Will Rousseff and Brazil’s other leaders summon up the will to truly stand up for women’s rights? Will they tackle one of the true solutions to high maternal mortality: decriminalization of abortion and measures that could effectively reduce deaths related to unsafe abortions?
You may ask: what exactly is “women’s empowerment” and how can we support this effort to promote sustainable development in a comprehensive and long-term way, while at the same time respecting human rights?
Not only is the Rio +20 outcome document, “The Future We Want,” silent on sexual and reproductive rights, but during the negotiations many of the EU and G77 countries who have been progressive on these issues in the past were completely silent.
While the last hours of negotiations unfold, we begin to look forward to future demographic trends and how to turn them into dividends rather losses.
Today I participated in an extraordinary side-event on “Rio+20 and Women’s lives: A Cross-General Dialogue” at the Ford Foundation Pavilion. This event was very intimate, it drew you in, with women’s personal stories for Rio+20 and beyond.
Today, here at the BEMFAM clinic in Cachoeirinha Favela in Rio de Janeiro, youth were having a very animated discussion about how they viewed sexuality, reproductive health, being young, and their feelings and emotions about this period in their life.
If ICPD and CPD showed a commitment by world leadership to achieve a better quality of life for all, what will Rio+20 show?
This week begins the major UN Rio+20 “Earth Summit,” and I’ll be covering women and reproductive health (RH) issues as relate to the official UN proceedings, the NGO perspectives, and global south women’s personal stories on how Rio+20 touches their lives.
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Although the 45th Session of the UN Commission on Population and Development just ended, it is already time to raise our voices in preparation for the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development that will convene in Brazil in June.
