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Porec
Platform of Action
Advocacy
for Women's Economic and Political Empowerment
In Transition Countries of Southeastern Europe Regional Conference
Porec, July 2, 2000
The following statement is the Platform of Action adopted by the
participants of the Porec Regional Conference.
"We sixty women from business, politics, NGOs, trade unions, national
and local government officials, journalists, entrepreneurs and managers
from the countries of southeastern Europe, supported by our friends
from Europe and the U.S., gathered at a conference in Porec, Croatia,
on June 29-July 2, 2000 to enumerate our common basic problems in
transition societies. We concluded that all aspects of the current
social framework discriminate against women. Greater numbers of
women in decision-making positions will surely aid economic and
democratic development of our societies.
Therefore we advocate for immediate and significant improvement
of women's positions in the labor market, business and politics,
and for an increased social safety net for women, by means of:
- Education based on the tenets of gender equality
- Education of women for entrepreneurship and public office
- Access to professional job training and retraining
- Building of responsible institutional mechanisms for promoting
gender equality
- Changes in legislation and its implementation
- Insistence on creation and implementation of socially just
national economic strategies that take women into account
- Credit access for women entrepreneurs and formation of loan
guarantee funds
- Access to information
- Gathering of gender-disaggregated statistics and public access
to data
- Continuous analysis of women's position in the four above-mentioned
areas
- Creation of partnerships between public, private and civil
sectors in society
Campaigns for public policy advocacy will be founded on:
- Cooperation with men (gender integration)
- Networking (within economic, political and NGO sectors and among
them at the local, national and international levels)
- Promotion of women's successes; and
- Sensitizing the public and the media to women's priorities,
insisting on gender-sensitive language
We seek women's equal participation in the creation of peaceful
and stable societies, active inclusion in all working tables of
the Stability Pact, and other relevant international and regional
initiatives."
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