UNFPA launches new report on gender issues

Gender discrimination has been reduced in the former Soviet republic of Kyrgyzstan but much more progress is needed on the path to equality, the UN’s population agency has reported. Gulnara Kadyrkulova, executive representative of the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) in Kyrgyzstan, said at the launch of the agency’s latest report in the capital Bishkek on Monday: “This report reflects many problems around the world, but many of these problems are very similar to those that we have here in Kyrgyzstan." “For example, one of the problems is that only 27 percent of women [in Kyrgyzstan] use modern methods of contraception, when in industrialised countries it is much higher,” Kadyrkulova said, also citing the lack of women working as qualified medical specialists and in the political sphere. “Though we see that Kyrgyzstan has [made] some improvements … it still needs to work hard,” she added. According to the report, “The Promise of Equality: Gender Equity, Reproductive Health and the Millennium Development Goals”, the major gender issues in the Central Asian country were reproductive health, women’s limited access to medical personnel, high maternal mortality and inequality in politics and finance. Activists and ordinary members of the public often raise gender issues in this mountainous country of 5.5 million people, of whom the World Bank says more than 40 percent live below the national poverty line. However, the traditional stereotype of women in subservient, low-profile positions within society remains widespread. One of the major gender problems is the under-representation of women in government institutions and the state legislature. Although women comprise more than half the population – 51 percent – there is not a single woman in the country’s parliament. According to statistics, only 37 percent of government employees are women. Nazgul Tashbaeva, from the National State Committee on family, women and gender affairs, said gender was a government policy priority, but the biggest hurdle to progress was the absence of women in the legislature. “If there were more women in parliament, the policy of the government would be more social protection-oriented, because women are more interested in [issues such as] mother and child protection,” she said. Zamira Akbagysheva, president of the Congress of Women of Kyrgyzstan, said women were most active in the civic sector; in politics and finance there were very few. “It is very interesting that women participate in many seminars and projects,” she added, “but when it [comes] to political power, financial resources and distribution of land, women are not to be seen.”