GEM Summit News, 12 August 2008

In this edition …

– Beyond numbers – Women make their mark
– Care work
– Gender, media & elections
– Media managers shiver at the idea of gender policies

Stories from the GEM Summit – read the stories below as attachments

Advertising Association takes action against sexist billboards
By Rishi Raj Ramnauth
More than 50 percent of the billboards scattered around the paradise-island of have images of women. But the portrayal of women in these adverts is often negative if not plain degrading.  
Women are portrayed only for their attractiveness and “used as baits” by marketing and advertising agencies for promoting various products, says Davina Sholay of the Mauritius Media Watch-GEMSA Organisation. Read more

Beyond Numbers – women leaders make their mark
A word with Rosemary Okello-Orlale
By Daniel Manyowa
As she celebrates her 43rd birthday in the midst of the busy GEM Summit schedule, Rosemary Okello-Orlale, Kenyan journalist, publisher, media trainer and gender activist, can look back on a long list of achievements. A founding member and executive director of African Women and Child Feature Service (AWC), a prominent journalist, and committed gender activist, Okello-Orlale challenges any doubts about the potential of women to achieve. Read more

Care work counts for caregivers
By Perpetual Sichikwenkwe
HIV/AIDS has forever changed many aspects of our countries and communities. Perhaps most significant is the increased burden of taking care of the sick, either in hospitals or homes.   Research conducted across the region indicates that it is women and girls who are overwhelmingly responsible for caring for people who are ill, a burden that has increased significantly with HIV and AIDS. Studies show that approximately 90 percent of AIDS care takes place in the home and caring for someone with AIDS can increase the workload of a caretaker by one third. Read more

Les Francophones mieux outillés pour promouvoir le genre
Par Marie-Annick Savripène
Deux jours de participation au troisième sommet sur le genre et les médias, organisé par Gender Links, GEMSA et le Media Institute of Southern Africa, cela doit bien laisser des traces. Lesquelles  ? C’est ce que GEM SUMMIT NEWS a tenté de cerner en interrogeant plusieurs participants venus des pays francophones que sont Maurice, la République Démocratique du Congo et .Texte complete

Gender,media and elections:Fifty percent women by 2015
By Susan Tolmay
With upcoming elections in 10 countries over the next three years, the SADC region has the opportunity to make great strides towards increasing the numbers of women in parliaments and other key decision-making posts in national government structures.So far, it has moved at a snail’s pace, not even achieving in all SADC countries the target of 30 percent set by the SADC Heads of State when they signed the Declaration on Gender and Development in Blantyre in 1997. Read more

In Defense of the Birds of Prey
By Tony Khoza
Jim- a 20-year-old native of Africa À“ never entered any of the sessions at the third Gender and Media Summit (GEM), but he was always hovering in the background. Jim lives at the back of the Kopanong Hotel and Conference Centre, which is one of the three centers for the South African National Bird of Prey Centre. The others are in Inanda and the Free State.  Read more

Media managers shiver at the idea of gender policies
By Arthur Okwemba
Just how challenging moves to have media houses adopt gender p olicies is going to be emerged yesterday at the GEM Summit when participants expressed concern over the cold reception the idea gets from media owners and managers across Southern Africa.  Read more

Policies plus training equals better media responses
By Arthur Mwansa
Media houses throughout Southern Africa have received an overdose of capacity building and training on policy development to mainstream gender and HIV and AIDS into workplace practices and editorial content.  Read more

Que du positif!: L’adhésion des pays francophones Á  GEMSA
Par Marie-Annick Savripène
L’adhésion Á  GEMSA des deux pays francophones de la Communauté pour le Développement de l’Afrique Australe, Á  savoir et la République Démocratique du Congo (RDC), n’a apporté que du bon Á  ces pays. C’est ce que soutiennent Ialfine Papisy-Tracoulat et Dorothée Swedi, respectivement présidentes de GEMSA- et de GEMSA-RDC. Texte complete

SADC Protocol on Gender and Development À“ What’s in it for the media?
By Gloria Ganyani
The SADC Protocol on Gender and Development, which comes before the Heads of State for signing this week, has a groundbreaking section that will advance and give extra momentum to the regional activism to bring about gender equality in and through the media. Read more

Saying Goodbye
By Daniel Manyowa
All the honours have been awarded, the last presentation given, and bags packed for heading home. So what will all these participants take away from the conference? Some say making news friends and comrades in the industry is the highlight. Others cite new knowledge and ideas that they can bring into their work in gender and media.   Read more

Editorial

Double infection: HIV and conservative ideology

By Mercedes Sayagaues

Clink. Boom. Screech. Stop in your tracks.Out of the amiable  political correctness of empowering widows and paying home-based carers, comes a sudden,jarring dissonance.A representative of JournAIDS, a group of Malawian journalists who specialise on the epidemic, presents his group’s support for mandatory HIV testing for pregnant women. Not routine testing, the standard practice in Malawi. Mandatory. Read more

Photos: Trevor Davies
Editors:Deborah Walter,  Pat Made