Gender Budget Monitoring Unit for MOWAC (2/04/09)

Gender equality and empowerment of women are indispensable tools for advancing development, reducing poverty and also key to achieving the eight Millennium Development Goals that serves as a framework for halving poverty and improving lives.
In spite of tremendous efforts over the world, discrimination against women and girls, including gender-based violence, economic discrimination and others, still persist. Marginalisation of women due to some cultural practices has not helped in developing the capacity of women in Ghana and other countries.
To help strengthen women’s participation in economic decision-making through their engagement in budgetary processes, as well as enhance the incorporation of gender into economic governance and leadership processes, the New Patriotic Party (NPP) Administration began a Gender Responsive Budgeting Initiative (GBI) to give a further boost to women’s participation in taking economic decisions.
That initiative became necessary after Cabinet approved the adoption of a gender responsive budgeting guideline for all ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) in the 2008 budget. It requires ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) in the country to adopt a positive change in their organisational culture to accommodate gender responsive budgeting in their programmes and also give policy direction for all MDAs to take into account critical gender equality, equity and women empowerment concerns at all levels of activity planning and resource allocation.
Speaking at a seminar on Gender Budgeting for Directors of the various MDAs in the country, organised by the Civil Servants Association Ladies Club (CISALAC) in Accra on Tuesday, the Minister for Women and Children's Affairs (MOWAC), Ms Akua Sena Dansua, said the government was to establish a Gender Budget Monitoring Unit at the Ministry of Women and Children's Affairs (MOWAC) in collaboration with the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning (MoFEP) to facilitate the implementation of gender budgeting in all ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs).
She said the unit would be given the mandate to facilitate the development of gender based budgets in all the MDAs and monitor their implementation.
This she said was to ensure that the gender equity commitment of the government was respected and adhered to, adding that the objective was to ensure that the National and Sector Budgets for 2010 and beyond were gender responsive.
She stressed that the decision by the government to introduce Gender Responsive Budgeting (GRB) was born out of the realisation that poverty, vulnerability, marginalisation, social exclusion and the disparity gaps between geographical areas could be reduced faster, addressed and narrowed if the concerns and specific needs of all these segments were taken into account during sector and national policy design, budgeting and implementation.
Ms Dansua stated that the government therefore regarded GRB as an important tool for gender mainstreaming and women empowerment.
She said some of the benefits to be derived included promotion of good governance, ascertaining whether public expenditures were allocated in an equitable way, promoting the realisation of women's rights and promoting accountability and transparency.
She stressed that the GRB was not a separate budget but a budgeting tool or process that took into account the various concerns of males and females in any development planning.
She said the GRB was a holistic and effective approach to addressing human development since it responded positively to the needs and development aspirations of all segments of the population.
The Resident Representative of Japan International Co-operation Agency (JICA), Ghana, Mr Kunihiro Yamauchi, said the government of Japan had realised the important role of women in the social economic development of the country and would continue to champion the cause of women in Ghana.
He said the marginalisation of women due to some cultural practices had not helped in developing the capacity of women in the country.
The President of CISALAC, Mrs Cynthia Saar Bediako of MoFEP, said the seminar was to provide participants the opportunity to share knowledge and information on gender responsive budget and new trends in gender budgeting to accelerate the GRB and gender mainstreaming agenda.
She said participants of the workshop would be taken through the background of gender budgeting in Ghana, the existing situation, understanding gender and concepts, GRB, importance of budgeting and tools for analysis.
She said the one-day seminar would help the participants appreciate and criticise the budget and also contribute to the decision making process in Ghana.