The one-day seminar brought together the UN Country Team members, gender focal points, and UN programme staff to map, learn and network in order to strengthen capacities of the UN staff engaged in programme design and implementation to mainstream gender in policy dialogue with the government, other counterparts and stakeholders. The event was also aimed to increase awareness and knowledge of the existing mainstreaming gender tools and institutionalize minimal UN Country Team performance standards for promoting and mainstreaming gender equality into UN programming and operation.
Being a process of integrating the aims of gender equality and women's rights into the agendas, policies, and practices of governments and NGOs throughout the world, gender mainstreaming is a powerful approach that can eliminate the gap between policies and practice in the sphere of gender equality and women empowerment in Ukraine.
During the workshop, the participants received hands-on experience on gender mainstreaming tools and their application such as gender markers and gender scorecards, other performance indicators for gender equality, as well as knowledge on CEDAW and UPR reporting mechanisms.
The seminar provided the participants with an opportunity to discuss key strategic issues related to the implementation of the gender mainstreaming strategy in Ukraine and clearly showed that there is a will and a commitment to continue the work on gender equality mainstreaming in development co-operation with Ukrainian public authorities and civil society.
The seminar participants also recognised the existing challenges of gender equality mainstreaming in the country and that there is a need for critical views and fresh approaches on how to apply it in practice, how to combine the global vision of gender equity with the efforts and aspirations of the women and men in the country and how to ground the actions of UN system in the specific national social environment.
