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Regional
Workshops on Gender Budgeting The first Regional Workshop on Gender Budgeting for State Governments was held on 23-24 November 2005. State Secretaries, Finance, Planning and Women and Child Development were invited from Delhi, Rajasthan, Himmachal Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana, Jammu & Kashmir and Uttranchal. The purpose of the Workshop was introduction of concepts and tools of Gender Budgeting and discussions to identify priority areas for action by State Governments in the realm of Gender Budgeting. Summary proceedings are as follows.
Keynote observations of Secretary (WCD) In her Key Note address, Secretary(WCD) stressed on the importance of Gender Budgeting indicating that the end objective is empowerment of women. She expressed concern that despite decades of planning important macro indicators like MMR literacy and employment continued to be adverse for women. In such a scenario, Gender Budgeting emerges as a powerful tool for Empowerment of Women. It is a means to ensure adequate focus on resource allocation for women and to track utilization of public funds and implementation of programmes. The best of intentions and commitments requires dedication of funds and efforts. Gender Budgeting addresses both. Gender Budgeting helps to bring in greater transparency and accountability in the development initiatives and processes. Laying emphasis on health facilities, she stressed upon the need for gender sensitivity not only in allocation of resources but also delivery of health services. Secretary (WCD) emphasized the importance of State Governments taking up Gender Budgeting initiatives in view of their dominant contribution in allocation of resources for women and critical role in implementation of all major public expenditure programmes. She urged the States to take ownership of this initiative and wield it as a weapon against all barriers to Women’s Empowerment! She expressed the hope that the State Governments would actively participate in the Workshop and bring in their expertise and experience to give a boost and shaper edge to Gender Budgeting Initiatives in the country. Presentation on Concepts of Gender Budgeting- Director, Finance, DWCD, GOI Director(F), DWCD give a presentation on the concepts of Gender Budgeting Highlights : Definition- an exercise to translate stated gender commitments of the Government into budgetary commitments, entailing affirmative action for empowering women and examination of the utilization of resources allocated for women and impact of public expenditure and policies of the Government on women. Gender Commitments- Constitutional provisions affecting women, importance of Article 15(3) which enables affirmative discrimination in favour of women. Other gender commitments include women related legislation, National Policy for Empowerment of Women 2001, Ninth and Tenth Plan commitments on resource allocation etc. The various policy level commitments point towards holistic empowerment of women covering all aspects- social, economic and political. The challenge lies in translating these into outcomes for women’s empowerment through Gender Budgeting. Government of India initiatives- Gender Budget Cells are being opened in various Departments of Government of India to act as a focal point for all Gender Budget initiatives in the Departments. Capacity building workshops for these Gender Budget Cells have also been held by the Department of Women and Child Development. The importance of Gender Budgeting can also be seen from the fact that the Prime Minister in his address to the NDC on 27 June 2005 has made a special mention on the subject. The Union Budget 2005-06 has a new Statement on Gender Budgeting (Statement 19), in the Union Government Expenditure Budget Volume 1.
Gender Mainstreaming: Emphasizing the importance of gender mainstreaming, the following action areas were suggested for enhancing coverage and participation of women in mainstream sectors
Presentation on Tools of Gender Budgeting- Director, Finance, DWCD
Explaining the tools of Gender Budgeting Director(F) emphasized the distinction between the budgeting process and the gender budget which is an outcome of the Gender Budgeting process. Participants were introduced to tools like –Guidelines for Gender sensitive Review of Public Expenditure and Policy –Preparation of Gender based profile of public expenditure –Beneficiary Needs Assessment –Impact Analysis of public expenditure and policies including gender sensitive review of implementation and programme design –Beneficiary Incidence Analysis –Participative Budgeting
Explaining the holistic approach to empowerment, it was explained that it is not enough to look at any one sector while allocating resources for women, there has to be a holistic concept which ensures adequate resource allocation for all areas including health and nutrition, sustained employment, access to credit and asset ownership, skills, research and design technology and political participation. Further, regional imbalances have to be corrected. For this it is necessary to focus on specific needs of women residing in villages and towns.
Action areas identified
Presentation on Gendering Urban Development – Ms. Darshini Mahadevia, School of Planning, CEPT University, Ahmedabad Ms. Darshini Mahadevia pointed out the need for addressing gender concerns in urban development projects highlighting the increasing concentration of population in urban areas. She pointed out that 47.37% of the urban population comprises females and urban poverty is largely concentrated in small and medium towns. Quoting studies, Ms. Mahadevia highlighted the poor access to basic civic services in urban areas like access to tap water supply, toilet facility, drainage system, etc. In her presentation Ms. Mahadevia stressed upon the need to look at the budgets of Municipal Corporations and State Government supported para statal bodies that have been set up to finance urban development expenditure. She pointed out that there is a tendency for low priority to be given to expenditure on infrastructure which is critical for women like water supply, sanitation, low cost public transport, slum development and education and health facilities. Further, participation in decision making is limited. In major urban centers the focus is shifting towards high end infrastructure development like highways, proper roads, etc., sometimes at the cost of provision of basic facilities. She recommended that there is a need for improving the finances of the urban local bodies and greater participation of women in decision making while according prioritization to various urban projects.
Presentation of Gender Budgeting – Energy Dr. Jyoti Parikh, Executive Director, Integrated Research and Action for Development (IRADe) Dr. Jyoti Parikh stressed upon the criticality of providing clean cooking fuel for women particularly in rural India where 95.6 per cent of households use bio fuels and only 16.5 per cent uses kerosene oil for cooking. She pointed out the hazards of bio-fuel for women in terms of drudgery and physical labour involved in collection of fuel and the resultant pressure on the spine. Besides this exposure to the pollutants associated with utilization of less clean fuel was highlighted. Dr. Jyoti Parikh also pressed that this was an economic problems since 3 billion days in rural India are spent in gathering fuel and more days in processing them. 12 billion days are lost in fetching water and impact of water related disease. She stressed upon the need for prioritization of resource allocation towards providing clean fuel for cooking safe water for drinking and sanitation facilities. Dr. Parikh recommended that there should be a national mission on cooking fuel being made freely available for women and it should be promoted as a micro enterprise development activity encouraging women self help groups. The drive should also be for promotion of employment opportunities for women and building their capacity to assist and manage energy programmes. This would have a spill over benefit in the health sector. Presentation on Need for Gender Mainstreaming- some evidences Dr Aparna Negi Asstt. Proffesor, Department of Economics, H.P. University, Shimla In her presentation Dr Aparna Negi explained how gender mainstreaming is critical for achievement of Development Goals. She quoted examples from tha agriculture and forestry sectors of Himmachal Pradesh to explain how women contribute signicant labour in these sectors but their contributuion mostly goes un-paid. In contrast, an activity like horticulture affords significant reduction in labour but control over produce still remains with men. Even in water shed programmes that aim at community participation, independent role of women is not ensured. She stressed upon the need for making programmes specific to local needs, training and capacity building for women and financial support by way of access to credit. Gender Audit of all programmes is necessary to ensure gender mainstreaming. Gender Budgets and Employment Guarantees scheme – Dr. Asha Kapoor Mehta Professor of Economics, IIPA, New Delhi
Prof. Mehta pointed out that despite budgets plans and poverty alleviations strategies poverty levels in the country continued to be unacceptably high and within the population that is poor women and children are the most deprived. Stessing the importance of employment guarantee schemes she pointed out that in poor households the only source of purchasing power for food and health is current income which in turn depends on availability of work/employment opportunities and fair remuneration for work. In this context Prof. Mehta presented analysis of the Maharashtra Employment Guarantee Scheme (based upon the works of Krishnaraj Pandy and Kanchi 2003). While the scheme was not designed to be women friendly women were the major beneficiaries as it offered work close to the residence and also provided for crèches and special provision of maternity benefits, etc. However, the impact assessment indicates that calculation of wages was subjective and women got paid less, maternity benefit did not materialize as anticipated and shelters and creches were not provided. Prof. Mehta recommended that there should be a stricter monitoring of various public expenditure programmes and greater participation of women in the decision making and implementation. For the National Rural Guarantee Scheme to be effective, it is necessary that people must know their rights under the Act which would require an effective multi media campaign. Prof. Mehta also highlighted the incidence of unpaid labour by women particularly in the agricultural sector. She gave the example of Gum Karaya which is a non-timber forest produce attributed as a male dominated activity. She pointed out that actual analysis of the production system clearly pointed to the fact that women do more than 90% of the activities associated with this produce starting from collection of gum, cleaning it, processing it and marketing it. The activity by men is restricted to making a gash in the tree to enable oozing of the gum. But income accrues to the men. She stated that this is a typical example most of the activities in agricultural and animal husbandry where women are toiling without any income or asset base.
Presentation on Building Budgets from Below- Dr. Ahalya Bhatt, SSF, Bangalore Smt. Ahalaya S. Bhat stressed upon the value of partnership and capacity building amongst women and elected women representatives of the panchayats for effective gender budgeting at the grass root level. Outlining the steps entailed in building budgets from below she stressed that training women in the budgeting process was seen as vital for effective leadership by women. Thus it is a process of economic governance linked to political governance. This entailed federating the women and then asking them to prepare the "ought" budget based upon the perceived priority of the women. This process enables women to better understand the budgeting process and working of the public distribution system, health services, etc. As a result of the exercise carried out in Karnataka in select areas, there as an enhancement in utilization of funds for projects like integrated women development programme in some areas specific ear-marking of funds for women’s development was undertaken. After considerable capacity building there was a significant improvement in effectiveness of women in panchayats.
Presentations by State Governments Karnataka
Land, (b) Housing, c) Agriculture and allied services, d) Rural Development, e) Education, f) Health, g) Industry with focus on sericulture, village industries corporation
1/3rd resources and physical targets ear-marked for women in select schemes and sectors. Each Department required to build a gender evaluation technique in monthly monitoring reviews and focus on better implementation and monitoring from a gender perspective. Review is chaired by Additional Chief Secretary and Secretary, DWCD is a Member-Secretary.
Rajasthan
Madhya Pradesh
Orissa
Delhi •Stree Shakti: A multi- stakeholder programme involving Health, Education, Training and Technical Education, Legal Aid, Delhi Commission for Women, Crime Against Women Cell, Delhi State AIDS control society, Yoga Institute.
Women ‘s Health – identification of beneficiaries, treatment at camp and referrals through linked hospitals. Awareness Generation- Through IEC and counseling on social issues. Capacity Building – Identifying those who require skill building support and enrolling them in Centers.
Discussions on Action Plan for Gender Budgeting and Recommendations The participating State representatives were given a Handout (enclosed) detailing possible areas of activities that could be undertaken by the State Governments under Gender Budgeting on a short-term and long term basis. Six States- Delhi, Himmachal Pradesh, Punjab, Rajasthan, Uttranachal and Uttar Pradesh- participated in the strategy session. Most of the State participants expressed the need for consultation within their respective Departments and with Finance and Planning Departments in their respective States, before finalizing their recommendations. However, preliminary details are enclosed in Table A.
-TABLE A State Wise Action Plan on Gender Budgeting
Based upon discussions during the workshop and strategy session, certain key priority areas for action by State Governments and recommendations were identified. These are as under :
Recommendations of the Workshop
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