Workshop proposes national budget geared to women By Miranda La Rose

Stabroek News
November 4, 2002

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Participants at a women's leadership workshop would like to see budgets at the national and local government level more reflective of the needs of women.

The issue arose at a workshop organised by the Guyana Bar Association (GBA) in collaboration with the Guyana Association of Women's Lawyers (GAWL). The one-day Organisation of American States (OAS)-sponsored workshop, which attracted participation from a wide cross-section of women's and other non-governmental organisations, was held in the conference room of the Hughes, Fields and Stoby law firm on Hadfield Street on Saturday.

The concept of what the workshop called a 'genderised' budget was previously contained in a submission made by the Women's Millennium Caucus to the Ministry of Finance two years ago in keeping with the Beijing Platform for action. The platform called on governments to promote women's economic rights and independence, including access to employment, appropriate working conditions and control over economic resources.

The submission which was not accepted was presented by businesswoman Jocelyn Dow and said that different taxes and expenditures have a different impact on women and men. The difference is based on the fact that men and women play different roles in all societies, function differently as economic agents, contribute differently to the economic good of the country and access public services differently having gender specific needs and resources based on several cultural factors. The submissions were not accepted.

But Head of the Fiscal and Monetary Unit in the Finance Ministry, Louise Bouyea said on Saturday that the budgets are already 'genderised' in an indirect way. She said investment in the social sector was contributing in direct and indirect ways to issues that affect genders, and women in particular. Giving an example of how the national budget was indirectly 'genderised', Bouyea referred to the government's contribution to women's issues in maternal and child welfare in the health sector as well as in the schools feeding programme; water and sanitation and poverty alleviation among others.

GBA/GAWL executive and co-coordinator of the workshop, Anande Trotman, noted, however, that while women's and children's issues may be dealt with in the budget indirectly, there were other health and reproductive issues that needed to be considered.

According to the Millennium Caucus, there is a general view that national budgets are gender neutral but this is not the case with most. Bouyea and Treasurer of the Mayor and City Council, Roderick Edinboro made presentations on the local government and the national budgets which provoked considerable debate from the floor.

Declaring the workshop open, Director of the local OAS office Dennis Moses said it was one in an ongoing OAS initiative in Guyana which is part of a multinational OAS project - Women's political participation: training in Democracy and Governance. Guyana, St Kitts-Nevis and Antigua and Barbuda are the participating countries.

The Guyana project is at present twinned with Antigua's and is helping the women of the island country in their constitutional reform process.

Moses said the project is aimed at enhancing women's participation in decision-making and the policy making process at all levels and to promote actions to increase women's capacity to participate in political decision-making and leadership positions.

He said the OAS contribution to the project was consistent with other efforts to support issues affecting women in other member states. Through the Inter-American Commission on Women (CIM), the OAS has been assisting the Rural Women's Network in Guyana.

Following the sessions which dealt with `Sensitising Women about Budgets' and `Communicating the Women's Agenda', participants requested other workshops on project planning and preparation for budgets at the local and national government level.

Participants also requested more information on the operations of the NDCs as well as training in public speaking.