Asia-Pacific Capacity Development on Gender and Macroeconomic Issues (Asia-Pacific GEM)

Regional Intensive Course on Gender and Macroeconomic Issues

The first Asia-Pacific regional intensive course on gender and macroeconomic issues was held at Miriam College in Quezon City, Philippines, June 14-25, 2010. The aim of the course was to provide participants with the knowledge on gender and macroeconomic issues and with tools that can be applied for a project designed and executed at national and community levels.

The event was co-organized by the UNDP Asia- Pacific Regional Centre, Miriam College, Asian Institute of Technology (AIT), Development Alternatives with Women for a New Era (DAWN), and Gender and Macro International Working Group (GEM-IWG), with the generous support of the Government of Japan through the Japan-UNDP Partnership Fund. This year, 47 participants from 17 different countries in the region completed the course.

The course started with a presentation of findings from the 2010 Asia-Pacific Human Development Report, Power, Voice, and Rights: A Turning Point of Gender Equality in Asia and the Pacific, followed by introduction to gender and economics. Introductory sessions emphasized the importance of exploring and analyzing the informal sector, in addition to formal sector, and the unpaid work—such as care work, family farm practices for subsistence, and volunteer work, which are not included in conventional economic analysis and policy debates.

The following sessions looked at the conceptual and measurement issues of the informal economy and of unpaid work in depth. Case studies on measuring work intensity and gender analysis of informal savings of urban informal workers were also discussed.

The second week of the course discussed gender analysis of liberalization and globalization including migration, trade, and investment. Gender-aware macromodeling and gender analysis of fiscal policy were also introduced. Participants were reminded of the importance of sex-disaggregated data to analyze the impact of globalization on human development from a gender lens and to ensure that the government policies would mitigate the negative effects among the poor.

The sessions on June 18 were open to the public; about 120 people including faculties, students, government officials and activists from Metro Manila attended this public forum titled "Global Economy and Financing Development: Feminist Perspectives."

The public forum was opened by Dr. Leticia Ramos-Shahani, Dean of the College of International, Humanitarian and Development Studies, Miriam College. Professor Jayati Ghosh of Jawaharlal Nehru University in India started the session titled "Economic Crisis and Gendered Impacts in the Asia-Pacific" by providing an overview of the impact of the recent economic crisis on women in developing countries in the region. Professors Indira Hirway of Centre for Development Alternatives and Yasuko Muramatsu of Tokyo Women's Christian University discussed the impact of the crisis on small enterprises and informal workers in India and women and the working poor in Japan respectively.

The following session discussed gender responsive macroeconomic policies in an era of global uncertainty. Dr. Shiladitya Chatterjee, Asian Development Bank (ADB), presented the key messages from the regional MDG report jointly published by the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP), ADB and UNDP in 2010. Dr. Marina Durano of DAWN argued that feminist proposals for gender equitable public policies are congruent with many others seeking to address macroeconomic imbalances; and many of them can only be addressed through global economic governance structures.

The last session organized and contributed by DAWN addressed several key issues concerning financing development. Dr. Gita Sen of DAWN discussed the Tobin tax and implications for feminists while Dr. Marina Durano presented the DAWN’s engagement in global policy debates and with the UN on financing for development. Two fellows from the 2010 regional intensive course, Ms. Natividad Bernardino from Miriam College and Ms. Natalie Verceles from University of the Philippines-Diliman presented the Philippines cases on financing agricultural development and gender and development budget respectively.

Other course instructors are Dr. Diane Elson (University of Essex), Dr. Maria Floro (American University), Ms. Maita Gomez (Action for Economic Reforms), Dr. Margarita Guerrero (UNESCAP), Dr. Kyoko Kusakabe (AIT), Dr. Aphitchaya Nguanbanchong (Oxfam GB, Thailand), Dr. Shaianne Osterreich (Ithaca College), Dr. Anushree Sinha (National Council of Applied Economic Research), Dr. Joseph T. Yap (Philippines Institute for Development Studies) and UNDP Asia-Pacific Regional Centre staffs. Many of them are the members of the GEM-IWG.

Next regional course will be held in summer of 2011. Call for applications will be announced in early 2011.

Asia-Pacific GEM 2010 Intensive Course Agenda Revised Final 7 July 2010