The United Nations (UN) Resident Coordinator to Ghana Christine Evans-Klock has lauded Ghana’s success at empowering women to ensure that they contribute meaningfully to national development. 
She said in an interview with Xinhua on Saturday the setting up of the ministry of gender, children and social protection by the Ghanaian government which has really been focusing in protecting the vulnerable in society and human rights is a great step forward.
“We see that Ghana has gone forward in many areas of legislation, for affirmative action, from protecting women’s health and there is still more to do,” she told Xinhua after partaking in a public health walk and community forum on women empowerment.
The walk was organized by the Joint UN Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) and its partners to climax the month-long activities marking this year’s International Women’s Day.
The event, which is aimed at drawing public attention to the need to continue efforts to empower women, attracted some hundreds of women in communities who are considered to be in the informal sector and who are likely to be left behind in women’s empowerment events.
Evans-Klock said the UN was also working to prevent mother-to- child transmission of HIV, to fully recognized rights, to support the implementation of Ghana’s new legislation and truly work with the gender ministry in what it is trying to do here in Ghana.
The UN Resident Coordinator said there have been a lot of successes after the Beijing conference but added that there is still more work to do.
“I think some of the main achievements have been that maternal death has been cut half in the last 20 years,” she said.
“We are seeing now that equal number of boys and girls across the world get their primary education and many governments like Ghana have instituted national legislation to protect women’s rights and to empower them,” said Evans-Klock. Enditem
Source: Xinhua
