Toward a New Foreign Policy.

Key Recommendations

* Development effectiveness, combined
with problems such as HIV/AIDS,
may force the integration of gender
in U.S. aid.

* A view of gender integration as
necessary for program effectiveness
must replace the concept of gender as
a sector or "just another initiative du
jour."

* Women's development must be
situated in the larger context of
international investment and trade.

Several factors may be aligning to facilitate the integration of gender into some aspects of U.S. development assistance programming. The increasing statistical evidence of the feminization of poverty is becoming harder to ignore. And the current push from Capitol Hill for U.S. development dollars to show results may lead USAID to invest in areas that bring a high return--women and girls. Added to this is the realization that the cure to the HIV/AIDS pandemic in Asia and Africa hinges on raising the status of women and girls and giving them more power to demand safe sex. USAID's renewed emphasis on agricultural development must also target women, since they are often the only able-bodied people left in some rural communities, as men migrate to find jobs. After all, women have always been the small producers who grow food for the family and the local marketplace.

The Women's EDGE coalition, together with over 60 organizations, has developed a blueprint for a gendered development assistance portfolio. This blueprint will be introduced into Congress as the GAINS for Women and Girls Act (Global Action and Investments for New Success for Women and Girls). It is the most comprehensive legislation on international women's issues ever introduced.

The GAINS Act proposes concrete and pragmatic changes to adequately address women's concerns in ten major areas of U.S. development programming: gender integration, poverty reduction and economic growth, education, health care, agriculture and food security, human rights, violence, conflicts and peace building, leadership and participation, and environmental protection.

Regarding integrating gender, a working group led by the International Center for Research on Women has proposed four primary actions:

* Create financial incentives for integrating gender and targeting women and girls. The GAINS Act establishes a matching fund within the Office of Women in Development to provide USAID missions or specific projects with the resources needed to incorporate the different roles of women and men into program design, implementation, and evaluation.

* Provide adequate funding for and elevate the Office of Women in Development and its leadership. Under the agency's new structure of four development pillars--the Global Development Alliance, economic growth and agriculture, global health, and conflict prevention and humanitarian relief--the WID office should be situated within the economic growth and agriculture division, because these two areas need gender integration more urgently than the others.

The WID office should receive up to $30 million, and its director should become a deputy assistant administrator or the equivalent. These changes would give the WID office both the stature and resources it needs to effectively assist all USAID missions and bureaus with gender integration.

* Establish a WID Management Group within the agency, consisting of deputy assistant administrators. Members of the WID management group should meet on a routine basis to monitor and assist with the ongoing implementation of and compliance with USAID gender integration policies and programs. Such a mechanism would provide adequate oversight and buy-in by a larger set of actors than merely the WID office alone.

* Form a council to: (a) coordinate and promote the advancement of women and girls in the programs and policies of all U.S. federal agencies and departments and (b) provide a means for nongovernmental organizations to work in partnership with the federal government on areas of mutual concern.

In addition, recent USAID reorganization proposals suggest that the office of Program, Policy, and Coordination (PPC) will conduct all planning, policy development, and budgeting for the entire agency. It is absolutely critical that the PPC include a full-time political appointee to ensure that gender integration and women's programs get their due attention.

The GAINS Act details how gender can be integrated into each of the nine sectors covered in the bill. For example, the conflicts and peace building section recommends that whenever the United States is party to a peace process, the diplomatic team should consult with women's organizations and women leaders in the region and take these views and recommendations into account while assisting conflicting parties in reaching agreement. The agriculture and food security section spells out the substantial role that women play in household and commercial food production. It then provides a menu of ways that these roles can be factored into agricultural aid--from ensuring that equipment is appropriate for women (who have less muscle mass than men) to building on the deep knowledge that women have about local plants and growing conditions.

Advocates can facilitate the agency's integration of gender in several ways. First and foremost, they can bring a vocal constituency to support gender integration or call attention to inaction. In addition, a quick analysis of how development resources are reaching communities can lead to a focus on two areas outside of, but related to, USAID. One is the private voluntary organizations, contractors, and country-based nongovernmental organizations with which USAID is increasingly contracting. InterAction's Commission on the Advancement of Women has ingeniously focused on convincing these large aid organizations to integrate gender into their USAID and non-USAID fieldwork. The second area is the private sector. With private investment and trade surpassing government development assistance, it is imperative to understand the gendered impacts of these policies and institutions--such as the WTO--and to use that knowledge to get the best out of trade and investment for poor women and their communities. The focus on women and U.S. development assistance, particularly in the economic, agricultural, and human capacity development sectors, is absolutely critical if women and girls are to gain from the globalizing economy.

Ritu Sharma <[e-mail]> is cofounder and executive director of Women's EDGE.