In April 2021, the Pacific Community (SPC) has coordinated the 14th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women and the 7th Meeting of the Pacific Ministers for Women, hosted by the Government of French Polynesia. The conference brought together decision-makers, development partners, research institutions and civil society organisations. Following this landmark event, SPC will continue to publish portraits of inspiring gender champions who are at the heart of Pacific development programmes.

In the Pacific, many can attest that the Land, Sea, People and Culture are almost inseparable.

This rings true for a member of the founding Coordination Council of the locally-managed Marine Area Network (LMMA network), Alifereti Tawake, as he reflects on his upbringing and how mothers and women in his life are holders of traditional knowledge of the vast Pacific Ocean.

“Women should be involved in ocean management because they bring motherly care, motherly instincts and deep-rooted knowledge of ocean and ocean governance.”

“I was brought up by my grandparents in the mid 1980’s and my grandfather loved fishing. My grandmother was the most skilful fisher I came across. She would be able to point out exactly where to go, in which part of the reef we could get octopus, what time of the day it was and what was the direction of the wind...”

Alifereti says he won’t forget his grandmother’s advice: “If we know our resources well, we will know how to care for them.”

He further adds that engaging women in ocean spaces and governance should be intentional as they are the providers for families in coastal communities and hold a wealth of knowledge

“Mothers should be intentionally approached not just in policy, not just in advocacy but in practice,” he said.

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Human Rights and Social Development (HRSD) Division

In April 2021, the Pacific Community (SPC) coordinated the 14th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women and the 7th Meeting of the Pacific Ministers for Women, hosted by the Government of French Polynesia. The conference brought together decision-makers, development partners, research institutions and civil society organisations. Following this landmark event, SPC will continue to publish portraits of inspiring gender champions who are at the heart of Pacific development programmes.

In recent years more women are becoming sailors, marine scientists, and ocean stewards, a space that was once only dominated by men.

Although women are still underrepresented in these Ocean-related sectors despite making up almost fifty percent of the Pacific’s population, they have certainly come a long way to have their voices heard at the table.

Dr Katy Soapi, who works at Pacific Community Centre for Ocean Science (PCCOS) at SPC as an ocean scientist, believes it was the bold decisions of women ocean pioneers who were initially banned from accessing these sectors who led to the creation of new opportunities.   

“At times it may be appropriate to make your own table if you can’t have the space and opportunity to participate. For example, I am now part of a women seagrass monitoring group in my country of origin, the Solomon Islands. When we started conservation and monitoring activities on our island, ten years ago, men dominated everything. We advocated for women to be part of the work, but things were not moving. Therefore, we managed to create a separate seagrass monitoring group.  We collected data for ten years and the published the data,” she said.

Dr Katy says that it is important to include a diversity of voices in the development of ocean projects.

“When voices of people who use the ocean daily are missing, we end up with less progressive, less innovative and less enabling projects. What women bring to the table is inclusivity and diversity. We clearly need new diverse ideas to tackle problems like pollution, climate change, and overfishing but these ideas won’t change if we have the same people.”

The Decade of Ocean Science initiative also presents Pacific people with a unique opportunity to look for transformative ocean solutions for sustainable development and connecting people and the oceans.

 “We have a chance to develop, co-design and co-deliver a decade long of oceans projects that mainstream gender equity and capacity building activities that enforce women-specific actions as well as taking into account our cultural settings.”

The 14th Triennial Conference on Pacific Women also reaffirmed that the Ocean is inseparable from Pacific people’s cultures, economies, and societies. The Pacific Ocean forms a crucial element of Pacific women’s identities, ways, and knowledge, and is a source of cultural and material empowerment.

“We need to be guided by the wealth of traditional knowledge held by our people and our local communities,” said Katy.

by Epeli Lalagavesi

Division

Human Rights and Social Development (HRSD) Division

In April 2021, the Pacific Community (SPC) coordinated the 14th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women and the 7th Meeting of the Pacific Ministers for Women, hosted by the Government of French Polynesia. The conference brought together decision-makers, development partners, research institutions and civil society organisations. Following this landmark event, SPC will continue to publish portraits of inspiring gender champions who are at the heart of Pacific development programmes.

One woman who isn’t afraid to engage herself in these ocean spaces is Ivanancy Vunikura, an ocean defender and sailor.

Ivanancy is one of the few women in the world who can claim that she has sailed the vast Pacific ocean on a traditional Vaka.

She started her sailing career with the Uto Ni Yalo, a Fiji-based association whose role is to promote sustainable, reciprocal relationship with nature by encouraging solutions for a healthy ocean – and gathering trash on the remote islands it visits. In 2011, traditional boats from Uto Ni Yalo sailed from the South Pacific to the USA, creating history and reclaiming the ocean.

 This sail led her to work for the Okeanos Foundation where she currently advocates for sustainable sea transportation and the revival of traditional sailing in the Pacific.

Her sailing journey hasn’t always been smooth. Ivanancy had to fight storms, rough seas, and sometimes adverse cultural beliefs.  

“I remember visiting a community where it was a taboo for women to sail with men, so we had to ask for permission from the chief upon arrival’, she recalls.

“We were granted permission, but it was hard to work with men from the community who joined our sailing cruise, since they were not used to share the Vaka with women. However, this didn’t deter me, and eventually, we all managed to work together.”

Ivanancy said that, because of their education, many women in the Pacific think they are not worthy enough, and not brave enough to stand up and have their voices heard. But winds are now changing, and Ivanancy believes that “Women also have a place at the helm of the Pacific Vaka”.

Division

Human Rights and Social Development (HRSD) Division

Pacific Ministers for Women endorsed priorities to accelerate progress towards achieving gender equality and a full realisation of women’s human rights in the region, at the conclusion of the 7th Meeting of Pacific Ministers for Women last week.

The Ministerial meeting followed the 14th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women. The outcomes of the Ministers meeting focussed on recommendations under the 3 priority themes - Women’s Economic Empowerment, Gender- Responsive Climate Justice and Gender Based Violence (GBV).

With the overarching theme of the series of meetings titled, ‘Our Ocean, Our Heritage, Our Future – Empowering All Women in the Blue Pacific Continent’, deliberations were also focussed on the ocean as being inseparable from Pacific peoples, cultures, economies and societies, and a source of cultural and material empowerment.

The host, French Polynesia’s Minister for Women, Hon. Isabelle Sachet said, “We have much to celebrate in our region with the progress of gender equality but we recognise much work remains. The added challenges of COVID-19 and climate change on women and girls within our various countries, will make our work even harder. However, we have taken a bold step by accepting this Outcomes Document.  In 3 years’ time we will look back at this process and what we agreed on through this virtual meeting with pride.”

The Director General of the Pacific Community (SPC), Dr Stuart Minchin echoed Madame Sachet’s statement, “The focus that you all showed today is a testament on the key priority that your governments place on addressing gender equality in our region. There needs to be greater ownership of this Outcomes Document.  We need to work together to ensure that we bring life to its words.  The commitment shown by you during the Conference and in today’s Ministerial Meeting reassures me that you have every intention to take ownership.”

The Outcomes Document is now being confirmed by countries and territories that participated in the Conference and the Ministerial meeting.

The Conference called on governments, with the assistance of civil society organisations (CSOs), faith-based organisations (FBOs), Council of Regional Organisations of the Pacific (CROP) agencies, development partners, and the private sector to implement the following specific actions.

First, to adopt measures to increase women’s participation in all levels of leadership and decision-making including political representation, senior positions in the public and private sector and within local and communal governance systems. As well as supporting ongoing efforts of the private sector in creating and strengthening leadership pathways for women and demonstrating their capacity as leaders to shift social norms.

Secondly, to implement policies, legislation and gender-responsive budgets in compliance with agreed regional and international standards and conventions to address disparities with regard to women’s access and opportunities in all fields of economic activity; proactively expand opportunities for women to participate in critical sectors and industries; equally acknowledge, value and remunerate women’s work in all fields. This includes investing in and strengthen contextualised, evidence based GBV prevention programmes that work with children and young people, and ensuring that violence prevention is integrated into formal and informal education curricula. It also includes a focus on balanced GBV efforts which include prevention programmes, survivor response services, criminal justice system responses, support for survivors, and rehabilitation efforts for perpetrators.

Finally, ensuring women and other marginalised groups meaningfully participate in all stages of the design and implementation of national and sectoral policies, strategies and plans relating to climate change and disaster risk management and that such policies, strategies and plans are gender-responsive and include gender indicators.

The meeting also confirmed the Republic of Marshall Islands as the host for the 15th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women and the 8th Meeting of Pacific Ministers for Women.

The 14th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women, convened by the Pacific Community (SPC) and hosted and chaired by French Polynesia, was held from 27 to 29 April 2021, preceded by side events from 22 to 23 April 2021. The Conference was a hybrid virtual event with over 1000 registrants connecting from different locations across the Pacific, reflecting the immense interest the journey of Pacific women of all diversities towards equality. Participants included Pacific island country and territory (PICT) government delegations, civil society representatives, development partners, academia, private sector, and other stakeholders, from within the Blue Pacific continent and beyond.

Useful link: Outcomes and Recommendations Document

News Category

Joint Release

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Human Rights and Social Development (HRSD) Division

“Women's economic empowerment is a development game changer. The more women participate in a formal or informal economy, the more prosperous families, communities, and countries become. This game changer has significant financial rewards…,” Dr Mareva Lechat-Kitalong, Adviser and Legal Counsel, Office of the President, French Polynesia speaking at the opening of the Women’s for Economic Empowerment (WEE) plenary session at the 14th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women.

The plenary was one of the sessions on day one of the triennial and generated rich discussions from 22 delegates from the Pacific.

The WEE plenary focussed on discussions on how Pacific women could overcome their obstacles through the experiences, advice and practical solutions shared by inspiring women from the region who have overcome these hurdles.

Panellists Dr Manumatavai Tupou-Roosen from Tonga, Ms Evonne Kennedy from Papua New Guinea, Ms Heuira Itae-Tetaa of French Polynesia, Ms Adi Maimalaga Tafunai of Samoa and Ms Una Valenitabua of Fiji were invited to share their experiences and actions they have taken in their organisations and communities to empower women.

Dr Manumatavai Tupou-Roosen, Director General, Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Agency (FFA) said, “We know that women play a critical component of the workforce as highlighted, three quarters in the processing facilities, so it doesn't just make ethical sense for women to have an equal opportunity as men, but also it makes good economic sense to fully leverage the role that women can bring.

Dr Tupou- Roosen, underlined, “we must increase our efforts among the lessons that we've learned, that is, challenging the status quo means creating systems structures and processes that are wholly inclusive. And this involves greater research and broader data collection and analysis.”

Evonne Kennedy, Executive Director, Business Coalition of Women, PNG said, “at the business Coalition for Women, of the key areas that we've been finding that has impacted women's economic empowerment is violence. So, family and sexual violence, gender-based violence, sexual harassment, but also workplace health and safety. These have a significant social cost to business and the economy and women carry large part of the burden.”

“So our key focus has been to identify solutions for the business community, developing a suite of policies that companies can adopt or adapt to suit their needs. The key is also getting the buy in and leaders need to be understanding how this is impacting their organizations, and the business community at large,” she added.

Ms Heiura Itae-Tetaa, Founder of Speak Tahiti, French Polynesia spoke on her understanding of women’s economic empowerment sharing on innovations and technology that she has adopted with her business. “To be an island woman in the middle of the Pacific is an asset. And I do believe in the potential of island communities and I am deeply convinced as I've proved it that our language, our culture is our wealth and that it can actually be the key to opportunities.”

In response to the question “Are there reliable data on women's economic empowerment or is there an absence of quantitative data and why is it difficult to obtain such data?”, Adi Maimalaga Tafunai, Executive Director, Women in Business Development Inc, Samoa replied that “Statistics are available on women's economic empowerment, but I don’t feel there's enough data available for women in the non-formal sector where we work.”

Tafunai also mentioned the importance of culture. “The Pacific is made up of about 22 island countries which means 22 cultures and every one of our cultures does things in different ways, and it'll be important for us if we're going to look at gathering the data that we pay attention to this work focusing on our women, our youth, our people with disabilities and the way the culture focuses on them.”

At the end of the plenary the conference delegates made recommendations on specific actions on women’s economic empowerment to be included in the Triennial Outcomes, to be endorsed this week by the Ministers for Women during their 7th Meeting.

Key actions were a combination of recommendations drawn from National Consultations that took place the past month in several Pacific Countries and Territories and the plenary session itself.

The session on Women’s Economic Empowerment is one of three plenary sessions of the 14th Triennial conference of Pacific Women registering more than 1000 delegates across the Pacific through a combination of in person and virtual discussions from the 27-29th April,2021.

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Human Rights and Social Development (HRSD) Division

Ever wondered how locally produced fruits and vegetables reach our community markets despite the heavy restrictions in place due to the current COVID-19 pandemic?

The COVID environment has created additional challenges for market vendors from across the region, who already faced issues in getting their produce to their stalls. Women in particular, who represent the majority of sellers, face challenges in accessing economic opportunities in the informal sector.

These concerns were voiced at a side event titled: Market Vendor Associations in Solomon Islands, Fiji and Vanuatu: advancing Women’s Economic Empowerment organised by UN Women last week and held in the margins of the 14th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women.

The side event focused on market vendor association’s roles in advancing women’s economic empowerment (WEE) in local markets, highlighting not only challenges but also how women were driving change at local level, specifically in the COVID context.

Members of respective market vendors associations from Fiji, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu spoke in this side event.

Port Vila Market – Vanuatu

When COVID-19 was declared a global pandemic in March 2020, the Vanuatu government declared a state of emergency and implemented strict protocols throughout the country, including the markets. This not only included social distancing protocols but also the reduction of opening hours to 6am to 8pm, a change from the usual 24 hours a day, six days a week.

Jeanette Wallace, Secretary for the Silae Vanua Market Vendors Association for Port Villa explained “The market vendors would sleep at the market with the unsold produce. In the COVID-19 period, the city council required the market to be empty by 8pm, each day. The vendors must take the leftover produce when they leave the market, which means they must pay for transport to take their produce home, and then pay for transport again the next morning to bring the produce back to the market.”

This proved to be very expensive, especially when many people in Port Villa also lost their jobs and the usual number of customers at the market was reduced heavily, affecting the vendors income per day.

The vendors signed petitions and submitted it to Wallace’s team and the Market Vendors Association. These petitions were sent to the Market Manager who then escalated it to the Clerk of the Port Vila City Council for their action.

After a week, the vendors were notified that they can leave the unsold produce at the market with provisions made for a security guard to look after the produce.

Wallace explained that “A few of our vendors are satisfied and are saying that there is an increase of income, because they do not have to spend on transportation of leftover produce at the end of each day, the women vendors are able to go home at the end of the day and there has been decrease in their stress levels as they are sleeping better at home.”

Luganville Municipal Market – Santo, Vanuatu

2020 was filled with challenges for market vendors on Santo as the island not only faced the restrictions imposed by the global pandemic but also massive destruction to their crops and properties as category 5 Tropical Cyclone Harold made landfall on the southwest part of the island in April.

Catherine Leo, Luganville’s Market Manager, elaborated on two major issues faced by the communal market in the aftermath of TC Harold.

Firstly, the market lost a significant part of their income because the number of vendors coming to the market decreased, as many homes and gardens from the south and west coast had been destroyed by the cyclone.

Secondly, while many vendors from the southwest coast of Santo lost their gardens, vendors from the East were more fortunate and were able to transport their produce to the market. However, due to the state of emergency, the Luganville Council imposed restrictions, including reduced opening hours (6am to 6pm) and banning vendors from sleeping at the market to guard their leftover produce.

These restrictions once again caused considerable transportation issues for the eastern vendors.

“Although the transport owners were willing to bring vendors as early as 4am, they must wait until 6am, before they can unload their products. So transport owners are reluctant to come as late as 6am,” Leo explained.

Through collaborative efforts of the Municipal Council, Market Vendors Association and the Mayor’s Office in Luganville, amendments were made to restrictions to support  local vendors.

Despite the council losing a big part of their income, market stall fees were excused. In addition, more vendors were allowed in the market on a rotation basis, keeping in line with the COVID-19 restrictions.

Leo was part of the team that collated the concerns of the vendors and voiced it at the Mayor’s office, especially regarding opening hours and transport. In response, the mayor’s office allowed the market to open at 4am, as requested.

“So now the vendors are happy, they can come early to the market, and transport owners are also happy to bring the vendors, because they have no clash with their schedule. And the council is slowly picking up on their income, as more vendors were able to come to the market now,” said Leo.

Similar inspiring stories were shared by vendors from Fiji and Solomon Islands at the side-event.

The Triennial Conference of Pacific Women and the 7th Meeting of the Pacific Ministers for Women, coordinated by SPC takes place from 27 – 29 April and 4 May respectively (Fiji Time). For more news, information and updates from this regional meeting, please visit: https://www.spc.int/pacificwomentriennial

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Corporate
Human Rights and Social Development (HRSD) Division

The plenary session for Day two of the 14th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women heard discussions focussing on interesting solution-based and home-grown initiatives to address gender-based violence (GBV).

According to one of the panellists at the GBV plenary, Vaela Ngai, Director for the Solomon Islands Women’s Development Division at the Ministry of Women, Youth, Children and Family Affairs, an example of a homegrown initiative currently being implemented by Solomon Islands is the SafeNet referral network.

“The (SafeNet)  is a network of government ministries and agencies CSOs, and NGOs that over the past two years have progressively worked to ensure the availability and accessibility of quality and essential services ranging from safe accommodation, legal advice, medical services, protection, and counselling through our referral pathway, including standard operating procedures,” Ngai said.

The members of the SafeNet include health, police, Family Support Centre, Christian Care Centre, Planned Parenthood Association, the Public Solicitors Office and the Ministry of Women, Youth, Children and Family Affairs.

Ngai added, “the SafeNet for years had been mainly established at the national level around the capital Honiara, until more recently. At the beginning of 2018, we began the process of rolling this out to our nine provinces. We have successfully rolled out SafeNet to four of the nine provinces and will continue to roll it out to the remaining 5 provinces this year.”

The SafeNet initiative continuously evolved and was tailor made to fit the context of the four provinces where it has been implemented to ensure it works regardless of whether it is at the national or provincial level.

“For example, there was the need to expand the provincial segment members to include community groups, and leaders, including chiefs, as entry points into the referral system for victims and survivors of GBV,” Ngai stated.

“This was to provide that link between victims and survivors from rural and remote areas to the gender-based violence services in the referral system.”

Ngai said COVID-19 demanded that the SafeNet initiative be adapted to the pandemic context by incorporating different health measures, creating and distributing information showing available services during the lockdown situations which included a safe net Facebook page.

She further highlighted that “for other Pacific Island Countries and Territories that want to learn about SafeNet, there is guidebook that can be found on the UN Women Asia Pacific website. This past year we have also welcomed and accommodated SafeNet study tours to Solomon Islands by Kiribati and Federated States of Micronesia.”

The second home-grown initiative to counteract GBV by Solomon Islands government is the domestic violence counselling guideline that was developed as a requirement under the Family Protection Act, 2014.

“The overall aim of this initiative is to provide protection for the public, and particularly GBV victims and survivors by establishing a registry of domestic violence counsellors in all 10 provinces of some islands including in Honiara,” Ngai shared with the participants.

Another panellist from Kiribati, Teretia Tokam shared learnings from Kiribati’s Primary Prevention Programme which aims at reducing, preventing and eliminating gender-based violence before it happens.

Tokam said one of the strong prevention programmes that is evidence based and is ideal in responding to GBV in Kiribati is the Pacific Partnership to End Violence Against Women and Girls programme.

“As part of this programme, the Kiribati government together with the Pacific Community’s (SPC) Human Rights and Social Development (HRSD) Division are implementing the Social Citizenship Education programme which works with in-service teachers, schools, school leaders and also students through their interpretation of human rights and gender equality,” Tokam highlighted.

Moderator for the GBV plenary Ofa-Ki-Levuka Guttenbeil Likiliki, Executive Director of the Tonga Women’s and Children’s Crisis Centre highlighted that with the Covid-19 pandemic, many Pacific governments have understandably redirected funding and resources towards efforts in preventing the outbreak, however, the result is that it leaves less room for essential services required by domestic violence survivors exacerbated during the Covid-19 restrictions.

“We are making progress with integrated services, providing effective prevention and response to gender based violence, developing the knowledge and capacity of health, education, law enforcement and social service providers to be able to provide a full range of integrated support, trained and skilled staff, however we still have a long way to go,” she said.

Guttenbeil Likiliki stated that a milestone achievement for the region was that all but one Pacific Island Country have ratified the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) and most Pacific Island Countries and Territories have domestic violence legislations.

The 14th Triennial Conference and 7th Meeting of Pacific Ministers for Women from 27 – 29 April and 4 May respectively, is coordinated by the Pacific Community’s Human Rights and Social Development (HRSD) division and hosted by the Government of French Polynesia.

It involves a series of meetings and consultations aimed at sustaining the momentum towards gender equality in the Pacific. It includes national multi-stakeholder consultations and one virtual, regional consultation with government line ministries, feminist and women’s rights organisations, faith leaders, media, private sector, and young women. Together, Pacific governments will agree on achievable targets and develop an action plan to progress gender equality in the region.

For more information, discussions and news from the Conference, please visit: https://www.spc.int/pacificwomentriennial

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Human Rights and Social Development (HRSD) Division

Despite some good progress in the region, women remain underrepresented in leadership positions in private sectors.

These were the sentiments shared by the Asian Development Bank's women Economic Empowerment Specialist, Sarah Boxall, while presenting the preliminary findings of a women in business leadership study during one of the side-events held in the margins of the 14th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women.

Boxall said although the region’s data showed a good representation of women in leadership compared to the world average, there is still room for improvement. “We can see women hold 9% of Board Chair positions 22% of board director seats and 12% of CEO positions across the Pacific. This compares quite favourably with global averages, but those global averages are themselves very low.”

She further added that changes in leadership roles can happen quickly with the appropriate motivation. “The sustained increases in leadership role will not happen if you don't have commitment to changing things and resourcing it appropriately.”

Pacific Island Forum Secretariat’s Director Programmes and Initiative, Zarak Khan emphasised how COVID-19 is creating another challenge for women in the economy as it has redefined approach to doing business. ”We are now faced with two basic choices. We can fold and concede in the face of these challenges, or we can use these challenges to create opportunities and learn hard lessons, so that we can build back better.”

Khan further highlighted the positive momentum already being seen in the region, “As we refocus our strategies, we see an increasing number of Pacific businesses developing gender and diversity inclusive policies to overcome natural biases and create a more inclusive working environment. These efforts have already resulted in greater retention of women, and a higher proportion of women taking on management roles.”

Managing Director of ETK group, Bolaji Sofoluwe, believes the work of Rocio Lorenzo titled “Innovation through diversity” is proof enough to have women in business and leadership. “The study proved that gender diversity is actually linked to innovation performance. So, the discussion of women in business and in leadership, I dare say is no longer a suggestion as the point has been proven but it is essential for survival,” Bolaji said.

The 14th Triennial Conference and 7th Meeting of Pacific Ministers for Women from 27 – 29 April and 4 May respectively, is coordinated by the Pacific Community’s Human Rights and Social Development (HRSD) division and hosted by the Government of French Polynesia. It involves a series of meetings and consultations aimed at sustaining the momentum towards gender equality in the Pacific. It includes national multi-stakeholder consultations and one virtual, regional consultation with government line ministries, feminist and women’s rights organisations, faith leaders, media, private sector, and young women. Together, Pacific governments will agree on achievable targets and develop an action plan to progress gender equality in the region.

Division

Human Rights and Social Development (HRSD) Division