Gender perspective crucial in Ukraine's crisis areas
Gender advocates and women’s groups brought their voices and experiences to a UN Women-supported consultation on the Luhansk Regional Development Strategy in Ukraine. Their recommendations say a gender agenda must be included if development planning is to meet the needs of women and those most affected by Ukraine’s on-going eastern conflict.Date:
On 25 October, representatives from the Luhansk regional administration, local communes (Hromada), civil society organizations and women's grassroots groups met to present joint recommendations on how to integrate gender equality into the Luhansk’s Regional Development Strategy, which will guide local development planning and policy in the troubled region until 2020.
The more than 45 consultation participants recommended that the Strategy:
- Integrate the Istanbul Convention, the National Action Plan on the Implementation of the UN Security Council Resolution on Women, Peace and Security 1325, and the National Action Plan on Human Rights into the Strategy;
- Create shelters and crisis centres for survivors of the domestic violence;
- Use sex-disaggregated data throughout;
- Introduce and strengthen mobile gender-based violence response teams that can give psychological assistance;
- Create infrastructure for parents with children and people with disabilities;
- Provide social housing to the most vulnerable, including internally displaced and host communities, students, young families, single headed households and the elderly, based on gender sensitive eligibility analysis;
- Conduct a gender-sensitive needs assessment of local population to inform regional programmes and budgets;
- Provide support to female entrepreneurs, particularly for start-up businesses.
"It is critical to include gender-sensitive issues in the Strategy document, which will define the region’s development planning for years,” said Ms. Halyna Skipalska, of the Ukrainian Foundation for Public Health.
“Shelters for women who suffered from gender-based violence, establishing crisis hotlines, recovery programs for survivors and offenders of sexual violence: These issues have to be reflected and addressed in the Strategy,” said Ms. Skipalska.
The consultations are part of the joint UNDP-UN Women Programme on Restoration of Governance and Reconciliation in the Conflict-Affected Areas of Ukraine. Funded by the European Union, the Programme supports military-civilian administrations and the people of Luhansk and Donetsk in developing concrete action plans to implement strategies that integrate gender equality at local and regional levels.
Within the Programme, UN Women gives strategic support to ensure that the upcoming Strategy includes the interests of Luhansk’s most vulnerable women and men, while UNDP provides technical assistance to Ukraine’s regional governments to integrate gender into recovery and development planning at the local level, particularly during and after crises.
The recommendations were well received by government and international agency representatives.
“Women’s organizations are our reliable partners,” says Ms. Olga Lishyk, Deputy Head of the Luhansk Oblast Civil-Military Administration. “In crisis situations, women’s organizations were especially mobile, dynamic and well organized. These recommendations will be integrated into the Strategy’s implementation plans.”
“We will work closely with the government, both at the regional and local level next year. UN Women will conduct a series of training sessions on gender-responsive budgeting for local authorities and NGOs,” said Mr. Oleksander Bai, National Programme Analyst, UN Women.
Based on a thorough analysis of the current situation in Luhansk, where conflict continues between non-state separatist groups and Ukraine’s armed forces, the draft Strategy focuses on:
- Using decentralization and e-governance reforms to strengthen local governance;
- Economic recovery and sustainable development;
- Restoring critical infrastructure and services;
- Increasing community security and peace-building.
“Including gender issues in the strategy is imperative. Safe-guarding women’s rights and their empowerment is the backbone of society,” says Mr. Kunal Dhar, Recovery and Stabilization Advisor and Head of Project Office at UNDP Ukraine.
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