Baghdad, 16 September 2019 – Under the patronage of His Excellency the Prime Minister Mr. Adel Abdul Mahdi, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), in Cooperation with The Ministry of Planning (MoP), hosted a conference on Iraqi Women’s Vision on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 2030. The conference aimed to shape the vision of Iraqi women on the SDGs and 2030 Agenda and discuss their role and current issues.

Attendees discussed the possible entry points to strengthen women empowerment, and highlighted the need to address gender equality, and place women issues as a top priority in the development process.

“Women’s Empowerment and gender equality claimed a prominent place in the Iraqi Vision 2030. Therefore, we affirm the need of building effective administrative institutions to ensure women's inclusiveness in the political, social and economic fields to enhance their developmental participation in the society,” said the Minister of Planning, H.E Mr. Nuri Sabah al-Dulaimi, in his opening remarks.

Representing HE the Prime Minister, The Secretary-General of the Council of Ministers, H.E Mr. Hameed al-Ghazi, highlighted the important role of women in society saying: “We believe that women are the core of the society and it is essential to develop a mechanism towards strengthening women empowerment in Iraq".

UNDP Resident Representative, Ms. Zena Ali Ahmad, also stated that, "The 2030 Agenda cannot be achieved without realizing gender equality. Acting on SDG 5 alone is not enough. We must integrate the goals within our planning systems in order to achieve all dimensions of development; politically, socially, economically, and environmentally. Given the inter-linkages and inter-dependence of the SDGs, any attempt to achieve one goal or to address a problem must be done closely through these dimensions combined all together”.

During the conference, different aspects of the experience of Iraqi women was analyzed from various points of view, including and not limited to education, political participation, health, social protection, decision-making, sectoral strategies, the national 2030 vision on SDGs, and the National Development Plan (NDP) for the period 2018-2022.

UNDP presented findings of an analysis, completed in 2019, through which the NDP 2018-2022 and Iraq 2030 vision were compared with the targets of SDG 5 to identify gaps. This is a first step toward assessing Iraq’s readiness to achieve the SDG gender targets, especially where the country still falls short on issues of discrimination and violence against women and girls, unpaid care-work and domestic violence that require immediate action.

Participants concluded that there is a need to develop a road map to activate women’s role as an early warning mechanism to combat extremist violence and corruption.

For more information please contact:

Mohammed Al-Bahbahanee, Communications Specialist