Foy-Connor at Workshop
The Gender Affairs Unit of the Ministry of Home Affairs hosted Ms. Tamara Huggins, a consultant on behalf of the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB), who is updating Anguilla’s Country Gender Assessment (CGA). Consultant Huggins arrived on island on Sunday evening for a week of meetings with a number of stakeholders from the public and private sector, as well as community organizations.
One of the goals of the CGA is to determine how gender is significantly linked to Anguilla’s bottom line: the economic prosperity of the nation. The premise is that the ills of society, including poverty and crime, affect the well-being of the nation. By determining pockets of opportunities where all individuals, men and women, can make a productive living for themselves, this bottom line can be improved. The CDB consultancy assists in identifying what barriers exist in areas such as education, the marketplace, resource availability, health and other sectors. The ultimate goal is to determine opportunities for the advancement for men, women, boys and girls.
Since gender is a cross-cutting theme to social, cultural, economic and political issues, Consultant Huggins met with a number of stakeholders throughout the week. Some of these included the Minister of Gender, Honourable Jerome Roberts, Permanent Secretary of Finance, Dr. Aidan Harrigan, Permanent Secretary of Economic Development, M. Foster Rogers, Gender Working Group members Steve McCready of the Governor’s Office and Dawne Richardson of the AG Chambers, Police Commissioner Rudolph Proctor, Chief Education Officer, Rhonda Connor, Dr. Leroy Hill of the Anguilla Community College, the Anguilla Red Cross, Chamber of Commerce, Anguilla National Youth Ambassadors, Departments of Social Development, Youth and Culture, Environment, Disaster Management and the Department of Statistics, in addition to the Soroptimist Club International, Anguilla Community Action Network, various business owners and faith-based leaders and members focus group.
Anguilla’s previous Country Gender Assessment was conducted in 2011 on behalf of CDB. Since that time, the nation has seen a change in the capabilities of the gender machinery with the establishment of the Gender Affairs Unit under Gender Development Coordinator, Dr. Ronya Foy Connor. The current CGA report will update new developments across all sectors.
Consultant Huggins stated that “conducting the Country Gender Assessment work is a seminal opportunity to gather information and assess public opinion in light of the recent establishment of the Gender Affairs Unit. It will assist the Unit in expectations to fulfill its mandate and determine its role in gender and development outcomes.” Consultant Huggins continued to note how “partners in Anguilla are coming to realize the importance of gender to their work. This exercise of the Country Gender Assessment is building public awareness so that men, women, boys and girls can feel equally considered and part of the development of the country of Anguilla.”
Dr. Foy Connor indicated that this CDB consultation “assists in gathering widespread opinion about community issues that may be of interest to the Gender Affairs Unit.” She further explained, “I am encouraged by the opportunities that have been presented this week. It was yet another opportunity to hear the voices of community members and learn about the initiatives they’re undertaking to affect gender awareness and gender equity.”
Dr. Foy Connor indicated that the nation is seeing progress on the Domestic Violence Bill as the document should be before the House of Assembly before the end of the year. Additionally, the request for the extension of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) to Anguilla is now underway in the hope that Anguilla will sign on to this international treaty in 2015. Through project funding from the Governor’s Office, the Gender Affairs Unit is also preparing to implement public service-wide training in Gender Equality and Mainstreaming (GEMS).
The Country Gender Assessment is first and foremost an intimate look into a range of Anguilla’s sectors and an assessment of the successes and challenges. Gathering CGA information will then assist in a gender analysis, to consider how programmes and policies may differentially affect men or women even though they are not intended to. This identification can lead to a process of gender mainstreaming which, at its end, ensures that the best resources of men and women are appropriately utilized in order to affect positive community change and economic development.
