June 26, 2024.- Yesterday, the webinar “Mainstreaming Gender Equality: Exchange of Good Practices between the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and the Pacific Alliance” was held, organized by the Gender Technical Group (GTG), under the leadership of Mexico, in the framework of the ASEAN-Pacific Alliance Work Plan 2021-2025 and the Roadmap for the Autonomy and Economic Empowerment of Women of the Pacific Alliance
This activity aimed to address good practices, commitments, initiatives and strategies to promote gender equality in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the Pacific Alliance (PA) in order to identify challenges and common efforts. More than 90 representatives from technical groups, committees and subcommittees of the PA, ASEAN and the embassies of the four member countries of the Alliance participated in the event.
The inaugural part of the event was attended by the Deputy Secretary General of the Ministry of Women, Family and Community Development of Malaysia, Chua Choon Hwa; the ASEAN Deputy Secretary General for the Socio-Cultural Community, Ekkaphab Phanthavong; Marcela Otero Fuentes, General Director of Multilateral Economic Affairs of Chile’s Undersecretariat of International Economic Relations, representing the Pro Tempore Presidency of the Pacific Alliance; and Elba Espinoza, Vice Minister of Women’s Affairs of Peru, as coordinator of the PA’s Technical Group on Gender.
A representative of ASEAN and the PA presented their progress, good practices and experiences on the topics addressed during the three segments of the webinar: “The importance of sex-disaggregated data to boost women’s economic empowerment”; “An agenda for gender mainstreaming”; and “Inclusive trade, main regional strategies”.
Throughout its three interventions, ASEAN highlighted three main good practices: ASEAN Gender Outlook (2022), a study that provides statistical evidence to promote investment in women and girls in vulnerable situations to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs); the ASEAN Gender Mainstreaming Strategic Framework (AGMSF) 2022, which seeks to promote gender mainstreaming in the work of ASEAN, as well as in ASEAN member countries. Finally, the ASEAN Comprehensive Framework on Care Economy (2021) and the Declaration on Building a More Sustainable, Inclusive and Resilient Future (2022) as experiences for the promotion of women’s entrepreneurship.
For its part, the Pacific Alliance highlighted official documents such as the Presidential Declaration on Gender Equality, the Roadmap for Women’s Autonomy and Economic Empowerment, as well as some studies and initiatives that drive the agenda such as the diagnostics “Radiography of the participation of PA women entrepreneurs in foreign trade in the PA (2019)”, “Annex: Impact of COVID-19 on the operations of women-led enterprises in the PA (2021)”, the Survey for Gender Mainstreaming in PA Technical Groups and the Community of Women Entrepreneurs launched in collaboration with the Inter-American Development Bank.
Gender equality and women’s empowerment is a priority in the agendas of the Pacific Alliance and ASEAN, therefore “cooperation with our allies is crucial, especially in identifying thematic areas where we can work together […] we will continue to advance the gender agenda as a strategy to promote substantive equality”, said Sandra Mendoza Durán, Coordinator of International Affairs of the National Institute of Women of Mexico during the closing remarks of the webinar.