Soft Launch of the International Gender Champions – New York

Ambassador Lauber,
Executive Director Mlambo-Ngcuka,
Ambassador Hamamoto,
Ms. Kraft Buchman,
Excellencies,
Dear Colleagues,
Ladies and gentlemen:

Today marks another milestone in the success story of the International Gender Champions initiative. I am very happy to be here in New York with my two co-founders of this network, the Permanent Representative of the United States of America, Ambassador Hamamoto, and the Executive Director of Women@TheTable, Ms. Kraft-Buchman.

First of all let me thank the Swiss Permanent Mission and Ambassador Lauber for generously hosting us for this soft launch today. It is great to see that our Swiss friends are spearheading the expansion of the Gender Champions network to New York. This is another powerful example of our joint efforts to further bridge the gap between New York and Geneva.

This increasingly imperative bridging is also exemplified by the presence with us today of the Executive Director of UN Women after she was in Geneva just last week for the opening of the new UN Women liaison office there. UN Women has supported the Gender Champions initiative from the start by sharing its invaluable experience and knowledge, both for the design of the initiative as well as with the different Gender Champions to implement their commitments. This also proved very useful in developing an official gender policy for the UN Office in Geneva which we have just instituted.

The number of people who are now closely involved in this exciting initiative keeps expanding, and I want to thank all of you for having come today, and for showing your interest in the important matter of gender equality.

When Ambassador Hamamoto, Ms. Kraft-Buchman and I came together to develop the Gender Champions network, we felt that 20 years after the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing and despite the plethora of treaties, agreements and plans of action, gender equality was still too far from being achieved, including at the UN. We realized that only through determined and concerted action from the top would real progress be achieved. And we were not the only ones thinking this. But a catalyst was needed. As the rapid expansion of the International Gender Champions initiative illustrates, it proved to be just that.

Let me briefly explain to you, how the initiative translates words into action. One of the important aspects is that it is simple: it is aimed at the leadership of the public sector at all governance levels, civil society organizations and the private sector. Each Gender Champion makes three concrete commitments. One is the common panel parity pledge, by which we all strive for gender equality on panel discussions. Champions no longer participate in panels that do not include the other gender. In addition to this first common commitment, every Gender Champion has to commit to two specific pledges that aim to improve gender equality within their organization or programmatic work.

By creating such a tightly knit community around the same goal, we are raising awareness of the issue and create peer pressure on all leaders of organizations and permanent missions to do the right thing. Through the panel parity pledge and other commitments, we are increasing the visibility of women in international fora. And by meeting regularly to keep track, we are creating a community of practice across institutions on issues such as women's representation, organizational culture and talent development. Accountability is key, and it is working. One of the major factors of success of the International Gender Champions initiative has been the fact that permanent missions and secretariats, businesses as well as civil society representatives, have been able to dialogue openly on an equal footing about their challenges and activities, pool resources and exchange lessons learned and best practices.

As the initiative enters its second year in Geneva, we are aiming to go beyond the issues of women's representation and visibility to broaden the impact. We want to use the Champions to genuinely influence the substance of the debates in governing bodies. By expanding to New York, where the main political organs of our own organization are based, the international network of Gender Champions will hopefully have an even deeper impact substantive debates.

It is only natural that the International Gender Champions network comes to New York, where UN Women and other UN entities work to promote the rights, wellbeing and empowerment of women and girls. I am thinking of UNFPA, UNICEF, or the Global Compact for example. Our new Secretary-General was a Gender Champion as High Commissioner in Geneva and those of you who heard his inaugural statement in the General Assembly yesterday will have taken good note of his strong position on the gender issue. We look forward to welcome him as a New York Gender Champion soon.

Dear colleagues,

Our roadmap for the next 15 years – the Sustainable Development Goals – include the achievement of gender equality by 2030. Gender is a cross-cutting issue that will help determine the success of every single goal. In Geneva, around 120 current and former Gender Champions have already made more than 250 specific commitments that will help us get there. I hope New York can top that number. And I hope that we will also be establishing chapters of the initiative in other hubs of the UN system soon. Gender equality should have been the norm in all our work places a long time ago, and we have to finally make it a reality. I am looking forward to working with all of you to achieve this goal.

Thank you very much.