Lesli Davis
Women Peace and Security Programme, United Nations
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), otherwise known as the Global Goals, are a universal call to action to end poverty, protect the planet and ensure that all people enjoy peace and prosperity by the year 2030. These 17 goals include interconnected themes. Cross-cutting all of these is Goal 5 – the aim to achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls.
In ASEAN, there has been significant progress toward the realization of these goals, yet there is still a long way to go. Much of this work has been spearheaded and implemented by women – from efforts to promote business practices that give women greater equality and leadership in Thailand to work at the community level in Indonesia to foster more peaceful villages.
This presentation will briefly present the SDGs, with special attention to Goal 5, present some baseline data for the ASEAN region, and explore how women in the region have been working to achieve the goals and what is yet left to accomplish. The presentation will argue that the realization of gender equality and women’s leadership lies at the heart of improving society, along with achieving the Global Goals in ASEAN and globally.
(Presented in the international conference – Prominent Women in the ASEAN Community, 13 July 2018, Le Meridien Hotel, Bangkok, organized by Institute of Thai Studies and Faculty of Education, Chulalongkorn University)