UNITED NATIONS GENERAL ASSEMBLY

23rd Special Session

"Women 2000:

Gender Equality, Development and Peace for the Twenty First Century"

THE INTERNATIONAL FEDERATION

OF RED CROSS AND RED CRESCENT SOCIETIES

Statement by

Mrs. Mariapia Garavaglia, Vice-President

Mr. President, Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,

In earlier decades we believed that inequality between men and women would disappear once legislation was balanced, when women received as much formal education as men and the problem of arranging day care for small children was overcome. In the 1990s, however, we have had to recognise that this is not enough. It is obvious from this review session that much stronger will to put the theory of gender equality into practice is needed. In this regard, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies fully supports the proposed Framework for further actions and initiatives submitted by the Commission on the Status of Women to this special session, in particular the commitment to create an enabling environment to implement the Beijing Declaration an the Platform for Action.

In general, we believe that the propose framework recommends the application of a holistic approach to actions in five functional categories aimed at demonstrating political will; at capacity-building for the advancement of women and gender mainstreaming; at ensuring accountability; at establishing co-operation and partnership and, finally, at supporting women and girls currently subject to discrimination and disadvantage. We hope that this approach will not only ensure better interlinkages between the 12 critical' areas of concern of the Platform for Action but also would bring the more: fundamental changes required to achieve concrete results.

I would like to take this opportunity to mention that last year, the General Assembly of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies adopted a special policy on gender issues. Our goal is to ensure that all Red Cross and Red Crescent programmes benefit men and women equally, according to their different needs and with the input and equal. participation of men and women at all levels within our 176 National Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, our Secretariat in Geneva and its fled offices in 67 countries. The adoption of this policy helped us to place gender equality high on the political agenda.

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies recognises that natural disasters, conflicts, social and political ' stability may affect men and women differently and that Red Cross and Red Crescent emergency response and long-term humanitarian assistance may also have a different impact on me and women. Therefore, we will continuously review our own system to incorporate gender analysis in the assessment, planning and reporting of programmes, including our disaster espouse, disaster preparedness and provision of community-based health services. An example is our current research on the impact of humanitarian aid management on men a women led by British Red Cross Society.

We also recognise that despite the positive developments within our organisation, we need to achieve measurable results in building on individual Red Cross and Red Crescent capacity to mainstream a gender perspective in their policies and programmes; especially developing competence of staff members in applying gender analysis in programming and ensuring accountability in this regard. We also recognise that new initiatives must be taken to ensure well-balanced participation by men and women from all sectors of society in Red Cross and Red Crescent work. One of the important component of our pledge made to the 27th International Conference of the Red Cross and Red Crescent held last year is about ensuring equal . opportunities for men and women of all ages as volunteers in service delivery and leadership and bringing about greater involvement of marginalised groups.

Mr. President,

We believe that the framework for further actions and initiatives to emerge from this session should pay special attention to the following areas:

Ensure the high quality of humanitarian assistance that meets different needs of men

Mr. President,

To conclude, we -- in the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies-value that this special session reaffirms the commitment of the international community to the Beijing Declaration and the Platform for Action. Most especially, we hope that the outcome document of this special session will be more than a just a new plan, that it will be a working tool based on lessons learned from obstacles encountered in the follow-up to the Fourth World Conference on Women.