National Seminar and Training on Gender Mainstreaming in S&T Policy Formulation in Indonesia, Jakarta, 30-31 August 2004

It is worth noting that in Indonesia, the APGEST Focal Point is the same as the RESGEST NFP, a situation that facilitates coordination and building of synergy between the two complementary programs. The Seminar and Training was jointly organized by the Indonesian GEST National Committee, UNESCO Office Jakarta, Indonesian Institute of Sciences, Ministry of Women Empowerment and Ministry of Research and Technology.  The seminar and training was attended by 90 participants consisting of high and medium level officers and planners of various government offices, NGOs and universities. 

Four key areas were presented and discussed during the seminar namely: S&T gender responsive policies, Gender Mainstreaming in S&T activities, and Gender Responsive S&T Planning and Development and Gender Concepts and analysis. 

The seminar used the GEST Training Manual developed by APGEST – UNESCO.  The benefit of the seminar and training are to increase the awareness of policy makers in gender responsive policy and program planning as well as the increase of capabilities in formulating gender responsive S&T policy.

Recommendations of the seminar were addressed to S&T Government Institutions, and included the following:

(a) establishing gender mainstreaming group in all government S&T institutions,

(b) conducting gender analysis for the formulation of S&T policies,

(c)  developing Gender and S&T Networking and conducting GST data collection, and

(d) GST studies/research  as basic information for decision makers/policy formulator.

An International Symposium on Gender in Sustainable Development (SYGESD), Yogyakarta, Indonesia, 23-25 September 2004 

The Symposium was held in collaboration with University Pembangunan Nasional ‘Veteran” Yogyakarta and Ministry of Women Empowerment. About 70 participants from 22 countries in Asia, Australia, Europe, USA and Africa attended the symposium.  The theme of the symposium was “Women make the world different through Science, Technology and Environment in Practice”.   

Main results of the Symposium were in the form of recommendations, namely:

(1) Government and other GEST stakeholders should promote Science and Technology policies for sustainable human development including poverty reduction, and  the enhancement of strengthened strategies in empowering women;

(2) Government and other GEST stakeholders should promote the use and collection of  sex-disaggregated data to facilitate effective S&T decision making and policy formulations; 

(3) GEST stakeholders should promote national and regional networking in Gender and S&T;

(4) Government should encourage more women scientists, technologies, engineers, lawyers, and other fields to be involved in S&T schools activities, particularly at the junior and senior high schools;

(5) Women’s capabilities in the grassroots areas should be improved through appropriate technology transfers to enable them to develop micro-enterprises and increase their family income.

The 2nd Regional Secretariat Meeting on Gender, Science and Technology, Yogyakarta, Indonesia, 21-22 September 2004 

 The meeting was attended by 4 NFPs and 2 GEST Nat Com, 2 advisors, four observers and some local participants, bringing the total to  20 participants. The small number of  countries attending the meeting affected the effectiveness of the meeting itself.

The objectives of the Regional Meeting were to review and appraise the 2001-2004 GEST activities at national as well as regional level and the formulation of programs for National Focal Point and GEST National Committee during 2005-2007. Several issues were discussed during the meeting, including the status of GST in each member countries, the role of the National Focal Point and GEST National Committee in each country, GST Data collection, research and studies on Gender in S&T,  and GST networking. Other topics discussed included the  re-activation of  RESGEST web-site  and its link with other relevant sites, fund raising and dissemination of  RESGEST activities. 

The key results of the Meeting can be summarized as follows :

(1) The essential role of the NFP or GEST Nat Com was recognized and the tenure of the NFPs should nominally be set at two years, with continuation subject to indicated interest and commitment to meeting the basic responsibilities associated with meeting the targets and goals of the Network; 

(2) Promotion of GST involves work (such as GST data collection, studies/researches, networking, etc) at national, regional and global levels;

(3) NFPs or GEST Nat Coms must work closely together with all GEST stakeholders to attain the goal of GEST ;

(4) Re-activate RESGEST web-site; and

(5)  Improve the mechanism for Regional Networking including preparation of the progress reports from NFPs and GEST Nat Com to the Program Coordinator, and from program coordinator to GAB

National Workshop on S&T for Enhancing the Quality of Life of Women in Indonesia, Jakarta, 23-24  May 2006

The workshop was organized in cooperation with the Ministry of Women’s Empowerment and the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI) and attended by 40 participants from various Ministries, NGOs and Universities.         The objectives of this workshop, among others, were:

(1)            to increase understanding of S&T development and its benefit for increasing the quality of life of the community, inparticular of women ;

(2)           to increase the institutional support for enhancing women’s participation and access to S&T development and its benefit for community;

(3) to formulate sustainable policies and programs for increasing human capability together with the benefit of S&T for increasing the guality of life of the community, inparticular of women’s life and   

(4)            to develop institutional network . The results of the seminar are in the form of recommendations to S&T related institutions, R&D institutions, NGOs and academia, on the improvements of S&T policies for increasing women’s quality of life and proposing a program to implement the policy to increase the quality of life of women. The development of an institutional network is also proposed.