Experts dialogue: towards gender-responsive socio-economic recovery
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UN Women hosted a national dialogue on 24 June to discuss emerging trends and evidence on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in Jordan on women’s economic empowerment and participation in the labour market. The dialogue gathered members of the Inter-Ministerial Committee on Women’s Empowerment, civil society organizations, parliament representatives, the private sector, academia, members of the international community under the Gender Partners Coordination Group and UN agencies.
“We reaffirm our support to the recommendations and action plans developed during the ‘Women’s Economic Empowerment’ conference and we recognize, at this critical time, the importance of their operationalization to address gender needs at a community level,” affirmed H.E. Eng. Mousa Maaytah, Minister of Political and Parliamentary Affairs and Chair of the Inter-Ministerial Committee on Women’s Empowerment.
Women comprised less than 20% of the workforce in Jordan prior to the crisis . The impact of the pandemic has further exacerbated the situation of vulnerable women in Jordan, contributing to adverse economic outcomes including significant challenges in returning to work, pay gaps, monitoring mechanisms to prevent discriminatory attitudes in the private sector, and increased unpaid care workload. “Women business owners faced additional challenges during the crisis, due to the increased burden of domestic responsibilities’, Dr. Reem Baghdadi, Vice President of the Industrial Women Council.
During the session, UN Women presented the findings of the recently developed ‘Policy Recommendations for Strengthening Jordan’s Recovery’, which identifies a series of policy recommendations across seven areas in order to facilitate a gender-responsive recovery and to enhance women’s economic empowerment in Jordan.
The dialogue also built on the recommendations from the National Women’s Economic Empowerment Conference organized in January 2020 by the Inter-Ministerial Committee on Women’s Empowerment and the House of Representatives under the patronage of the Prime Minister of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, H.E. Dr. Omar Razzaz, which sought to boost women’s economic empowerment at the governorate level.
In order to enhance the gender-responsive recovery, UN Women, in close collaboration with national women’s machineries, will continue to foster national networks to facilitate the collection and analysis of gender data, whilst incorporating gender-responsive planning into decentralization initiatives with the aim of strengthening socio-economic recovery and women’s economic empowerment.
Aligned with the National Strategy for Women (2020-2025) and advanced through localization efforts by national stakeholders, this initiative is held under the regional programme, “Promoting Productive Employment and Decent Work for Women in Egypt, Jordan and Palestine,” and led in partnership with UN Women and the International Labor Organization (ILO), with the generous support of the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida).