05 June 2000

Bonn, Germany: The work of 21 UN Volunteer gender specialists is featured in a new publication to be issued Tuesday in New York during a special session of the United Nations General Assembly marking the fifth anniversary of the World Conference on Women in Beijing.

In addition to the launch of the booklet, "Gender Mainstreaming in the United Nations", four UNV gender specialists will talk about their experiences in the field and answer questions as part of a panel discussion Wednesday at UN Headquarters which is being chaired by Aster Zaoude, manager of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Gender in Development Programme.

Gender mainstreaming within the United Nations system gained momentum in the wake of the 1995 World Conference on Women, which resulted in the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action.

To help bring about equality and development for women, the United Nations Volunteer programme (UNV) joined forces with UNDP's Gender in Development Programme and the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) to develop a project entitled "Follow-up to the Beijing Platform for Action: UNV Support to Gender Mainstreaming".

Over the past two years, the 21 UNV gender specialists under this project have taken up assignments in countries around the world to help ensure that gender equality concerns are considered in all policy, programme, administrative and financial activities and in organizational procedures.

The new booklet, published jointly by UNV, UNDP and UNIFEM and compiled by one of the UNV specialists, outlines mainstreaming activities in the UN such as support for implementation of a new law on equal opportunities for women in Panama. And in Lebanon, a UNV gender specialist organized a series of learning sessions for UN staff members to help them prevent sexual harassment in their offices.

The 60-page illustrated publication features biographical information on each of the UNV gender specialists and details of their experiences in the field. These UNVs work in the following countries: Botswana, Cambodia, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Haiti, Ivory Coast, Kyrgyzstan, Lao PDR, Lebanon, Malawi, Mexico, Morocco, Mozambique, Niger, Panama, South Africa, Tanzania, Turkmenistan, Uganda, Vietnam and Yemen.