On Saturday 8 March, UNA-UK celebrated International Women's Day - a chance to reflect on progress made, call for change and celebrate women around the world who are making a difference to their countries and communities.
This year, we sent two of our own gender champions - UNA-UK's Policy & Advocacy Officer, Hayley Richardson, and Sally Spear, a long-standing member of UNA’s Women’s Advisory Council - to New York to lobby on the 2014 theme for Women's Day: Equality for women is progress for all. They will be attending the 2014 Commission on the Status of Women to convey UNA-UK's views on the challenges, achievements and next steps in making the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) a reality for women and girls.
From now until 21 March, our delegation will use every opportunity to influence decision-makers and highlight the suggestions submitted by UNA-UK members and supporters in the lead-up to the conference via our poll of issues and suggestion box.
You can follow their progress on Twitter and Facebook. A report of their visit will be posted here on their return.
Your views
We are delighted that over 300 of you took part in our poll. Your top priorities were: education - with 37%, equality - with 23%, and action to tackle poverty - with 22%. Click here to see the full results.
As many of you pointed out in your submissions, all the issues featured in the poll are important and inter-related, and UNA-UK's delegation will be emphasising the need for a joined-up approach to women's empowerment in development programmes.
We were particularly grateful for the 100+ personalised submissions that we received, which drew attention to many issues not adequately addressed in, or entirely absent from, the MDG framework. They included several comments on the need to address all forms of violence against women and make progress on the UN's women, peace and security agenda.
Beyond 2015
Whilst the Commission on the Status of Women will focus on the current development goals, due to expire in 2015, it is an opportunity to reflect on what has and hasn't worked as the international community turns its attention to the post-2015 development agenda.
Building on UNA-UK's previous work in this area, our delegation will be lobbying hard for the new development framework to include a stand-alone goal on gender equality and empowerment, whilst mainstreaming gender-specific concerns and targets across all the goals.
Further reading
UN Commission on the Status of Women
UNA-UK supports international development gender equality bill in UK Parliament
UN Day celebration highlights gender, conflict and governance as development priorities
Top UN officials address Parliament on the need to tackle violence against women
UNA-UK outlines priorities and challenges for post-2015 development agenda
International Development Secretary addresses Parliament
UNA-UK magazine feature: 10 reasons why it's hard to be a woman
