Gender

Hunger advocates call on President Obama to pledge a commitment to global hunger at the G8 summit. Credit: ActionAid USA

Put Food Crisis on G8’s Plate, Group Urges

By Charundi Panagoda
Days before the annual White House Easter Egg Roll, anti- poverty advocates staged their own egg hunt in Lafayette Park to urge President Obama to "find political will to end global hunger" during the upcoming G8 Summit at Camp David.
Poor rural women in Latin America face especially large hurdles in gaining access to justice. Credit: Milagros Salazar/IPS

Full Access to Justice Elusive for Women in Latin America

By Marcela Valente
Only a small proportion of women in the region whose rights are undermined achieve full access to justice, says a collective of women’s organisations from eight countries of Latin America.
More and more girls in Guatemala are having babies. Credit: Fiat Luxe/CC BY-ND 2.0

Guatemala – Regional Leader in Teen Pregnancies

By Danilo Valladares
Teenage pregnancies are on the rise in Guatemala, along with the drop-out rate in schools, family breakdown and many other related social ills.

Nepal’s Rural Women Seek Justice

By Naresh Newar
Women in Nepal’s remote rural areas stood shoulder-to-shoulder with their men during the bloody 1996-2006 civil war that overthrew an oppressive monarchy, but many now battle domestic violence at home.
Traditional Bolivian textiles. Credit: Psyberartist/CC BY 2.0

Native Andean Women Weave a Future in Bolivia

By IPS Correspondents and - -
Their skill and dexterity in weaving textiles, to be worn on festive occasions or displayed in windows for sale to tourists, have become the mainstay of indigenous women and their families in Cochabamba, Bolivia.
No man, except for those raised here as children, lives in Umoja village in Kenya. Credit: Hannah Rubenstein/IPS

Where Men Now Fear to Tread

By Hannah Rubenstein
No man, except for those raised here as children, lives in Umoja village in Kenya; one has not for two decades. It is a village only of and for women, women who have been abused, raped, and forced from their homes.

Maldivian Women Fight for Rights

By Feizal Samath
Maldivian women, long used to taking a backseat in the Muslim-dominated Indian Ocean country, say they are determined to ensure that they are not deprived of their rights under the new regime of President Mohammed Waheed Hassan.

Afghan Women Victims Not Perpetrators of ‘Moral Crimes’

By Giuliana Sgrena
Mursal, a beautiful 19-year-old girl who has run away from home to escape a mentally ill husband, is just one of many Afghan women and girls who are now considered criminals under the country’s laws on ‘morality.’

Payments for Environmental Services Skip Rural Women in Mexico

By Emilio Godoy
Despite the key role they play in caring for natural resources in the face of climate change, rural women in Mexico do not benefit from payments for environmental services, say activists and experts.
Women in rural Kashmir walk great distances to fetch clean water. Credit: Athar Parvaiz/IPS

Women Pay for Kashmir’s Water Woes

By Athar Parvaiz
Naseema Akhtar, 38, worries that her daily treks to collect clean water from the mountain springs around her village of Bonpora, in Kashmir’s Kupwara district, are getting longer. She is already doing more than seven km every day.
Dhan Bai received a certificate from a madrassa saying her daughter had converted to Islam. Credit: Fahim Siddiqi/IPS.

Hindu Girls Targeted in Coerced Conversions

By Zofeen Ebrahim
Bharti, a 15-year-old Hindu girl living in the Lyari area in Karachi, left home for her sewing class last December, never to return. Three days later, her father Narain Das was told she had converted to Islam.

ARGENTINA: Lack of Information Raises Risk of Cervical Cancer

By Marcela Valente
A novel research study in Argentina explored women's knowledge and beliefs about cervical cancer, in the provinces with the highest mortality from this highly preventable form of cancer, to design more effective policies.
Afghan women in Herat. Credit: Rebecca Murray/IPS

Rights Group Criticises Afghan ‘Moral Crimes’

By IPS Correspondents and - -
A new report from Human Rights Watch says hundreds of women and girls in Afghanistan have been imprisoned for 'moral crimes', including running away from home and sex outside marriage.
Kalpana at her pottery Credit: Naimul Haq/IPS

Women Lead Poverty Reduction in Bangladesh

By Naimul Haq and - -
Kalpana Rani Pal’s pottery business is modest by any yardstick but it is small enterprises like these that are helping reduce poverty levels in Bangladesh.

Mind the Women’s Business

By Lowana Veal
"We want to hear each others’ stories on how we have coped with changes, how we have got to where we are now and thus how we can be an inspiration to others," says Anna Loa Olafsdottir, one of the people behind a group of women in southwest Iceland who call themselves SKASS.
Martha Borete Angela is a first-year students in a programme for midwives at the Catholic Health Training Institute South Sudan. Credit: Andrew Green/IPS

Saving Mothers’ Lives One Midwife at a Time in South Sudan

By Andrew Green and - -
Martha Borete Angela’s gaze sinks to the ground as she admits neither of her two children was delivered by a midwife or doctor. The 28-year-old South Sudanese woman shared this fact in front of her classmates: first-year students in a programme for midwives at the Catholic Health Training Institute in Wau, a city in the western part of the country.
Maternal health is not a priority in Africa. Credit: Kristin Palitza/IPS

Africa’s Political Instability Hinders Maternal Health Progress

By Kristin Palitza and - -
Political instability, civil strife and humanitarian crises in Africa have over the past decades reversed countless maternal health development gains on the continent, health experts warn.
Guatemalan indigenous leader Rosalina Tuyuc. Credit: Danilo Valladares/IPS

Q&A: “We Are on the Road to Overcoming Impunity” in Guatemala

By Danilo Valladares and - -
"To achieve peace, it is necessary for the truth to come out, and for the victims to receive reparations. And part of this is that cases of genocide and crimes against humanity against the Maya people must come to trial," says Guatemalan indigenous leader Rosalina Tuyuc.

Malaysians Miss Indonesian Hired Help

By Baradan Kuppusamy and - -
Ideally, Malaysia’s affluent households could meet their need for domestic help by tapping on Indonesia, a large country with linguistic and cultural similarities - but Jakarta has placed a ban on its nationals working as domestics in the neighbouring country.
Student union members in Tripoli. Credit: Rebecca Murray/IPS.

Libyan Youth Yearn for Normalcy

By Rebecca Murray and - -
Young men and women socialise together at Tripoli University’s ‘campus B’ tarmac parking lot as they prepare to sit for examinations during this tumultuous school year.

Gender Empowerment Still Lags Far Behind in Global Village

By Thalif Deen
When the United Nations concluded a two-week session highlighting the plight of rural women last week, the meetings singled out both the achievements and shortcomings of the ongoing relentless battle for gender equality in a world still dominated - and overwhelmingly ruled - by men.
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