UN Women Executive Director & Upcoming Events

UN Women Executive Director Michelle Bachelet
Democracy & Gender Equality Roundtable in New York – 4 May 2011

UN Women Strategy
This month, UN Women released their Strategic Plan. The final draft of the plan must be finished by May 16th in order to be translated and go to the Executive Board meeting the last week of June for its approval. This is the framework of the global strategic plan and civil society can expect that the regional and national level plans for UN Women will begin to be developed around July-September. Read more on GEAR website >>

During Nigeria's last leg of elections on April 26th, UN Women monitored the polls for violence against women. UN Women, in partnership with the Institute for Democracy in Africa (IDASA), has been following such violence in Nigeria since the start of the elections process in 2011, in which more than 500 people have died as a result of electoral violence following the country's presidential elections earlier in April.

On the 28th of April, UN Women Executive Director Michelle Bachelet delivered a speech at the Women's Foreign Policy Group Luncheon. In her speech, she referred to the new UN Women Strategic Plan which identifies women's economic empowerment and women's political participation and leadership as part of their main priorities in addition to ending violence against women and girls by engaging women fully in peace and post-conflict processes and in national development planning.

The Democracy and Gender Equality roundtable took place on May 4th in which Ms. Bachelet delivered a speech. In her speech she reminded the audience of the 1970's slogan: ‘personal is political'. She stated that this slogan reflected the fact that inequality in the private sphere undermines equality in the public sphere. Her concluding words suggested that based on the recommendations from the roundtable, UN Women would hope to enhance their democracy assistance. The following quote exemplified her sentiment regarding the current agenda.

UN Women will be hosting several events at the Least Developed United Nations Conference on the Least Developed Countries (LDC) from the 9th – 13th of May in Istanbul, Turkey. The purpose of the conference is to asses the results of the 10-year action plan for the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) adopted at the Third United Nations Conference on LDCs in Brussels, Belgium, in 2001. In addition to adopting new measures and strategies for the sustainable development of the LDCs into the next decade.

The following events will be hosted by UN Women:

  • The Business and Development Cases for Engaging Women in Global Value Chains. (Please click on the links for the Agenda & Speaker Biographies).

  • Gender and Migration: Care Workers at the Interface of Migration and Development. (Please click on the links for the Agenda, Flyer, and Concept Note).

  • Panel Discussion: Integrating migration and remittances into LDC national and regional development planning, including through a gender perspective. (Please click on the links for the Agenda & Concept Notes).