With greater equality our women can progress faster in leadership
Embrace equity-having equal opportunities is not enough
INTERNATIONAL Women's Day puts a spot light on successes and challenges in achieving gender equality. Each one of us has talents.
With greater equality our women can progress much faster into leadership, better employment, access to health and a world free of violence.
We hold half the sky and can support each other to greater heights. This year the focus is on how we can use digital media to enhance many of our skills and build on social, economic and health empowerment of our women across Fiji.
Every year on March 8, International Women's Day is commemorated across the globe - women from all walks of life gather together, spanning cultural and ethnic divides, to commemorate their battle for peace, justice, equality, and progress.
To mark the day we are conducting a digital marketing training for women in Macuata and we will soon be launching information through our digital media platforms to address the many issues being raised.
The Fiji Government through its international and regional commitments has developed a well-structured legal and policy framework over the last few decades.
We are committed to strengthening this framework through legislative and policy development, reviews and reforms through our 'all of government' approach with close collaborations with our civil society and development partners to ensure we continue to realise women's rights as human rights and create an enabling, equitable environment for our Fijian women to thrive in and actively talk about what affects them.
Despite the legislative provisions that we have made as a nation, girl child abuse is on the rise, gender based violence rates remain among the highest in the world; women in leadership numbers remain significantly less than men; economic participation and gender pay gap are still a reality among many other forms of discrimination against women and girls.
We as a people need to summon the fortitude to overcome all obstacles in all areas of life in order to achieve significant progress.
This year's International Women's Day, let's commit to act together to create an enabling, violence free Fiji for all our women and girls.
This is needed for us to build a prosperous nation, we cannot leave the productivity and resourcefulness of half the population behind to get half as far when we can go all the way together.
We as leaders cannot leave the next generation of women and girls to continue to suffer and be discriminated against.
And the change must start with every individual, in every Fijian home, and community.
Vinaka Vakalevu.
THE Campaign theme for this year's International Women's Day (IWD) is "Embrace Equity" – having equal opportunities is no longer enough.
The focus on equity as a theme speaks to the importance of recognising the different circumstances and lived experiences of each individual and ensuring that these differences are considered in the allocation of resources.
As Principal Strategic Lead – Pacific Women and Girls, at SPC, I get to see firsthand the challenges we face as a region due to gender inequality that exists in society.
To me, these challenges also provide us with a unique opportunity to leverage efforts that don't only bring about a more equitable society but also a more peaceful and sustainable one.
Nation building must be based on a platform that gives all women and men, boys and girls, equitable opportunities to access resources, to have their voices heard and the agency to make their own decisions. International Women's Day is a day to celebrate how far we have come but more importantly to reflect on the challenges and strategise on what more needs to be done to bring about a gender-equal and equitable society.
Due to it's nature as a cross-cutting issue, the solutions that we seek must be multi-sectoral and multi-pronged.
To mark IWD 2023, SPC will be hosting a panel discussion with an eminent panel of experts – Directors in most of the scientific divisions of SPC who will be talking about how gender is mainstreamed into the different sectoral work that they do."