APWA-Pakistan
APWA Governing Body Meeting 2009 APWA Governing Body Meeting was held on 14th to 15th November 2009 in Karachi. APWA members from all over Pakistan participated. The inaugural ceremony was held in APWA Auditorium, Karachi. The conference was inaugurated by Ms. Nasreen Jalil. Keynote Speaker was Ms. Rabia Javeri Agha, Secretary Department of Women Development of Sindh. The theme was: “The Role of Civil Service Organization in the Economic Empowerment of Women”. RESOLUTION
The Committee Comprised 1. MASUDAH AHMED 2. FAREEDA KHAN 3. MEHER AFROZE HABIB In consultation, discussion with the branches: NWFP PUNJAB HYDERABAD SUKKUR 1. The prime most feeling and concern was felt of the prevailing insecure conditions in the country. It is felt that not enough was being done to protect the citizens and property in all provinces. 2. The closure of educational institutions is an irreparable loss for students. However, they also paid rich tribute to the armed forces for protecting the country selflessly. 3. CHILD ABUSE It is noted with deep concern the rising incidents of tragic cases of child abuse in schools, homes, streets etc. Including the rising number of child labor cases. APWA calls upon all relevant authorities to act in stronger terms to curb this menace. 4. PRICE CONTROL APWA Governing Body and Branches view with great concern and anguish the alarming price rise in day to day items and commodities. This is making the life of average citizen and more so of the poor most miserable and stressful. APWA urges the authorities and like minded NGO’s to take effective and urgent measures to save the citizens of such conflicts of sectarian, religious and all form of prejudices. 5. APWA while appreciating the efforts of the Speaker National Assembly for forming the caucus of women parliamentarians calls upon the caucus to include the NGOs with a sound track record of services for women empowerment to be taken on board for the activities and directions for future planning. Theses women parliamentarian caucuses should also be replicated at the provincial assemblies. 6. APWA like the whole of Pakistan is deeply aggrieved by the ongoing spate of terrorism. APWA wants a substantial number of women on the committees for conflict resolution activities. As APWA has branches in all the provinces, APWA members should be included in these meetings. 7. APWA calls upon the Government to appoint women judges in the superior judiciary i.e the Supreme Court, the Federal Shariat Court and the Lahore High Court. 8. APWA calls upon the Government through the good offices of the Speaker National Assembly to include the NCSW and APWA in the Constitutional Reform Committee. 9. APWA calls upon the Government to grant a special status to the First Women’s Bank, so that its equity should be Two Billion instead of Nine Billion as required for the other commercial banks. This step shall be in conformity with the Constitutional requirement of special provisions for the empowerment of women. Facilitating the FWBL shall go a long way for women’s economic empowerment. 10. APWA is dismayed at the apathy of the Government that despite its oversized cabinet there is no Federal Minister in the Ministry of Women Development. In this period of war against terrorism women and children are the worst sufferers. 11. CIVIL AWARD NOMINATION
It was unanimous by approved to nominate the two APWA stalwarts for civil Awards 1. Mrs. Yasmin Dastur 2. Mrs. Zeb Patel
APWA activities in achieving the MDG’s Goals 3,4,5,6 (including addressing the HIV/AIDS epidemic in collaboration with partners, stakeholders and Government of Pakistan) APWA countrywide has an extensive experience of running women focused activities through its programmes and projects. It works effectively on it own, as well as with relevant Government departments, other NGO’s and Stakeholders and local population. APWA’s successful role in Advocacy and services for women and child health is well known. During the last (5) Five years (2004-2009), APWA has been working on two major projects, One supported by the M / o Women Development Government of Pakistan and the Second with the support of UNAID and UNFPA. National level workshops in twelve (12) locations and several Provincial and district level seminars have been organized on the protection of women and girls from HIV/AIDs. APWA along with other NGO’s and stakeholders continues to play a strong Advocacy role for prevention, treatment and rehabilitation of (PLHIV), (PPTCT). Also Information on awareness on HIV /AID has been an integrated in all health and education Programme of APWA. Vital information on HIV / AIDS has been effectively integrated along with MNCH, family health and RH to protect the women and children from the HIV virus. Dissemination of information in the community is motivate males is also part of its programme regarding the better health of mother and child. Over all these projects aim to focus on the vulnerability of women and children to the epidemic along with awareness raising for better services. APWA Strategy for Scaling – Up of HIV AIDS prevention among women and children in collaboration with UNAIDS and UNFPA APWA is implementing a second phase project in collaboration with UNAIDS and UNFPA 2008 to 2010. This page will focus on the vulnerability spouses and children of Intravenous Drug user (IDU’s) migrant and refugees by providing skill development training to such women activities being under taken are: 1. To address vulnerability and risk of HIV infections among the spouses of IDU’s through awareness raising and counseling services. 2. Providing vocational and livelihood skills and training to spouses of IDU’s, Migrant etc, PLHIV /AIDS for their economic empowerment through APWA’s centers in three districts, Lahore, Sargodha and Faisalabad. 3. Dissemination of information through workshops, meetings and advocacy campaigns for such training. Along with awareness raising of health workers and teachers. 4. Encouraging other NGO’s, social / health workers, Government representatives to offer assistance in these and similar activities. 5. APWA is running schools and colleges in all over Pakistan and have a resource of teachings staff, who are being included in Advocacy campaign against HIV / AIDS.
Triennial Conference
The 18th Triennial Conference of APWA held on 8 - 9 March 2008 at Zeenat Auditorium APWA Punjab, Jail Road Lahore. The theme of the conference was "Gender Mainstreaming Millennium Development Goals. The conference was participated by National and Provincial branches of APWA, liaison branch Islamabad, affiliates of APWA and friends of APWA. The Chief Guest of the conference was Justice Rtd. Dr. Javed Iqbal.
HIV/AIDS Workshop
On May 20-21 2007, with the pecuniary assistance of USAID, APWA arranged a workshop on HIV/AIDS and ensured the provision of basic education and women focused capacity building of women NGOs and CBOs on prevention of HIV/AIDS for women and girls in N.W.F.P. The workshop was part of activities of a joint APWA, UNAIDS and UNFPA project. The workshop emphasized the need to address root causes such as power and inequality, leadership, human rights, advocacy and women's burden of care. The workshop provided a great networking and learning platform for civil society organizations working on HIV agencies, government and media to discuss issues related to HIV/AIDS and vulnerabilities of women and girls.
Health Awareness Programme
APWA Sukkur is working on HIV/AIDS since 2006 with National AIDS Control and in collaboration with UNFPA and Women Development Ministry. In this connection seminars are being conducted in several places.
In our Sindh province, diseases such as Hepatitis and HIV/AIDS are increasing. The E.D.O Health, in their report, gave brief details of HIV/AIDS cases in which ages 17 to 21 were identified as high risk, in different areas of Sukkur City.
In order to combat such diseases, APWA Sukkur started awareness programs and seminars specifially for women and children of the area on the topic of "How to protect yourself and your child" in collaboration with a reputed N.G.O called Sahil, which has been well received by the mothers at large, who are showing an interest in these types of program because they get the opportunity to learn more information. In the four branches of APWA Sukkur, awareness programs regarding the protection from diseases were initiated through storytelling, whereby more that 1000 students were able to learn how to take good care of their health and live a healthy life.
Workshop on Advocacy And Awareness Raising Program Among NGOs And CBOs About HIV/AIDS
On the 17th and 18th of December 2007, APWA held a two-day workshop on Advocacy and Awareness on HIV and AIDS. With the support of UNAIDS, the workshop took place at the APWA Lady Nusrat Haroon Auditorium in Karachi. 19 NGOs were invited by APWA in addition to many others who were present during the opening program. The facilitators of the program were Mrs. Meagan Baldwin (UNAIDS), Dr. Salman Safder (UNAIDS), Dr. Shehla Baqi (SIUT), Dr. Sikander Sohani (AAHUNG) and Dr. Sharaf Ali Shah (Bridge).
The participating NGO's were:
Madadgar
BPWA
PAVHNA
MRHDO Pakistan Society
PWALA
Fatimid Foundation
SNNHA
Actionaid
AAGHAZ
AL Nijat
WISESPakistan Society
FPAP
SALBWS
ICSP
Shirkat Gah
NGORC
AMAL
Mr. Salman Safdar (UNAIDS) held a presentation focused on the current scenario of HIV and AIDS in Sindh and suggested that reproductive health services should be more functional and have non-discriminatory dealings with persons indulging in high risk behavior.
Dr. Shehla Baqi (SUIT) gave an informative presentation on 'Mother to Child Transmission of HIV and AIDS and its Prevention'. She explained how to handle an HIV-infected woman during and after pregnancy and their new-born in order to prevent the infection of the latter. The presentation addressed healthworkers and she shared how to protect themselves from infections. Mr. Sikander Sohani From AHUNG held a presentation on Socio-Economic and Health Consequences of the Epidemic and its prevention. The presentation included a description of prevalent risk factors, the relation between awareness and low literacy, education and vulnerability due to social and economical disadvantages.
He also talked about the importance of family and community, especially because HIV and AIDS in Pakistan is still a concentrated epidemic. Mrs. Megan Baldwin from UNAIDS made a presentation on gender and HIV and AIDS. She gave an introduction on the topic of 'Gender Empowerment of Women' and explained that social and biological factors make women more vulnerable to be infected with HIV. After the presentation, the participants were divided into two discussion groups and the outcomes of both working groups were discussed in a collaborative closing session. The participants gave feedback on the workshop performance, the achievement of the objectives, quality of materials and their level of satisfaction.
Mrs. Laila Haroon Sarfaraz distributed certificates among the participants and concluded the two-day workshop with a vote of thanks. HIV/AIDS workshops were also conducted in Quetta, Balochistan; Peshawar, N.W.F.P; Lahore, Punjab; and Islamabad. The concluding session was held in Islamabad in March of 2008.
APWA Governing Body Meeting
APWA Governing Body Meeting was held in Islamabad 27th to 28th April 2007.
APWA members from all over Pakistan participated. Twenty members from APWA Punjab attended the meeting. This was the biggest delegation. The opening ceremony was held in Holiday Inn Islamabad.Miss Sumaira Malik, Minister for Women Development and Youth Affairs was the Chief Guest.Keynote Speaker was Dr. Noshin Mehmood, Joint Director Pakistan Institue of Development Economics Islamabad. The theme was: "Millennium Development Goals, Gender and Civil Society". Dr. Noshin's presentation was very informative and knowledgeable. In the National Executive Meeting and Governing Body Meeting policy matters were discussed. 1. Restructuring of APWA Offices, a Director and Programme Officer should be employed. 2. All staff should be computer literate. 3. A Trust of all APWA Properties to be formed. In this connection Photostat copies of all APWA properties to be sent to National APWA. 4. Yearly audit to be conducted. 5. Life membership fee Rs. 4000/-All the members agreed to the above points. Meeting ended with vote of thanks to Mrs. Laila Sarfaraz and Dr. Sabiha Syed.Last but not least we would like to thank the Islamabad Branch for their hospitality. We also thank Mrs. Sarfraz and Miss Zareen Sarfraz for the dinners they hosted.
The International Conference on Gender Mainstreaming and Millennium Development Goals (MDGS) took place from 28 - 30 March 2005 in Islamabad. The conference was hosted by the ministry of Women Development, Government of Pakistan, coordinated by the all Pakistan Women's Association, in collaboration with the UN System in Pakistan. Key donors to the conference included UNDP, UNICEF, UNFPA, UNESCO, the Department of International Development (DFID), British Council, Gender Equality Project (GEP), the Swiss Agency for Development Cooperation (SDC), and the Asian Development Bank (ADB).
Over 700 national and international participants attended the conference representing 22 countries included, Macedonia, Philippines, Afghanistan, Malaysia, Australia, Morocco, Gambia, Poland, Lebanon, Cambodia, Tunisia, and Bangladesh. Participants included government officials, NGO representatives, Academics, Media representatives, the donor community, private sector and civil society.
In addition, representatives from several UN and donor agencies attended along with many ministers and dignitaries from the Pakistan government. The participants in the conference discussed the major challenges and opportunities faced by decision makers in the area of gender mainstreaming and the MDGs during the plenary session and the five concurrent workshops on Gender Equality and Women's Empowerment, Gender Equality Human Rights and Peace, Gender Equality and Poverty Alleviation, Gender Equality and Health and Gender Equality and Education. Leading experts presented papers and shared their knowledge, expertise and experiences on national gender mainstreaming strategies and innovative initiatives undertaken to fully implement the Millennium Declaration and the MDGs. The conference also emphasized the importance of gender mainstreaming policies, practices and techniques to eliminate the gap between policies, practices and action, and achieves gender equality and MDGs.