Dublin Rio Principles - Bridging the Gender Gap in Water Resource Management – Where do we stand, What lessons have we learned?

RIO+20 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development –13th – 22nd June, 2012 - Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Gender equality and women’s empowerment goals are part of the cornerstones of the principles that came out of the International Conference on Water and the Environment’s (ICWE), Dublin Principles (1992), the UN Conference on Environment and Development, (1992), the 2000 Millennium Development Summit, and the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) . When it comes to the implementation of these principles, evidence suggests that while progress has been made in achieving these goals, there are also significant gaps. It is widely believed that there are gaps between the pivotal roles that women play in the provision, management and safeguarding of water and how these roles are reflected in policy and institutional, arrangements for the development and management of water resources.

Bridging the gender gap in WRM will require promoting positive policies and strategies that equip and empower women and men to participate at all levels of water resources management in ways defined by them, wmen’s empowerment also contributes to improved water resources management. Regional and national level solutions therefore will require the development of water sector plans and an Africa continent Network/Partnership to support AMCOW, that is aligned with the existing gender policy frameworks to ensure that the different activities that are implemented in the water sector appropriately mainstream gender concerns.

Side Event: African Ministers’Council on Water (AMCOW); Global Water Partnership (GWP); United Nations Development Programme (UNDP); International Network for Capacity Building in Sustainable Water Management (Cap-Net) ; South Asia Consortium for Interdisciplinary Water Resources Studies (SaciWATERs) ; and the Public Health Institute’s (PHI) Center for Public Health and Climate Change; Gender and Water Alliance (GWA)

AMCOW has over the last 3 years provided leadership and commitment in this area in Africa. In May 2011, AMCOW launched its Policy and Strategy for Mainstreaming Gender in Africa’s Water Sector, following a 3-year participatory process that involved hundreds of stakeholders such as government, civil society and donor organisations in 40 countries, - this was clearly the most effective and consultative process ever undertaken in Africa. GWP has followed AMCOW’s example for Africa and is currently elaborating a gender Strategy for the GWP Network covering the 13 regions.

This event to be conducted at the Rio+20 Conference is convened by AMCOW, GWP; UNDP; Cap-Net; SaciWATERs and the Public Health Institute’s (PHI) Center for Public Health and Climate Change, GWA - it aims to build on previous gender mainstreaming international policy commitments by facilitating information exchange on strategies, actions, approaches , partnerships/networks, lessons learnt on gender mainstreaming throughout the world. It’s an initiative that is geared and seeks to share knowledge so as to support Africa’s implementation of the AMCOW gender strategy and to develop an Africa Network that will support AMCOW in this and bring these issues forward beyond RIO+20.

To view the Google Document and learn more about the event, click here.