10 June 2024 — Ukrainian and international NGOs working on the gendered impacts of the war in Ukraine continue to call for all reconstruction and recovery processes to ensure the full, equal, meaningful and safe participation and leadership of diverse Ukrainian women and to put gender equality at the centre. The upcoming Ukraine Recovery Conference in Berlin (URC24), co-hosted by the Government of Ukraine and the Federal Government of Germany, should reflect this.
Gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls (GEEWG) has received very little attention in the previous two Ukraine Recovery Conferences in Lugano in 2022 and in London in 2023. It has also been largely absent from the various recovery and reconstruction plans that have been formulated by donor governments and international organisations.
The full, equal, meaningful, safe and direct participation of diverse women, girls and marginalised groups in all decision-making processes, in line with the Government of Ukraine’s Women, Peace and Security National Action Plan until 2025, is key to formulating and delivering a recovery agenda that is equitable, inclusive and gender-responsive. Unless gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls is deliberately made central to recovery processes now, systemic barriers facing women and girls and their organisations to meaningfully contribute to the humanitarian response (e.g. improving but still limited participation, difficulty to access quality funding for women’s rights and women-led organisations (WRO/WLO)) will be replicated in Ukraine’s reconstruction and recovery process, deepening existing gender inequality. For example, funding from the Ukraine Community Recovery Fund, to date the only UN-administered fund for recovery of Ukraine, is only directly accessible for UN agencies.
We welcome the intentions of the URC24 co-hosts to broaden the participation of Ukrainian civil society, including WROs/WLOs, and to integrate gender perspectives throughout the conference, including through a dedicated panel on gender mainstreaming and women’s leadership at the conference itself, and not merely as a side event, and through the launch of the Alliance for Gender-responsive and Inclusive Recovery. Yet, more needs to be done to ensure that URC24 translates into concrete actions and ensure that gender equality is prioritised consistently and sustainably in the reconstruction and recovery process.
Recommendations for governments and international organisations:
Representation:
- Facilitate the full, equal, direct, safe, meaningful and substantial participation, representation, and leadership of women of all ages, girls and marginalised groups in all of their diversity in discussions and decisions on priorities for the recovery process at all levels (from local to national and beyond), including in the Ukraine Recovery Conference 2024 and follow-up conferences. Support for WROs/WLOs is critical to ensure this.
Resources:
- Increase the volume and improve the quality (flexible, multi-year, including core funding) of the funding to WROs/WLOs as lack of quality funding impedes the sustainability of WLOs/WROs and compromises their ability to participate in the recovery and reconstruction process.
- Flexible, long-term funding is key to support WROs/WLOs‘ activities to advocate for gender equality and women’s rights (e.g. implementation of UNSCR 1325 on Women, Peace and Security and the Istanbul Convention in Ukraine) and implement gender-transformative interventions that benefit entire communities. Recovery and reconstruction plans and strategies as well as the Alliance for Gender-responsive and Inclusive Recovery should have the ambition to transform gender norms, not just to “respond”, to achieve gender equality.
- Provide dedicated funding for the institutional development and organisational strengthening of WROs/WLOs, and for increased networking between them, to enable them to have a stronger voice in decision-making on reconstruction and recovery.
- Simplify and harmonise funding application processes and reporting requirements to increase smaller WROs/WLOs’ ability to secure funding.
- Set funding targets for recovery programmes that advance gender equality as well as targets for funding to WROs/WLOs and enhance accountability and transparency on progress against these targets by reporting publicly and regularly against them.
Rights:
- Invest in policies and measures that will protect and ensure equitable access of women of all ages, girls and marginalised groups in rural and urban areas to services they need and opportunities to rebuild their lives, including dignified economic and livelihood opportunities, formal and non-formal education, etc.
- Invest in gender transformative social protection schemes that compensate women’s domestic care work combined with strategies to support women’s equitable access to economic and educational opportunities, to enable them to participate in the recovery process as actors rather than passive recipients.
- Promote and resource age, gender, disability and diversity responsive trauma care, mental health and psychosocial support, including for ex-combatants, and GBV (and other survivors of violence) survivor-centred access to justice and accountability, which places the rights, safety and wishes of survivors at the centre of accountability mechanisms.
Accountability:
- Ensure that commitments made at Ukraine Recovery Conference 2024 and follow-up conferences will be implemented and progress monitored and reported transparently—accountability is key to ensure that commitments are translated into action. Consult civil society organisations, including WROs/WLOs, on their perspectives on progress and any corrective action plans to correct course.
Signatories:
ActionAid International
CARE International
Centre "Women's Perspectives"
Charity Foundation "Stabilization Support Services"
East SOS
International Rescue Committee
JurFem
NGO Girls / ГО "Дівчата"
Oxfam International
Plan International
Public Organization "Avalyst"
Right to Protection