□ Gender Equility and Family Minister Lee Jung-ok discussed gender-sensitive ways to cope with COVID 19 together with representatives from Asia-Pacific countries at a video ministerial conference hosted by UN Women* on Tuesday, June 9, 2020 with “For Gender-Sensitive Recovery from COVID 19” as theme.
* Created in January 2011 by the United Nations General Assembly, UN Women is dedicated to eradicating discrimination against women and girls, promoting gender equality, and empowering women.
ㅇ Participants from ten countries in the Asia-Pacific region including Korea and Australia shared their responses to COVID-19 and innovative cases and views on how to develop and implement gender-sensitive policies in dealing with COVID-19.
* The conference was attended by Korea, Australia, Japan, India, Thailand, the Philippines, Cambodia, Bangladesh, Myanmar, and Fiji.
ㅇ Previously, Minister Lee also joined a videoconference of major donor countries of UN Women, where representatives from UN Women, World Bank, and IFC and leaders from donor countries discussed the impact of COVID-19 on women and sustainable solutions.
□ The participating countries in the Asia-Pacific region are among the first areas hit by COVID-19, and they discussed approaches that the international community needs to adopt in order to respond effectively to COVID-19 from the gender-sensitive perspective.
ㅇ They reached a consensus that governments should ensure that women are not left out when designing and implementing COVID-19-related policies as the prolonged pandemic of COVID-19 can leave women particularly vulnerable, and that continuous policy support should be provided to eliminate inequalities facing women.
□ “At the conference, I stressed how effectively the Korean government has been responding to COVID-19, which is characterized by 3Ts (Trace, Test, and Treat ) and also shared Korea’s success cases featuring social distancing, which is widely and actively practiced by the general public,” Lee said.
ㅇ She added that she emphasized the need for global cooperation in addressing the impact of COVID-19 on the disadvantaged class and women and in providing socio-economic support from the gender-sensitive perspective, both of which are issues of common interest to the UN and the international community.