. Schutter ended his speech by calling on men to realize that it is in the interest of men to empower women so they do not have to shoulder the burden of being the only bread winner.
The three days consultation included plenary sessions on sharing good practices from the region and breakout sessions to discuss the practices in detail. The second day started with the testimonial from Nanu Ghatani, Women Famer and Leader from Nepal, during the Panel Discussion on the Strategic Approaches: Option to address gender dimensions of food and nutrition security. There were breakout sessions focusing on policy and concrete actions, and plenary session on tools and guidelines for strategic, equitable, and evidence-informed national policies and interventions. The third day focused on country specific interventions and ADB presented the output statement of the consultation for feedbacks from the participants.
The overall feedback of the consultation from the participants were highly positive, there was strong appreciation for the testimonial of Nanu Ghatani and also Dr. Olivier de Schutter’s keynote speech. Overall the participants appreciated the facilitation of the sessions and the interaction during the breakout groups. Though most participants appreciated the representation of various sectors, few of them mentioned the need to invite more representatives from CSOs, Ministry of Women and Health and UN Women.