The Situation Regarding Gender in Southern Africa and Best Practices of the Friedrich-Ebert Stiftung

The Southern Africa Regional Workshop on the Situation of Gender and Best Practices of the
Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung was held at the Heja Lodge near Windhoek, Namibia, from 12À“14 July
2004.
The workshop was organised against the background that SADC member countries had
signed the organisation’s Declaration on Gender and Development in 1997. In the Declaration,
SADC countries undertook to ensure the minimum representation by women in political and
decision-making structures reached 30% by 2005. Before or during 2005, a number of these
countries will have elections. Furthermore, all SADC countries are mandated to establish
national gender machineries within their respective countries. The task of the workshop,
therefore, was to determine whether SADC countries would achieve the minimum target set for
women; whether such machineries had been established or not; and if so, how functional they
were.

ISBN: 99916-764-3-0
Publisher: FES
Year of Publication: 2004