Millennium Development Goals

Two schoolgirls, India, November 2003 © Peter Armstrong

The 3rd of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) announced in the 2000 Declaration aims "to promote gender equality and empower women". It differed from the other Goals in calling for one of its targets to be achieved by 2005, far in advance of the overall 2015 deadline. Oxfam has reported that, in the event, over 90 countries failed to eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education by the deadline. The UN Population Fund's "State of World Population" report for 2005 shows that in South Asia only 69% of girls complete primary school whilst in sub-Saharan Africa the figure is less than 50%.

The lack of political will and resources that lie behind these figures also threaten to undermine the broader Goal of eliminating gender disparity at all levels of education. The official progress report for 1990-2005 concludes that "at current rates, the target of eliminating gender disparity in educational enrolment by 2015 will not be met in many regions". Broadly similar sentiments are expressed for other indicators assessing the gender Goal - women's achievement in youth literacy, employment, and representation in national parliaments.

Benin school room © Dan Gerber

Action necessary to accelerate progress is complex and varies for each country. There is some agreement, however, that the two most important steps are to remove fees for primary education (so that parents have less reason to favour boys over girls) and to improve school sanitation facilities to allow appropriate privacy for girls. The costs are high and, in countries where school fees have been lifted, the resulting influx of new pupils has often defeated the capacity of buildings and teachers to cope with them.

The strongest debate generated by the gender MDG has been less about the lack of progress in girls' education than the omission from the Goal of other important gender topics such as sexual and reproductive health and violence against women. Campaigners would also have preferred to see a much more inclusive approach, with gender perspectives specifically integrated into all of the Goals. A possible explanation for the lack of consensus is the plethora of UN organisations addressing different aspects of gender inequality - as part of the UN reform process, there have been calls for a more streamlined architecture of agencies to bring greater coherence to women's issues.

Women and Development

Woman leader at meeting, Benin © Dan Gerber

A clue as to the choice of girls' education as the absolute priority in the gender MDG lies in a statement by the former UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan, who has said: "there is no tool for development more effective than the education of girls. No other policy is as likely to raise economic productivity, lower infant and maternal mortality, improve nutrition and promote health - including helping to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS." The statement also illustrates the vital role that women can play in achieving the MDGs - research has demonstrated the link between empowerment of women and improvement in health and productivity of the family unit. The majority of international NGOs and bilateral aid agencies attach great importance to the correlation between poverty reduction and women's participation and have fully integrated gender perspectives into their development programmes.

Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf © Center for Global Development

Similar philosophy lies behind the encouragement of greater representation of women in all levels of government. Women are more likely than men to keep sight of the human dimension in problem-solving and to favour peaceful resolution of conflict. In 2000, the UN passed a resolution encouraging countries to allow greater representation of women in conflict-resolution, pointing out that women and children are most adversely affected by wars.

There are interesting developments in some post-conflict countries whose constitutions have been torn up and rewritten. The Rwandan parliament is believed to have the highest representation of women in the world at almost 50%. Debates in Nepal advocate high quotas for women in parliament and civil service. Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, Africa's first female president, has been elected in Liberia, a country torn apart by conflict and corruption.
Women's Rights

Malian women in Dire © Dan Gerber

The pursuit of equality for women is of course as much a matter of principle as of utility. As with the MDGs, exactly what should be included within the concept of women's rights has been the subject of evolving opinion. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights took the minimalist approach of saying that "everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex" .... with little further reference to women's issues. This proved unhelpful in practical terms and it took campaigners over 30 years to cajole the international community into solid interpretation and commitment to address gender injustice.

This commitment came in the shape of the Convention to Eliminate All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) which was adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1979. CEDAW has been described as a bill of rights for women; it spells out the areas in which women experience discrimination and commits countries to construct national gender policies and to amend their laws where necessary. The most solid subsequent endorsement of CEDAW came at the Fourth World Conference on Women, held in Beijing in September 1995, at which governments committed themselves to the Beijing Platform for Action, a detailed template for eradication of discrimination and poverty.

There is one major snag in this generally positive progression towards global consensus on women's rights; ratification of CEDAW in the US has been repeatedly blocked by right wing interests who perceive a threat to sovereignty. This US stance is shared only by Iran, Sudan and Somalia - traditionally unwelcome bedfellows of the superpower.

The most blatant and shaming infringement of women's rights cannot however be laid at the door of US intransigence. The practice of female infanticide and foeticide is linked especially with India and China where the incidence has been such that demographics are beginning to betray its pernicious impact. Originally believed to be a characteristic of impoverished rural communities, recent disclosures suggest that over 10% of female pregnancies in middle class New Delhi are aborted and that India's ratio of girls/boys under 6 years is almost as low as 90%. There can be no more explicit illustration of the strength of cultural norms to attribute low status to women.
Women's Equality

African women farmers

It is such cultural traditions in developing countries that create the most stubborn obstacle to the essential steps towards women's equality. The belief that girls should work in the home and in the fields rather than go to school, and the presumption that a woman acquires no right to property on marriage are deeply entrenched in many societies. Whilst development agencies are normally anxious to respect cultural traditions in their programmes, they are unlikely to compromise on issues of gender equality.

The disempowerment of women is often reinforced in a country's laws; for example, many countries in sub-Saharan Africa are in various stages of amending laws which prevent women from gaining access to land and property. The HIV/AIDS crisis has accelerated these pressures, given that over 30% of households in southern Africa are now headed by women, few of whom can claim ownership rights. In Pakistan there have been reports that women widowed by the 2005 earthquake have had their husbands' properties seized by male relatives.

Legal issues are most problematic in Islamic countries where elements of Sharia law governing the behaviour of women remain in place. The Pakistan government has encountered fierce resistance from Islamic political parties to its efforts to reform the Hudood ordinances, ancient laws which declaim that adultery is a crime when carried out by women, and which make it virtually impossible for a man to be convicted of rape.

Afghan school girls

The Taliban regime in Afghanistan represented the most extreme and unacceptable implementation of laws which deny a role for women. The ideology is reflected even in the recent efforts to regain power which has seen the destruction of girls' schools and the murder of female staff of local NGOs. Shirin Ebadi, the Iranian Nobel laureate, believes that the treatment of women in Islamic countries does not reflect the teachings of the Koran. She advocates a reinterpretation of Sharia law to recognise women's rights.
Women's Livelihoods

Women Carrying Water © World Bank

The burden of unpaid domestic work for women is particularly acute in developing countries. Poverty greatly compounds the demands of simple household tasks that would otherwise be minimal, such as collecting water and firewood. Women also typically take responsibility for tending land and livestock as well as coping with large extended families.

In the majority of poor countries therefore only a low proportion of women will be engaged in paid employment which itself is likely to be of low quality. In Central America the preponderance of unregistered female domestic workers raises concerns for low wages and security. In Asia where more women are able to find employment, concern focuses more on the business model of global corporations which typically engages women at the bottom of the production chain in factories with dubious labour conditions.

The success of microcredit schemes in South Asia has been attributed in part to the aptitude that women have shown for exploiting the opportunity to run small enterprises. Women have demonstrated better track records for repayment and for business sustainability.
Reproductive Health

Mother and child, Rwanda © Heidi Martin

The importance of family planning in developing countries emerged originally from population concerns and there has been considerable success in bringing down high average fertility rates. Reproductive health education is now equally motivated by the principle of empowerment of women, the reduction of maternal and child mortality rates, and full awareness of HIV/AIDS issues. According to the Millennium Project report published in 2005, necessary improvements to sexual and reproductive health are estimated to cost £36 billion pa until 2015 but are critical to improving women's health and achieving the MDGs.

CEDAW places an on obligation on countries to ensure that women have the same rights as men to decide the "number and spacing of their children and to have access to the information, education and means to enable them to exercise these rights". The majority of development agencies perceive the right to safe and high-quality abortion services as part of the overall picture for women's empowerment in reproductive health but the US government considers that the concept of sex education has become too wide. As a result the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) is starved of a large percentage of its funding whilst countries such as Uganda find successful AIDS programmes threatened by lack of funds to purchase condoms.
Violence against Women

Gender violence protest, Indonesia © Jane McGrory

Violence against women is one of the most brutal consequences of the economic, social, political, and cultural inequalities that exist between men and women. Yet strong concerns voiced by development agencies and policy-makers have emerged only in relatively recent years. There is no mention of the subject in CEDAW, apart from a brief reference to human trafficking, but now every high level development or human rights statement on gender issues will include a reference.

Whilst rich countries are by no means free of violence against women, the problems - which range from domestic violence to honour killings - are perceived to be more serious in developing countries. Greater focus on the topic has unearthed alarming estimates that as many as one in three of the world's women has experienced some form of violent abuse. Attitudes in society need to change so that women can be more forthcoming in disclosing their problems. Legislation also has a part to play as in the Domestic Violence Bill in India which came into force in 2006.

Legislation is also gradually being introduced in African countries where deep-rooted tradition accounts for the widespread practice of female genital mutilation (FGM) - affecting perhaps as many as 80% of women in Eritrea, Somalia and Benin. Trafficking of women for sex and other services is illegal but authorities are struggling to keep up with the combination of crime syndicates and poverty which drive the trade.

Women suffer terribly in war zones, especially those wars in which the world's media take only token interest. The incidence of rape in Darfur, Congo, Northern Uganda and Sierra Leone may never be known, let alone carry any hope of accountability.



This Guide has been compiled primarily by reference to the OneWorld archive of aid-related articles and to an earlier version of the OneWorld Gender Guide first published in 2004 with material provided by Volunteer Editor Sudha Chauhan.

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