A look back: FAO at the 69th Session of the Commission on the Status of Women

10-21 March, New York - “It is critical to address the challenges within agrifood systems that hold women back from reaching their full potential,” the Director of the FAO Liaison Office with the UN in New York, Angélica Jácome, stressed during the FAO Commit to Grow Equality (CGE) event at the 69th Session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW69) in New York.  

This was one of five events FAO organized at CSW69, positioning women’s empowerment in agrifood systems as a cross-cutting issue to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The events emphasized the Organization’s work and commitment to empowering women, including through financing and partnerships, data and statistics, and ensuring the right to food of young women and girls during conflicts, and beyond. 

Commit to Grow Equality  

The Commit to Grow Equality event marked the one-year launch of the initiative and the release of its first progress report, featuring CGE partners and their commitments to date. The CGE initiative seeks to enhance gender equality and women’s empowerment in agrifood systems through increased financing, investments and partnerships, bringing together a wide range of diverse stakeholders.  

The Director of the FAO Liaison Office with the UN in New York opened the event and encouraged stakeholders to join the initiative to transform agrifood systems and ensure that they work better for women, their communities and the planet. So far, the CGE initiative has 19 partners who made over 100 commitments.  

The Deputy Director of the Rural Transformation and Gender Equality Division at FAO, Lauren Phillips, presented the progress report, highlighting the commitments made by partners across six different thematic areas.  

Women’s and Girls’ Right to Food 

FAO also organized, together with the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), the World Food Programme (WFP), and the Governments of Malawi and Nepal, an event to raise awareness and identify pathways to accelerate progress toward fully realizing women’s and girls’ right to food in agrifood systems and beyond. Lauren Phillips moderated the event, pointing out that we must address the unique challenges faced by women and girls, who are disproportionately impacted by food insecurity and malnutrition to achieve the right to adequate and nutritious food for all. 

The Committee on World Food Security (CFS) voluntary guidelines on the Right to food and on gender equality and women's and girls' empowerment in the context of food security and nutrition were spotlighted during the event, as they cover critical thematic areas to address those unique challenges. 

The Ministers representing Malawi and Nepal commended the close collaboration with FAO, IFAD and WFP in the context of two joint programmes implemented in their respective countries to deliver transformative change, accelerate women’s economic empowerment and implement the voluntary guidelines.  

Conflict, Hunger and the disproportionate effects on Women and Girls 

On the margins of CSW69, the European Union, the Republic of Sierra Leone, the African Union, and the Global Network Against Food Crises in collaboration with FAO and WFP, brought together stakeholders to address the disproportionate impact of conflict and hunger on women and girls and discussed solutions that take into account the needs of this population specifically. At this roundtable discussion, FAO’s Deputy Director-General (DDG), Beth Bechdol, underlined the need to invest in building the ability of women to drive change, adding that responses to crises should focus not only on immediate relief but also on building women’s resilience and leadership. DDG Bechdol went on to say that women and girls need to be equipped with leadership training, literacy, and broader skills beyond agricultural production training.  

The roundtable discussion concluded with a strong call for enhanced collaboration and investment in empowering women and girls – essential in addressing the root causes of conflicts and both a matter of justice and a strategic economic decision. 

Empowering young women in agrifood systems 

During the second week of CSW69, FAO with the support of the Permanent Mission of the Republic of Indonesia to the UN and the Permanent Mission of Italy to the UN, organized a side event on Youth Perspectives on Empowering Young Women in Agrifood Systems through Education and Training. This side event is part of a year-long consultation process carried out by the World Food Forum (WFF) Youth Assembly, examining Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 5 (Gender Equality) in connection with SDG 4 (Quality Education) and SDG 8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth). The process will culminate in a Youth Recommendations Paper outlining strategies to empower young women in agrifood systems by leveraging these SDGs. Moderating the event was Martina Borrello, FAO’s Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment Specialist. 

During the opening of the event, the Director of the FAO Liaison Office with the UN in New York called on all stakeholders to intensify efforts to empower young women, and youth in general, as key agents of change.  

Lorenzo Gentile, Operations Specialist from the FAO Office of Youth and Women, gave an overview of the year-long WFF Youth Assembly consultation process and shared key lessons learned so far, inviting all participants to contribute to this process through a call for inputs launched during the event.  

Lastly, Kazuki Kitaoka, the Director of the FAO Office of Youth and Women, reiterated the importance of this discussion, underscoring the urgent need to expand access to quality education and training for young women in agrifood systems. The event came to a close after a lively discussion among youth participants. 

Data and Statistics: Measuring women’s empowerment 

FAO and the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) organized an event on Measuring Women's Empowerment in Large Scale Surveys. The event focused on the Women's Empowerment Metric for National Statistical Systems (WEMNS), a new metric for measuring women’s empowerment developed by IFPRI, Emory University and Oxford University in partnership with the World Bank. Under the umbrella of the 50x2030 Initiative to Close the Agricultural Data Gap, a project that aims to improve national agricultural surveys in low and lower-middle income countries, FAO contributed to the uptake of the metric integrating WEMNS in agricultural surveys of partner countries: Sierra Leone, Liberia and the United Republic of Tanzania.  

“Statisticians can contribute to women’s wellbeing by developing and promoting metrics on women’s empowerment,” explained FAO’s Statistician, Chiara Brunelli, during the event. She expanded on the integration of WEMNS in the project and discussed key findings from Sierra Leone, as an example. Learn more and watch the webcast here.