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Interventions and activities of WMG during informal formal sessions May June in NY

Interventions given on behalf of the WMG by, amongst others, WECF Director Sascha Gabizon, at the United Nations Rio+20 negotiations

02.06.2012 |Women's Major Group

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Women's Major Group for Rio+20 during the negotiations at the UN in New York, May-June 2012

Interventions and activities of WMG during informal formal sessions May June at the UN Head Quarters in NY

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Intervention by Rosa Lizarde, May 30, on behalf of the WMG:
It’s necessary first of all, to reiterate the words of the Secretary General at the beginning of this session. We urge you to work constructively. This session is in effect your last opportunity to work together before meeting in Rio. Failure is not an option and we must unite for the global common good. On the issues discussed today, Women remain firm that a rights-based approach to sustainable development is essential.

Read the complete text of the intervention here


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Please find below and attached the intervention given by Nozipho Wright on behalf of the Women's Major Group during the Rio+20 informals, 30 May 2012, New York.

Thank you Chairs,

My name is Nozipho Wright, from Botswana. I work with Energia – an International Network on Gender and Sustainable Energy, – and I speak on behalf of the Women’s Major Group

On the Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment section, which is upcoming – we first of all want to congratulate the many delegations which have supported strong language throughout the draft document, and are glad to see that gender equality, poverty eradication and sustainable development are recognized as key to the future we all want!

However, the past 20 years have shown us that gender equality often remains an empty term, if we do not create the necessary policy priorities, targets and instruments.

Read the complete text of the intervention here

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Intervention by Sascha Gabizon 10pm June 1, 2012 United Nations Rio+20 negotiations, Womens Major Group



Sascha Gabizon calls for immediate and much more urgent protection from dangerous chemicals that contaminate our homes, our environment and our bodies, that affect women and their children. She spoke of the lack of human rights in many countries where widowed and divorced women and their children are forced from their homes, and have no land rights.

Read the full intervention here

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Final Intervention by Imogen Ingram from IPEN, on behalf of the WMG, May 31

My name is Imogen Ingram from the Cook Islands.  I work with IPEN, the International Network for the Elimination of POPs and I speak on behalf of the Women’s Major Group .
 
With reference to Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) discussed this morning, the Women’s Major Group is worried about the SDGs content.
 
We need to learn from the problems of the MDGs. The post 2015 development agenda should be based on a human-rights approach.
 
Poverty is far from being eradicated.  A limited focus on income as an indicator of poverty, as in MDG-1, is not enough.
 
Women make up the majority of the world’s poor.
 
Women’s poverty is often difficult to measure, as they do unpaid domestic work, work in the informal and precarious sectors and their livelihoods are often based on subsistence farming and fishing activities.
 
Land-grabbing and the rush for resources by the global North in the global South are expelling women from lands into further poverty. We know that the majority of the slum dwellers are women.
 
The post 2015 development agenda therefore has to clearly link gender equality, poverty eradication and unsustainable resource use, and place this at the center of its concerns......

Read the complete text of the intervention here
 

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