UNCCD celebrates International Women's Day 2019

Bonn, Germany – UNCCD has joined other UNBonn organizations on 8 March 2019 to celebrate the International Women's Day. This year’s celebration puts innovation by women and girls, for women and girls, at the heart of efforts to remove barriers to gender equality, accelerate progress for women’s empowerment and improve social protection systems.

Addressing the meeting on UN campus, Dr. Heike Kuhn of the Federal Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development presented on-the-ground projects that enable women's empowerment, such as WeCode programming school for women in Uganda. During the follow-up discussions, participants agreed that providing women with access to digital learning is essential for giving them much-needed options to acquire new knowledge and skills without leaving their jobs, families and communities.

In his recent op-ed on the occasion of the International Women's Day, the UNCCD Executive Secretary Mr. Ibrahim Thiaw highlighted that science and technology can offer rural women new opportunities to tackle the daily challenges, reduce their workload, raise food production and participate more in the paid labour market. However, the real progress can only be achieved by creating an enabling environment to access these options through secure land rights, financing and education.

Learn more:

• Actions around the world
• UNCCD Gender Action Plan
• Land and gender