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UNFPA Holds Annual Review Meting for 2005
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Baku, 7 December, 2005 - United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) conducted this morning the Annual Review Meeting at the Excelsior Hotel. The meeting aimed to discuss the UNFPA achievements, challenges, and lessons learned in 2005 and to identify the main directions of activities for 2006 with the organization’s key counterparts among the government and non-governmental organizations, UN agencies, bilateral organizations and private sector.
The event was opened by demonstration of a video clip on gender equality and followed with the opening speech of UNFPA Program Coordinator Mr. Farid Babayev who underlined that UNFPA office in Azerbaijan was the leading UN agency for the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) 3 on promoting gender equality and MDG 5 –on improving maternal health in 2005 and actively contributed through its programs into poverty reduction in the country.
Ms. Anna- Birgitte Albrectsen, UNFPA-Azerbaijan Country Director, revealed the new vision and spirit of UNFPA: “UNFPA is increasingly becoming the voice of women and youth in the country. It also embodies a new way of working in Azerbaijan, which is a way of partnering with all aspects of society, partnering with the Government, obviously, as our primary counterpart, but also partnering with NGOs, private sector, academics, with the whole range of partners in the country. From both the video clip and form the review, that we will do today, you will see, that while gender issues have been very higher on our agenda in Azerbaijan for many years, in 2005 it really took a step upwards.”
Ms. M. Hasanova, parliamentarian, mentioned that MDGs would be incorporated into all Government policies, and this is currently taking place in Azerbaijan: “Maternal mortality rates are high in Azerbaijan. It’s time to ring the bell of alarm. We have also unsatisfactory situation with AIDS and infant mortality”. According to her, although UNFPA is more “gender-oriented” for 2006, there is still a gap in addressing all gender policies in UNFPA action plans for 2006. “There are discrepancies between resources allocated for health care and the financial needs for health reforms. Especially in rural areas we can see discrepancy between number of boys and girls attending schools. Despite the Decree of the President on empowerment of women, the first barrier for its implementation is the national budget. Today there is almost no female decision-makers in Azerbaijan. Taking into consideration that men, not women, elaborate the budget we can easily identify the root causes of this problem. Therefore it is crucial to raise the awareness of these people”. She said that although more than 2000 candidates were running for the recent parliamentary elections, only 117 of them were women. “This comprises only 7-8% of all candidates. It is one of the indicators of gender equality problem in the country. Women in our society deviate from making their voices heard”.
UNFPA established very good collaboration with the Ministry of Labor in the area of promoting population and development issues, especially in terms of increasing demographic studies and research in the country, said Mr. Vahab Mammadov, Chief of the Demographic Department of Ministry of Labor and Social Protection. According to him, putting demographic issues at the center of the planning process in the country contributed to the sustainability of poverty reduction.
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© United Nations Azerbaijan 2005 |
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UNFPA Holds Annual Review Meting for 2005
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© United Nations Azerbaijan 2005 |
