The Long Road to Equality: Taking stock of the situation of women and girls in Asia and the Pacific for Beijing+25 A synthesis report The designations employed and the presentation of the material in this publication do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of the Secretariat of the United Nations concerning the legal status of any country, territory, city or area, or of its authorities, or concerning the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries. The views expressed in this publication are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations. The publication has been issued without formal editing. Links contained in the present publication are provided for the convenience of the reader and are correct at the time of issue. The United Nations takes no responsibility for the continued accuracy of that information or for the content of any external website. Reproduction of material in this publication for sale or other commercial purposes, including publicity and advertising, is prohibited without the written permission of the copyright holders. Applications for such permission, with a statement of purpose and extent of the reproduction, should be addressed to the Director, Social Development Division, United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) at [email protected], or UN Women at [email protected] Some rights reserved. This work is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial- ShareAlike 3.0 IGO licence (CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO; https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/igo). Under the terms of this licence, you may copy, redistribute and adapt the work for non-commercial purposes, provided the work is appropriately cited, as indicated below. In any use of this work, there should be no suggestion that ESCAP and/or UN Women endorses any specific organization, products or services. The use of the ESCAP and UN Women logo is not permitted. If you adapt the work, then you must license your work under the same or equivalent Creative Commons licence. If you create a translation of this work, you should add the following disclaimer along with the suggested citation: “This translation was not created by the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific or UN Women. The Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific and UN Women are not responsible for the content or accuracy of this translation. The original English edition shall be the binding and authentic edition.” Any mediation relating to disputes arising under the licence shall be conducted in accordance with the mediation rules of the World Intellectual Property Organization. United Nations, Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific and UN Women Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific (2020). The Long Road to Equality: Taking stock of the situation of women and girls in Asia and the Pacific for Beijing+25, Bangkok, Thailand. United Nations publication Copyright © 2020 Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific and UN Women Printed in Bangkok Print ISSN: 2618-1010 Online ISSN: 2618-1029 ST/ESCAP/2925 Cover photos clockwise from top left: “Voices Against Violence” Fiji. Photo: UN Women/Caitlin Clifford; Woman medical technologist, Philippines. Photo: UN Women/Louie Pacardo; Women’s AOFC Cup winners 2018, Iran. Photo: Flickr/Singapore Youth Olympic Festival 2018; Woman garment worker in Uzbekistan. Photo: UN Women/Janarbek Amankulov; Girls washing their hands inside a new container WASH facility, Mongolia. Photo: UN Women/Mungunkhishig Batbaatar. The Long Road to Equality: Taking stock of the situation of women and girls in Asia and the Pacific for Beijing+25 A synthesis report Preface Sawan Panthaisong, a food Vendor at Sukhumvit Soi 20, Bangkok. Thailand. Photo: UN Women/Ploy Phutpheng. With the clarion call of the 2030 Agenda for The Asia-Pacific Ministerial Conference on the Sustainable Development to leave no one behind, Beijing+25 Review was convened by the Economic addressing gender inequality is fundamental for and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific achieving a prosperous, inclusive and sustainable (ESCAP) and the United Nations Entity for Gender future for all. 2020 marks a series of converging Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN global milestones: the 25th anniversary of the Women) in late 2019 to review progress on the adoption of the Beijing Declaration and Platform implementation of the Beijing Declaration and for Action; the 20th anniversary of UN Security Platform for Action and the Sustainable Development Council resolution 1325 on women, peace and Goals. More than 600 participants from 54 countries security; and the five-year milestone of the 2030 and 166 civil society organizations attended the Agenda for Sustainable Development and its SDGs. conference, which culminated in the adoption of Together, these offer an opportunity to take stock the Asia-Pacific Declaration on Advancing Gender of progress and persisting challenges and identify Equality and Women’s Empowerment. It offers a and accelerate actions to make gender equality and comprehensive set of commitments and actions on the empowerment of women a reality for all women region-specific issues to move forward the gender and girls in Asia and the Pacific. equality agenda over the next five years. 4 | The Long Road to Equality: Taking stock of the situation of women and girls in Asia and the Pacific for Beijing+25 Within this context, ESCAP and UN Women conducted a study of the progress made and gaps that remain in implementing the Beijing Declaration Asia and the Pacific has and Platform for Action. This synthesis report is the made good progress in result of an analytical review drawing from national review reports of ESCAP members and associate terms of the empowerment members on Beijing+25, SDG data and secondary of women and girls over literature. the last 25 years, but much Asia and the Pacific has made good progress in terms of the empowerment of women and girls over the work remains. Gains are last 25 years, but much work remains. Gains are currently threatened by the currently threatened by the COVID-19 pandemic, with gendered effects that are in large part COVID-19 pandemic, with attributable to the social and economic inequalities gendered effects that are women have long faced. in large part attributable At the regional level, governments highlighted to the social and economic progress in some key areas, including the expansion of social protection programmes that put resources inequalities women have into women’s hands, women’s greater educational long faced. attainment, increased economic empowerment and participation in public life, and improvements in health outcomes, including the halving of the region’s maternal mortality rate since 2000. Alongside these achievements, governments also To further advance gender equality in the region identified common challenges. These comprised in the coming five years, governments indicated limited government coordination and collaboration, that eliminating violence against women and girls, and weak or insufficient implementation of relevant promoting women’s political participation and laws and initiatives. Discriminatory social norms enhancing women’s access to decent work are top continue to limit women’s and girls’ abilities to priorities. Additional investments are needed in exercise and enjoy the full scope of their rights and key areas as diverse as social protection, inclusive available protections. Persistent gaps in gender data digital access and skills building, and sustainable hinder effective policies and programmes. infrastructure. Governments also noted that, in spite of progress, Across these areas, and many more, there is a critical further efforts will be needed to end violence need for concerted collective, collaborative and against women and girls; increase women’s political well-resourced action to empower all women and participation and leadership; enhance women’s girls in Asia and the Pacific, and to realize gender economic participation; improve women’s and girls’ equality for everyone, everywhere. health; and address environmental issues, such as climate change and natural resource management, as ongoing challenges to the realization of gender equality and women’s empowerment. | 5 Acknowledgements The Long Road to Equality: Taking stock of the situation of women and girls in Asia and the Pacific for Beijing+25 was prepared as part of the Asia and the Pacific regional review of 25 years of progress in implementing the 1995 Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action. The report was developed through a collaboration between ESCAP and the UN Women Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific, under the overall direction and guidance of Srinivas Tata, Director of the Social Development Division, ESCAP, and Mohammad Naciri, Regional Director of the UN Women Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific. A technical team from the two organizations (Cai Cai, Chief of Gender Equality and Social Inclusion Section, ESCAP; Channe Lindstrøm Oguzhan and Farzana Sharmin, Social Affairs Officers, ESCAP; Hulda Ouma, Planning and Coordination Specialist, UN Women; and Sara Duerto Valero, Regional Gender Statistics Specialist, UN Women) guided the development of the text. The drafting team comprised Melissa Langworthy (Chapters 1, 2 and 4), Lorena Fuentes (Chapter 3), and Tara Patricia Cookson (substantive editor). Substantive reviews and valuable inputs were provided by colleagues at ESCAP (Sabine Henning, Marco Roncarati and Sudha Gooty) and UN Women (Melissa Alvarado, Lesli Davis, Maria Holtsberg, Inkar Kadyrzhanova and Carla Silbert). The report was peer reviewed by members of the United Nations family working on gender equality and the empowerment of women in Asia and the Pacific. In particular, the team wishes to thank Annette Sanna Christina Wallgren (UN Environment), and Henrica Jansen and Ingrid Fitzgerald (UNFPA). Maria Mathew also provided valuable comments and inputs. Additionally, support on proof-reading was provided by Miriam Scheibe and Raphaëlle Berliat (ESCAP), and Denise Laaveri (UN Women).