UN Women supporting National Efforts of the Transitional Government in Sudan

Date: Sunday, September 6, 2020

As part of the National Preparatory workshops of the National Economic Conference, through a strategic partnership between the UN Women, UNFPA, women’s group and under the leadership of the gender machinery, the Ministry of Labor and Social Development and the sponsorship of her Excellency Ms. Lina Elshekh, a two days’ workshop on “Economy and Gender” was launched at the Bureau of Economic and Social Research.

DRC takes a step towards zero tolerance against gender-based violence

Date: Tuesday, September 1, 2020

Women and girls in the Democratic Republic of Congo are still the first victims of conflicts and socio-cultural practices that relegate them to second class citizen. In 2018, more than 35,000 cases of sexual violence were still recorded, the majority of them in the East. During the COVID-19 epidemic, violence increased by 99% in North Kivu Province. To respond the situation, the Deputy Minister of Planning and the Minister of State for Gender, Family and Child launched the new revision of the National Strategy for Combating Gender-based Violence (SNVGB) on Thursday, August 27, 2020 in Kinshasa.

UN Women Cameroon supports religious leaders in the development of their action plans to respond to HIV and GBV in COVID-19 context

Date: Sunday, August 30, 2020

From 19 to 21 August 2020 in Ebolowa, UN Women in partnership with the National AIDS Control Committee (CNLS) organized a workshop to develop the performance framework of HIV action plan on religious communities and to sensitize key religious leaders on quality messages to prevent HIV and GBV during in the context of COVID-19. The objective of this workshop was to finalize national HIV action plans of religious denominations in the context of COVID-19and to build the capacity of religious leaders in sensitization and community mobilization messages for the HIV response.

The Cameroon Inter-Ministerial Committee on Gender Statistics organized its first session of the year

Date: Sunday, August 30, 2020

The 2020 first session of the Inter-ministerial Committee on Gender Statistics in Cameroon was organized at Hôtel Azur in Yaoundé, on July 30th 2020, to update its members on the implementation of the Making Every Woman and Girl Count Project during the year 2020. The Meeting was chaired by the Secretary General of the Ministry of Women Empowerment and Family and Co-Chaired by the Director General of the National Institute of Statistics. The Inter-ministerial Committee provides its members with strategic orientations to improve the production and use of gender statistics for a better monitoring of the Sustainable Development Goals and the National Gender Policy.

In the Words of Liliane: “Thanks to the support of the Association of Women for the Promotion and Endogenous Development (AFPDE), as part of its program with UN Women, I was able to receive the necessary care for our survival.”

Date: Monday, August 24, 2020

Amid political instability and the pain of sequestrations in Burundi, Liliane, her husband and her four children settled in Sange, in the Democratic Republic of Congo in 2015. In 2019, Liliane gets pregnant. Living under the shock of trauma, emotions and in a difficult economic situation, Liliane wondered under what conditions her baby would come into the world. Rescued by the Women’s Peace & Humanitarian Fund of UN Women, she tells us how the organization saved her family's life.

UN Women supports the implementation of Zebra Model in Mozambique

Date: Thursday, August 20, 2020

Civil Society organizations, provincial and local governments represented by female mayors and governors and the country´s executive through the ministry of State Administration held a 3-day Conference in Maputo the capital of Mozambique for an exchange of experience on the implementation of recommendations of 39th summit of Southern Africa Development Community, SADC heads of States held in 2019.

Stronger partnerships and investment needed to support women’s recovery from COVID-19 in the Global South

Date: Friday, August 14, 2020

A virtual ministerial roundtable meeting organized by UN Women on 5 August 2020 brought to the forefront the need to safeguard women’s rights and put in place deliberate measures to advance gender equality, as part of COVID-19 response and recovery interventions.

My Take Your Take: Youth take over

Date: Wednesday, August 12, 2020

In this intergenerational series for the Generation Equality campaign, 24-year old Vickjune Wutoh, from Liberia discusses about women’s leadership and political participation with veteran activist, Commissioner Tonia Wiles who has been advocating for the rights of women and children from a young age and became more active after attending the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action in 1995.

A Two-Year Exhibition to Praise Women's Political Leadership in Africa

Date: Monday, August 3, 2020

The UN Women Regional Office for West and Central Africa (WCARO) in partnership with the Musée des civilisations noires in Dakar, Senegal, inaugurated in March 2020 a two-year exhibition that showcases women political leaders in Africa and highlights women's political participation across the continent. The exhibition will remain open until March 2022 and it is part of the Regional Women’s Leadership programme funded by the Government of Canada.

Affirmative Finance Action for Women in Africa, ImpactHER and UN Women Policy Brief exposes disadvantages to women entrepreneurs in post COVID-19 era

Date: Monday, July 20, 2020

Women-led businesses are more vulnerable to closure than those led by men in the era of the novel coronavirus, due to women’s limited access to finance, shifts in consumer behavior, and the increase in women’s household care responsibilities as a result of extended lockdowns. All across the continent, the coronavirus pandemic is wreaking economic havoc and hitting women the hardest, with women-led Small and Medium-sized Enterprises(SMEs) at greater risk of closure as they tend to be smaller and on average, operate in lower profit margin, service-based industries.

ONU Femmes appui le Forum National des Femmes pour le renforcement du leadership féminin au niveau communautaire au Burundi

Date: Saturday, July 18, 2020

Le bureau d’ONU Femmes au Burundi et le Forum National des Femmes ont signé le jeudi 16 juillet 2020, un accord de partenariat visant à renforcer la participation politique des femmes aux prochaines échéances politiques. Prévu pour une durée de 5 mois, le projet cible essentiellement une plus grande participation de femmes candidates collinaires pour ainsi atteindre au moins 20% de femmes candidates.

UN Women and UNDP support vulnerable women in South West and North West Regions of Cameroon

Date: Thursday, July 16, 2020

In Bamenda, on July 16 2020, 21 participants took part in the official launch of the project: “Support for women's socio-economic activities around the value chains induced by COVID-19 in the North-West and South-West Regions of Cameroon”, initiated jointly by UN Women and UNDP, in the conference room of the Regional Research Delegation of the North-West region in Bamenda.

National Rural Women Structure of Liberia raises awareness on COVID-19

Date: Friday, July 10, 2020

With support from UN Women, the National Rural Women Structure of Liberia is sensitizing women in rural Liberia on measures to prevent themselves and their families from COVID-19. During a recent awareness raising campaign, Mrs. Kebeh Monger, National President of the Rural Women Structure of Liberia, encouraged women to observe health protocols put in place by the Government of Liberia to prevent the spread of COVID-19.

Liberian Female owned tailoring businesses get a boost

Date: Friday, July 10, 2020

As part of its continuous effort to support the Government of Liberia to prevent the spread of COVID-19, UN Women on Friday 26 June 2020 signed a partnership agreement with the Ministry of Gender, Children, and Social Protection (MGCSP) to empower women-owned tailoring businesses affiliated to the Liberia National Tailoring Union to produce 10,000 masks that will be distributed to women, girls and children in Montserrado and Margibi counties in Liberia.

Young Generation Equality Champions urge stakeholders to place women and girls at centre of COVID-19 response

Date: Tuesday, June 23, 2020

The UN Women has partnered with Plan International, Msichana Initiative and the African Women Leaders’ Network (AWLN) in a virtual Roundtable Dialogue that sparked the need to keep the momentum of the UN Women Global Campaign: The Generation Equality – Realizing Women’s Rights for an Equal Future during the COVID-19 emergency.

The impact of COVID-19 on women: Nicole GAKOU, Senegalese female entrepreneur

Date: Friday, June 19, 2020

Nicole Gakou is an engineer in information systems and a business manager. She is also the President of the Union of Women Entrepreneurs of Senegal (UFCE). In this interview with UN Women, she sheds light on the impacts of COVID-19 on businesses led by women. The UFCE includes 500 women distributed in the regions of Dakar, St Louis, Ziguinchor, and Thiès who are active in all sectors of activity. Today, 46% of these women are in agro-food processing (agriculture, livestock and fish farming), 36% in services, and less than 1% work in laboratories of cosmetic industry. Over 90% of UFCE members are in the formal sector and the rest of the members are accompanied to achieve this.

COVID-19 response : UN Women Builds Economic Resilience of Women Living in Refugee Camps in Uganda

Date: Wednesday, June 10, 2020

UN Women has been working with CARE International since October 2018 to implement the Leadership, Empowerment Access and Protection (LEAP) program in the South Sudanese emergency response

UN Women and Private Bank in Mozambique join efforts to advance women economic empowerment

Date: Monday, May 25, 2020

The Commercial and Investment Bank (BCI) and UN Women Mozambique signed a memorandum of understanding in Maputo, to advocate and promote gender and women's empowerment in Mozambique. The agreement was signed by UN Women Mozambique and BCI representatives Marie Laetitia Kayisire and Rogério LAM respectively.

UN Women Mozambique supports young women partner organization to demand social protection for women and girls during COVID19

Date: Monday, May 25, 2020

Associação Socio Cultural Horizonte Azul (ASCHA) a Maputo based civil society organization and UN Women partner in activities by youth and for youth particularly on the right of girls and young women, issued a statement addressing government authorities to demand extension of social protection programs for women and girls and other vulnerable groups as long COVID19 impact last.

Female-Headed households in South Sudan bear the brunt of Covid-19 as livelihoods shrink

Date: Tuesday, May 19, 2020

Margret Raman, 38, a single mother of five, two boys and three girls, is one of the several women in Yambio, South Sudan who is bearing the brunt of the Covid-19 pandemic. “Since the announcement of Covid-19, our lives have never been the same. Since we received business and financial management skills from UN Women, our businesses have been growing only to be disturbed by Covid-19."