Women’s Participation in the Economy for Sustainable Development

Liberal International convening from November 9-11th 2006 in Marrakech, Morocco,

• Considering the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination and the Millennium Goals.

• Recognising that laws, policies, customs and traditions that restrict women’s equal access to credit and loans also prevent women from owning and inheriting land, property and housing and exclude women from participating fully in development processes, are discriminatory and may contribute to the feminisation of poverty and obstruct real sustainable development worldwide.

• Appreciating that in particular the lack of education for girls contributes to the failure of countries to develop their full potential.

• INLW calls on Liberal International’s (LI) member parties and other liberal organisations to urge their governments to:
  1. implement economic laws and policy initiatives for women to have access to property and inheritance;
  2. implement laws and policy initiatives to modernise the agricultural systems in order to ensure either landownership or tenure of land and natural resources for women;
  3. implement laws which ensure individual rights of women for access to credits and loans;
  4. implement laws which ensure individual rights of women to sign contracts;
  5. encourage greater participation of women at all levels in the political process;
  6. . enforce legislation to guarantee for both women and men equal pay for work of equal value; and
  7. assess the under-rated economic contribution of the reproductive and care economy of women in national budgets and accounts.