Minister of Women’s Empowerment and Child Protection, Bintang Puspayoga, has urged regional leaders across Indonesia to pay special attention to women and children by creating gender-responsive and pro-children policies.

“Women and children are strengths. If we look at the numbers alone, women account for half of Indonesia’s population and children account for one-third of Indonesia’s population,” Puspayoga said during Mother’s Day commemoration in Bengkulu on Thursday.

“It is important that all regional leaders pay very special attention to women and children,” she added.

At an event held to commemorate the 94th Mother’s Day in Bengkulu, Puspayoga explained that the event was not only celebratory but was part of building synergy between stakeholders for achieving women’s empowerment and gender equality.

Some important progress in realizing women’s empowerment and gender equality has been made in the form of the passage of the Sexual Violence Crime Law or Law No. 12 of 2022.

The establishment of women-friendly and child-caring villages to realize the fulfillment of women’s and children’s rights at the grassroots level has been another key progress.

Then there is the gender-perspective guideline for empowering women entrepreneurs. The guideline serves as a reference for ministries/institutions, local governments, the National Council for Financial Inclusion, development partners, civil organizations, and the private sector in organizing women’s entrepreneurship programs.

Puspayoga said that this year’s struggle to mainstream women’s issues during Indonesia’s G20 Presidency has yielded good results.

The G20 countries, for the first time, agreed and committed to women’s empowerment in a separate, full statement, which is contained in the G20 Bali Leaders’ Declaration.

“Together, we continue women’s struggle in the past to achieve complete equality and an advanced Indonesia through the principle of equal partnership where Indonesian women are equal to men in playing a role in building the nation,” the minister said.

Source: Antara News