Women in Development

A/RES/64/217View PDF

Who adopted this document and its mandates?

A Resolution of the General Assembly, under agenda item 57b Women in development, published in 2010.

What other versions does this mandate have?

15 versions · 1996–2024

This is an older version — the most recent is A/RES/79/223

Year	Symbol	Title	Word length	Text similarity
2024	A/RES/79/223	Women in development	9,342	91%Compare
2022	A/RES/77/181	Women in development	8,750	77%Compare
2020	A/RES/74/235	Women in development	8,144	87%Compare
2018	A/RES/72/234	Women in development	7,460	25%Compare
2016	A/RES/70/219	Women in development	6,816	56%Compare

Which reports were submitted under this mandate?

17 reports · 2003–2026

Year	Symbol	Title	Mandate resolution
2026	A/81/244	Women in development report of the Secretary-General	A/RES/79/223
2024	A/79/210	Women in development report of the Secretary-General	A/RES/77/181
2024	A/79/111	World survey on the role of women in development : harnessing social protection for gender equality, resilience and transformation report of the Secretary-General	A/RES/74/235
2022	A/77/243	Women in development report of the Secretary-General	A/RES/74/235
2019	A/74/279	Women in development report of the Secretary-General	A/RES/72/234

What’s in this document?

47 operative paragraphs

Takes note of the reports of the Secretary-General;¹³

¹³A/64/93 and A/64/162 and Corr.1.

Calls upon Member States, the United Nations system and other international and regional organizations, within their respective mandates, and all sectors of civil society, including non-governmental organizations, as well as all women and men, to fully commit themselves and to intensify their contributions to the implementation of the Beijing DeclarationError: Reference source not found and Platform for ActionError: Reference source not found and the outcome of the twenty-third special session of the General Assembly;Error: Reference source not found

Recognizes the mutually reinforcing links between gender equality and poverty eradication and the achievement of all of the Millennium Development Goals, as well as the need to elaborate and implement, where appropriate, in consultation with civil society, comprehensive gender-sensitive poverty eradication strategies that address social, structural and macroeconomic issues;

Emphasizes the need to link policies on economic and social development to ensure that all people, including those in poor and vulnerable groups, benefit from inclusive economic growth and development, in accordance with the goals of the Monterrey Consensus of the International Conference on Financing for Development;Error: Reference source not found

Urges Member States, non-governmental organizations and the United Nations system to accelerate further efforts to increase the number of women in decision-making and to build their capacity as agents of change, and to empower women to participate actively and effectively in the development, implementation and evaluation of national development and/or poverty eradication policies, strategies and programmes, including, where appropriate, programme-based approaches;

Stresses the importance of the adoption by Member States, international organizations, including the United Nations, the private sector, non-governmental organizations, trade unions and other stakeholders of appropriate measures to identify and address the negative impacts of the economic and financial crisis on women and girls and of maintaining adequate levels of funding for the achievement of gender equality and the empowerment of women;

Also stresses the importance of the creation by Member States, international organizations, including the United Nations, the private sector, non-governmental organizations, trade unions and other stakeholders of a favourable and conducive national and international environment in all areas of life for the effective integration of women in development, and of their undertaking and disseminating a gender analysis of policies and programmes related to macroeconomic stability, structural reform, taxation, investments, including foreign direct investment, and all relevant sectors of the economy;

Urges the donor community, Member States, international organizations, including the United Nations, the private sector, non-governmental organizations, trade unions and other stakeholders to strengthen the focus and impact of development assistance targeting gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls through gender mainstreaming, the funding of targeted activities and enhanced dialogue between donors and partners, and to also strengthen the mechanisms needed to effectively measure the resources allocated to incorporating gender perspectives in all areas of development assistance;

Urges Member States, non-governmental organizations and the United Nations system to accelerate further their efforts to increase the number of women in economic decision-making bodies, including at the highest levels in the relevant government ministries, international organizations, corporate boards and the banking sector, as well as to improve the collection, compilation, dissemination and use of data on women’s participation in economic decision-making bodies;

Urges Member States to incorporate a gender perspective, commensurate with gender equality goals, into the design, implementation, monitoring and reporting of national development strategies, and to encourage the involvement of men and boys in the promotion of gender equality, and in this regard calls upon the United Nations system to support national efforts to develop methodologies and tools and to promote capacity-building and evaluation;

Calls upon Member States to integrate a gender perspective into the design, implementation, monitoring, evaluation and reporting of national environmental policies, and to strengthen mechanisms and provide adequate resources to ensure women’s full and equal participation in decision-making at all levels on environmental issues, in particular on strategies related to the impact of climate change on the lives of women and girls;

Encourages Member States to ensure inclusive and more effective participation of national mechanisms for gender equality and women’s empowerment in formulating national development strategies, including strategies aimed at eradicating poverty and reducing inequalities, and calls upon the United Nations system to support national efforts in this regard;

Calls upon Member States to continue to increase women’s representation and participation in government decision-making at all levels in development policy areas in order to ensure that the priorities, needs and contributions of women are taken into consideration by, inter alia, providing access to training, developing measures to reconcile family and professional responsibilities and eliminating gender stereotyping in appointments and promotions;

Expresses deep concern about the pervasiveness of violence against women and girls, reiterates the need to further intensify efforts to prevent and eliminate all forms of violence against women and girls, and recognizes that violence against women and girls is one of the obstacles to the achievement of the objectives of equality, development and peace and that women’s poverty and the lack of political, social and economic empowerment, as well as their marginalization, may result from their exclusion from social policies for and benefits of sustainable development and can place them at increased risk of violence;

Recognizes the need to strengthen the capacity of Governments to incorporate a gender perspective into policies and decision-making, and encourages all Governments, international organizations, including the United Nations system, and other relevant stakeholders to assist and support the efforts of developing countries in integrating a gender perspective into all aspects of policymaking, including through the provision of technical assistance and financial resources;

Encourages Governments, the private sector, non-governmental organizations and other actors of civil society to promote and protect the rights of women workers, to take action to remove structural and legal barriers as well as stereotypic attitudes towards gender equality at work and to initiate positive steps to promote equal pay for equal work or work of equal value;

Urges Governments to develop and adequately resource active labour-market policies on full and productive employment and decent work for all, including the full participation of women and men in both rural and urban areas;

Calls upon Governments to strengthen efforts to protect the rights of, and ensure decent work conditions for, domestic workers, including migrant women, in relation to, inter alia, working hours, conditions and wages, access to health-care services and other social and economic benefits;

Encourages Member States to adopt and/or review and to fully implement gender-sensitive legislation and policies that reduce, through specifically targeted measures, horizontal and vertical occupational segregation and gender-based wage gaps;

Urges all Member States to undertake a gender analysis of national labour laws and standards and to establish gender-sensitive policies and guidelines for employment practices, including for transnational corporations, with particular attention to export-processing zones, building in this regard on multilateral instruments, including the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women¹⁴ and Conventions of the International Labour Organization;

¹⁴United Nations, Treaty Series, vol. 1249, No. 20378.

Also urges all Member States to take all appropriate measures to eliminate discrimination against women with regard to their access to financial services, including bank loans, bank accounts, mortgages and other forms of financial credit, giving special attention to poor, uneducated women, to support women’s access to legal assistance and to encourage the financial sector to mainstream gender perspectives in their policies and programmes;

Recognizes the role of microfinance, including microcredit, in the eradication of poverty, the empowerment of women and the generation of employment, notes in this regard the importance of sound national financial systems, and encourages the strengthening of existing and emerging microcredit institutions and their capacities, including through the support of international financial institutions;

Urges Governments to ensure that microfinance programmes focus on developing savings products that are safe, convenient and accessible to women in their efforts and support women’s efforts to retain control over their savings;

Urges all Governments to eliminate discrimination against women in the field of education and ensure their equal access to all levels of education;

Stresses the importance of developing national strategies for the promotion of sustainable and productive entrepreneurial activities that will generate income among disadvantaged women and women living in poverty;

Urges Member States to encourage women entrepreneurs, including through education, vocational training and training of women in business, administration and information and communications technology, and invites business associations to assist national efforts in this regard;

Encourages Governments to create a climate that is conducive to increasing the number of women entrepreneurs and the size of their businesses by giving them greater access to financial instruments, providing training and advisory services, facilitating networking and information-sharing and increasing their participation in advisory boards and other forums so as to enable them to contribute to the formulation and review of policies and programmes being developed by financial institutions;

Calls upon Governments to promote, inter alia, through legislation and family-friendly and gender-sensitive work environments, the facilitation of breastfeeding for working mothers and the provision of the necessary care for working women’s children and other dependants and to consider promoting policies and programmes, as appropriate, to enable men and women to reconcile their work, social and family responsibilities;

Encourages Member States to adopt and implement legislation and policies to promote the reconciliation of work and family responsibilities, including through increased flexibility in working arrangements such as part-time work, and to ensure that both women and men have access to maternity, paternity, parental and other forms of leave and are not discriminated against when availing themselves of such benefits;

Urges Member States to adopt and review legislation and policies to ensure women’s equal access to and control over land, housing and other property, including through inheritance, land reform programmes and land markets, and to take measures to implement those laws and policies;

Urges Governments to take measures to facilitate equitable access to land and property rights by providing training designed to make the judicial, legislative and administrative system more responsive to gender equality issues, to provide legal aid for women seeking to claim their rights, to support the efforts of women’s groups and networks and to carry out awareness campaigns to draw attention to the need for women’s equal rights to land and property;

Recognizes the need to empower women, particularly poor women, economically and politically, and in this regard encourages Governments, with the support of their development partners, to invest in appropriate infrastructure and other projects, including the provision of water and sanitation to rural areas and urban slums to increase health and well-being, relieve the workloads of women and girls and release their time and energy for other productive activities, including entrepreneurship;

Also recognizes the role of agriculture in development, and stresses the importance of reviewing agricultural policies and strategies to ensure that women’s critical role in food security is recognized and addressed as an integral part of both short- and long-term responses to the food crisis;

Expresses its concern at the overall expansion and feminization of the HIV/AIDS pandemic and the fact that women and girls bear a disproportionate share of the burden imposed by HIV/AIDS, that they are more easily infected, that they play a key role in care and that they have become more vulnerable to violence, stigmatization and discrimination, poverty and marginalization from their families and communities as a result of HIV/AIDS, and calls upon Governments and the international community to intensify efforts towards achieving the goal of universal access to comprehensive HIV prevention programmes, treatment, care and support by 2010 and of having halted and begun to reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS by 2015;

Reaffirms the commitment to achieve universal access to reproductive health by 2015, as set out at the International Conference on Population and Development,¹⁵ by integrating this goal into strategies to attain the internationally agreed development goals, including those contained in the United Nations Millennium DeclarationError: Reference source not found aimed at reducing maternal mortality, improving maternal health, reducing child mortality, promoting gender equality, combating HIV/AIDS and eradicating poverty;

¹⁵See Report of the International Conference on Population and Development, Cairo, 5–13 September 1994 (United Nations publication, Sales No. E.95.XIII.18).

Recognizes that there is a need for all donors to maintain and deliver on their existing bilateral and multilateral official development assistance commitments and targets, and that the full implementation of these commitments will substantially boost resources available to push forward the international development agenda;

Expresses deep concern that maternal health remains one area constrained by some of the largest health inequities in the world, and over the uneven progress in improving child and maternal health, and in this context calls upon States to renew their commitment to preventing and eliminating child and maternal mortality and morbidity;

Encourages the international community, the United Nations system, the private sector and civil society to continue to provide the necessary financial resources to assist national Governments in their efforts to meet the development targets and benchmarks agreed upon at the World Summit for Social Development, the Fourth World Conference on Women, the International Conference on Population and Development, the Millennium Summit, the International Conference on Financing for Development, the World Summit on Sustainable Development, the Second World Assembly on Ageing, the twenty-third and twenty-fourth special sessions of the General Assembly and other relevant United Nations conferences and summits;

Urges multilateral donors, and invites international financial institutions, within their respective mandates, and regional development banks to review and implement policies that support national efforts to ensure that a higher proportion of resources reaches women, in particular in rural and remote areas;

Stresses the importance of collecting and exchanging all relevant information needed on the role of women in development, including data on international migration, as well as the need to develop statistics disaggregated by age and sex, and in that regard encourages developed countries and relevant entities of the United Nations to provide support and assistance to developing countries, upon their request, with respect to establishing, developing and strengthening their databases and information systems;

Recognizes the critical role and contribution of rural women, including indigenous women, and their traditional knowledge, in enhancing agricultural and rural development, improving food security and eradicating rural poverty;

Calls upon all organizations of the United Nations system, within their organizational mandates, to mainstream a gender perspective and to pursue gender equality in their country programmes, planning instruments and sector-wide programmes and to articulate specific country-level goals and targets in this domain in accordance with national development strategies;

Calls upon the organizations of the United Nations development system, within their organizational mandates, to further improve their institutional accountability mechanisms and to include intergovernmentally agreed gender-equality results and gender-sensitive indicators in their strategic frameworks;

Calls upon the United Nations system to integrate gender mainstreaming into all its programmes and policies, including in the integrated follow-up to United Nations conferences, in accordance with agreed conclusions 1997/2 on gender mainstreaming adopted by the Economic and Social Council at its substantive session of 1997;¹⁶

¹⁶See Official Records of the General Assembly, Fifty-second Session, Supplement No. 3 and addendum (A/52/3/Rev.1 and Rev.1/Add.1), chap. IV, sect. A, para. 4.

Requests the Secretary-General to submit to the General Assembly at its sixty-sixth session a report on the progress made in the implementation of the present resolution, including on integrating a gender perspective into national development strategies;

Also requests the Secretary-General to update the 2009 World Survey on the Role of Women in Development¹⁷ for consideration by the General Assembly at its sixty-ninth session, noting that the survey should continue to focus on selective emerging development themes that have an impact on the role of women in the economy at the national, regional and international levels;

¹⁷United Nations publication, Sales No. E.09.IV.7.

Decides to include in the provisional agenda of its sixty-sixth session the sub-item entitled “Women in development”.

Women in Development

Who adopted this document and its mandates?

What other versions does this mandate have?

Which reports were submitted under this mandate?

What subjects does this mandate have?

What’s in this document?

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