Women Deliver — the world’s largest conference on gender equality and health, rights, and wellbeing of girls and women in the 21st century — will begin today (3) in Vancouver, Canada, bringing together around 6,000 participants from 160 countries. Sessions will be held until June 6.
The Women Deliver 2019 Conference will bring world leaders, influencers, academics, advocates, and change-makers to the Vancouver Convention Centre, with the goal of advancing progress for girls and women around the world.
“The conference will present new knowledge, promote world-class solutions, and engage a broad spectrum of voices,” said organisers.
“It will focus on several issues from health, nutrition, education, economic and political empowerment to human rights, good governance, and girls’ and women’s agency and equality.”
The conference starts today with a high-profile panel featuring Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Ethiopian President Sahle Work-Zewde. Maryam Monsef, Canada’s Minister of International Development and Minister for Women and Gender Equality will also be attending.
Dozens of events will take place during the week on topics ranging from the power of tech to promote gender equality, featuring Melinda Gates, to a celebration of the work of young intersectional feminists, to others on mental and reproductive health issues.
Over the past three years, the Trudeau government has placed great emphasis on its own initiatives that promote gender equality, including the Feminist International Assistance Policy and the Elsie Initiative for Women in Peace.
A host of topics will be discussed at the conference. Although health care is a basic human right, vulnerable, marginalised or disadvantaged populations do not have access to quality services that use a gender approach.
Gender-based violence, the sexualisation of women and girls, and the hypermasculinisation of boys and men will also be on the agenda.
The conference will focus on the fact that everyone benefits when women have equal opportunities and contribute to the economy. McKinsey Global Institute estimates that $12 trillion could be added to global GDP by 2025 by focusing on women’s economic empowerment. To do that, the world needs to focus on professional development programmes, child-care services, unconscious bias in the workplace, the wage gap, and more.
The conference comes on the heels of last week’s women’s conference in Oslo, Norway. The Oslo conference focused on sexual and gender-based violence perpetrated during humanitarian crises. According to the website of Norway’s permanent mission to the United Nations, the aim of the conference, which took place May 23 and 24, was to raise awareness of the need to combat this scourge and to solicit funds to assist the survivors. The Oslo conference was co-hosted by a number of other partners, including Iraq, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA).
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