Gender and Development

Based on the results of the "Needs Assessment" project carried out in the provinces of Henan and Shanxi Province, CANGO carried out a set of trainings. The training program is specially tailored for women in Henan and Shanxi Province and aims to promote gender awareness and gender equality, advance leadership and governance positions for women.

"Before the training, I feel that I've done good work in women rights protection" said Ms. Xing Liya, the chairman of Sui County's Women's Federation with 10 years' working experience, "After the training I analyzed my work with social gender theory, and I found that some of our work methods are contrary with the women development concept. For example, we've set prizes for 'good daughter-in-law', 'good mother' for many years, and used to think that this kind of prize can promote family stability. Now I realized that this kind of prize strengthens the traditional understanding about women's role in society and hampers women's development. In the future we'll set some prize to encourage men to do the housework in order to make society know that housework is not the only work for women."

The project is funded by the Danish Institute for Human Rights and implemented by the Women Federation of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. In 2004, a flyer for grass-root women was designed and ready to publish after discussions with all stakeholders. It aimed at raising awareness among the public, in particular among ordinary women. Through trainings, grass-root women cadres and legal staff understood the role of legal assistance and related skills in the field of anti-domestic violence. From a follow up survey, we discovered that they already took use of these skills in their local communities.

Trainees from the provincial and prefecture level of the women's federation, police station, court, and procuratorate raised their expertise from their involvement in project implementation. Two trainings for local media helped the participants grasp the knowledge and skills on legal assistance for victims of domestic violence. From the evaluation of the training, we learned that the participants would like to pay more attention to this field in their daily work.

In October, the Women Federation of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region (GXWF) submitted the "Decision of Prevention and Interdiction to Domestic Violence in Guangxi (draft)" to the Guangxi People's Congress. In late October, the Guanxi People's Congress delivered the "Decision of Prevention and Interdiction to Domestic Violence in Guangxi (revision)" to the concerned department for advice, meaning that it came into legislative procedure. In 2004 in Guangxi, two medical shelters for the treatment of domestic violence victims were established because of the proposal from the GXWF. With active work from GXWF, 196 complaint stations for the victims were established and 3 hotlines for complaint and consultation were opened.