GENEVA (ILO News) - Juan Somavia, the Director-General of the International Labour Office, today pledged to step up the commitment to gender issues of the ILO, both within its own walls as well as through its global activities. Mr. Somavia made the statement in a speech this morning to ILO staff and members of the Governing Body marking International Women's Day.
This was the first time that a Director-General of the ILO called a special session to celebrate Women's Day.
"While I recognize and laud the many serious efforts that have been made in recent years to move forward in mainstreaming gender in the Organization, I must share with you my intention to quicken the pace and strengthen the institutional commitment to this policy," Mr. Juan Somavia said. "The ILO has lagged behind other international organizations in a number of indicators of gender equality. As an organization dedicated to social justice and well-being of workers, we must be in the forefront of this UN effort."
"Promoting gender equality is not only the right thing to do. It is also the smart thing to do," Mr. Somavia said. "I therefore intend to give high priority to ensuring that ILO is counted among the most progressive organizations in the field of gender equality. We must be leaders and not laggards."
Noting that the ILO had played a major role in the past eight decades in setting standards promoting equality for women workers, Mr. Somavia cited data indicating the ILO was lagging behind in its pursuit of gender parity within its own Secretariat.
Mr. Somavia also pledged to take a number of other actions to augment ILO efforts on gender issues including:
- Place gender at the "heart of the ILO agenda," including mainstreaming of gender and development in the strategic objectives of the ILO in the proposals for the 2000-2001 budget;
- Integrating gender into technical work of the ILO by promoting gender sensitivity in research, advisory and operational work and integrating gender aspects into programmes focussed on the informal sector, small and medium enterprises, data collection, social security, promoting organizations of workers, training, employment creation schemes and proposing and evaluating standards, as well as in ILO branches, and regional and area offices;
- Urging member States, employers' and workers' organizations making up the ILO's tripartite structure to make a "systematic effort to ensure a greater representation of qualified and experienced women" in their delegations to the International Labour Conference, the Governing Body and tripartite committees, seminars and training courses;
- Supporting establishment a day-care facility within ILO headquarters in Geneva to "ensure that both women and men can be committed to their work without sacrificing efficiency, upward mobility or family contact."
"Renewing the commitment of human and financial resources to the goal of achieving gender equality constitutes a virtuous circle for the ILO," Mr. Somavia said, adding that the case for promoting gender equality was "self-evident and compelling". He noted that gender equality had been written into the declarations and programmes adopted by the World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna in 1993, the International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo in 1994, and the World Summit for Social Development in Copenhagen and the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, both held in 1995.