UNIFEM Pledges to Boost Gender Equality in Vietnam

The UN Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) has pledged to boost gender equality in Vietnam to help the country achieve the Millennium Development Goals by 2015, said an UN official at a conference in Hanoi Dec 8. The organization targets to raise the empowerment of Vietnamese women in the period 2011-2020, said Suzette Mitchell, the UNIFEM’s Chief Representative of in Vietnam. She also highlighted Vietnam’s first-ever national strategy on gender equality, saying that gender equality is a premise for other development goals. Vietnam reported the number of female parliament members in the 2007-2011 term at 25.76%, ranking the first in the Southeast Asia. The country aims to the raise the rate of female deputies in the National Assembly (NA) and People’s Councils to over 30% during the 2011-2015 term and over 35% in the following five years. It also targets to provide vocational training for half of rural women in the same period. In fact, women are mostly excluded in important decision or law making by the government, local observers said. (Vietnamplus Dec 8)