REMARKS: Samoa PM Fiame Mata'afa at the Gender Equality Forum, SIDS4

REMARKS
LAU AFIOGA FIAME NAOMI MATA’AFA
PRIME MINISTER OF SAMOA
OPENING OF THE GENDER EQUALITY FORUM AT SIDS4
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Heads of states and governments, representatives of SIDS, Ambassador Rabab Fatima, Under Secretary-General and High Representative for the LDCs, the LLDCs, and Small Islands Developing States.
Heads and representatives of Civil Society Organisations, development colleagues. Members of the clergy, representatives of the media, distinguished guests in the room, and online, 
I extend to you all warm greetings from Samoa, though I am in transition spanning continents to get to Antigua and Barbuda, but will not be on the ground in time to greet you all in person, I nevertheless am happy to share congratulations with all of you who have been part of the Gender Equality Forum.
I hope some if not all of you share my eagerness to find out what the outcomes of the next two days will be.
We can all acknowledge the first global conference on the sustainable development of Small Island Developing States held in Bridgetown, Barbados in April of 1994, to help Small Island States find solutions to the environmental and development challenges they were facing.

The SAMOA Pathway highlighted the core issues related to gender equality, including economic empowerment. This is critical for a resilient future. The critical areas of concern highlighted in the Beijing Platform for Action were also well reflected in the SAMOA Pathway and encapsulated in the Sustainable Development Goals.

Despite notable progress towards gender equality SIDS face distinctive challenges that hinder gender equality, and women's empowerment. Achieving gender equality in SIDS demands a strategic, gender-responsive, human-rights based and SIDS-appropriate approach that overcomes their innate obstacles and transforms their vulnerabilities into tools of resilience, innovation, and equality.

The Gender Equality Forum, one of the first of its kind, has importantly brought key stakeholders together to accelerate equality, leadership and opportunity for women and girls worldwide through sharing experiences and exploring opportunities from SIDS countries on multi sectoral and multi stakeholder strategies, including youth engagement, and engagement of the elderly on critical issues that contribute to indebtedness and insecurity, such as violence against women and girls.

Sharing strategies and opportunities for sustainable financing for gender equality and empowerment of women's agenda in SIDS increased networking across SIDS for women's organizations, and women leaders. Participants should be inspired and motivated to use the Forum to share better practices, lessons learned and pragmatic actions to ensure a resilient, inclusive future for all SIDS.

A key priority area for SIDS nations is the economic empowerment of women. Member states have a duty to ensure that women and men have equal employment opportunities, free choice of profession and employment, equal renumeration and access to social security benefits and the right to protection of health and safety in all work conditions.

Gender Based Violence is a prevalent issue that directly threatens the safety of women and girls and impedes the achievement of gender equality through its wide-ranging impacts on women's human rights, health, education, and economic empowerment. Under the SAMOA Pathway, one goal was to ensure women's full and equal effective participation in all fields and leadership at all levels of decision making in the public and private sectors through affirmative actions and temporary special measures as appropriate. And by setting and working to achieve concrete goals, targets and benchmarks, such as the SDG 5.5.1

The SAMOA Pathway, also aimed to ensure the promotion and protection of the human rights of all women and their sexual and reproductive health and reproductive rights in accordance with the programme of action of the International Conference on Population and Development, the Beijing Platform for Action, and the outcome documents of their review conferences.

SIDS are some of the world's most disaster prone countries. They have high exposure and vulnerability to hazards such as cyclones, floods, droughts, sea level rise, earth-quakes and tsunamis. The disaster mortality rate in SIDS is more than double the global average, according to the Sendai Framework monitor data. SIDS disaster costs are also amongst the highest in the world. On average, they experience disaster losses seven times higher than other countries as a share of their GDP. In this connection, I urge all SIDS nations and Pacific Island leaders to make gender equality a priority. We need to stop the violence before it even starts. And we can only achieve it if we work together as leaders of our countries to partner with women's movements, overseas CSOs, faith based organizations, sports agencies, places of learning, workplaces and traditional spaces to make SIDS a safe, healthy and equitable place for all women and girls. We can only achieve these goals, if we work from a common understanding of the root cause of gender inequality and common principles and values to steer our path.

The Gender Equality forum will also contribute to this week's SIDS conference and highlight the work that has been ongoing for decades in the gender equality space. We commend the women's movement in the SIDS regions who started this work long before SIDS as a concept was established. A key takeaway for all of us is to foster collaboration at all levels. Finally, let us congratulate the hosts of the Gender Equality Forum, UN Women-Caribbean and the UN Women-Pacific, and wish the delegates all the very best.

Soifua—ENDS

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