The nation and the UN have pledged to join hands in executing the national strategy on gender equality for 2011-2020 and a similar national programme for 2011-15 successfully.
The commitment was made by the Ministry of Labour, War Invalids and Social Affairs (MOLISA) and the largest international development body at a forum in Hanoi on March 9 to discuss gender policy.
The UN released a general plan for the 2012-16 period, which not only considers gender a key issue but also designs it as a long-term target to address. The UN resident coordinator said he expected that by 2016, central and local administrations, in association with the community, will be more active in solving gender issues. They were expected to speed up execution and supervision of the relevant law, policy and programmes in order to boost gender parity and transfer power to women, he said.
Deputy MOLISA Minister Nguyen Thanh Hoa emphasised that the Vietnamese Government had been doing its best to complete the legal system on gender equality.
The national strategy on gender equality for this decade will set firm targets and measures to speed up the transfer of power to women in all fields. The move also calls for narrowing the gender gap in education, training, sciences, technology and politics, she said.
Vietnam Women’s Union President Nguyen Thi Thanh Hoa pointed out the unequal working chances for female workforce, with 72.3 percent of women of working age are employed, while the figure for men is 8.7 percent higher.
Women are unlikely to find stable jobs, leading to the lack of sustainability for their living conditions, said the women’s leader.
She therefore called for women to be provided with higher education and training in life skills.
The population and housing census in 2009 showed that the gender imbalance has shifted from female prevalence in the elderly and middle aged population to male domination in the young generation, especially the population under five years old, blaming it on the revival of a cultural preference for boys.
Reports delivered at the forum conveyed a message of hard housework burdens on women who even assumed holiday time as another sort of housework by taking care of children.
Prejudice has prevented men from doing housework, the forum heard./.
