The G5 Sahel Women’s Platform, a key partner for inclusive development in the Sahel
Since its launch, the G5 Sahel Women’s Platform has positioned itself as a key player in promoting peace, security and development in the Sahel region. Find out more about how this multi-stakeholder umbrella structure works and its strategy for integrating gender into the regional and international strategies and initiatives of the G5 Sahel member countries.
How the Platform works
The G5 Sahel Women’s Platform comprises 4 entities:
- the supervisory body, consisting of the ministers of the member countries in charge of women and/or gender, which acts as a steering and communication body between the Platform and the G5 Sahel Council of Ministers
- the regional coordination
- the national coordination
- branches at the regional, departmental and municipal level.
An Ambitious Strategy to Assert Women’s Leadership in the Sahel
In its 2020-2024 strategy, the G5 Sahel Women’s Platform has defined 5 strategic orientations around a common vision: “Security, peace and justice in Sahel for inclusive, equitable and sustainable development where women’s leadership is asserted“.
- conflict prevention and management
- radicalisation and violent extremism countering
- women and girls’ protection against all forms of violence
- promotion of women’s and girls’ leadership and participation in political and administrative governance
- resilience and economic empowerment of women and girls in conflict areas.
The implementation of a permanent technical Secretariat to ensure the coordination and implementation of the Platform’s activities, as well as the mobilisation of the necessary resources to achieve the set objectives, is also foreseen in the strategic plan. This Secretariat will allow a better operationalisation of the Platform and a greater efficiency in the implementation of its actions in favour of gender equality and women’s rights in the Sahel region.
Coordination, monitoring, evaluation and capitalisation are also important issues for the G5 Sahel Women’s Platform.
Thanks to its operating mechanisms and ambitious strategy, the G5 Sahel Women’s Platform is establishing itself as a key player in the promotion of equal rights and opportunities for women and girls in the Sahel. Its vision gives hope for the future of the region.
The G5 Sahel Women’s Platform in Action
Since December 2021, the G5 Sahel Women’s Platform has trained two groups of women community leaders in mediation, dialogue and advocacy techniques. These women were subsequently able to build their communities’ capacity to resolve conflicts peacefully and to promote gender equality. These mediators play a central role by intervening in conflict areas. They are able to collect information on women’s needs and suggest practical solutions to meet those needs.
As a continuation of this project, the G5 Sahel Women’s Platform wishes to contribute to the empowerment of women by offering them training in food processing and basic hygiene product manufacturing. This initiative would enable women to develop useful skills to improve their economic situation and to enhance their ability to contribute to stability and peace in the region.
Embracing its role in promoting gender equality in the region, the Platform has played an important role in advocating for gender to be incorporated into G5 Sahel policies and programmes. Thanks to its commitment, the approval process of a gender policy within the G5 Sahel has been initiated, thus strengthening the participation of women in peace and security processes.
Promoting Gender Equality in Security
To address the multidimensional barriers in the nexus “Women, Peace and Security”, the G5 Sahel Women’s Platform initiated a side event at the 67th session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW67) on the theme “Breaking Barriers: Innovative Approaches for Advancing Gender Equality in Sahel Security and Justice“.
This event aims to promote the G5 Sahel Gender Award and its winners, while highlighting innovative solutions to promote gender equality in the field of security and justice.
Collaboration between the Sahel Alliance and the G5 Sahel Women’s Platform
The Platform and the Sahel Alliance are working in partnership to develop a regional, holistic and tailored approach to gender equality and women’s empowerment in the Sahel.
To implement the gender approach, the Sahel Alliance developed a specific working group whose mission is to ensure that “women and girls in the G5 Sahel countries lead a life where their human rights are respected, where they fully participate in the formulation and implementation of policies in line with the 2030 Agenda and more specifically with Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 5 which aims to achieve the empowerment of women and girls”.
The G5WP Regional Coordinator participated in the last Operational Steering Committee of the Alliance in December 2022. In addition, several Alliance members are collaborating with the G5WP, including the UN and the African Development Bank (AfDB). For example, the AfDB collaborated closely with the G5WP regional and country coordinators in the completion of the Sahel regional gender profile study, which is currently being finalised.
Gender is a priority transversal theme within the Sahel Alliance. Currently, more than 600 projects labelled Alliance Sahel (i.e. more than 50% of the projects being implemented) have a main or significant “gender” objective, for a total amount of nearly 15 billion euros.
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