We, the Ministers and representatives of Governments, Having gathered at the sixty-fourth session of the Commission on the Status of Women, in New York, on the occasion of the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on Women, held in Beijing in 1995, to undertake a review and appraisal of the implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action1 and the outcome documents of the twenty-third special session of the General Assembly, entitled “Women 2000: gender equality, development and peace for the twenty-first century”,2 including an assessment of current challenges that affect the implementation of the Platform for Action and the achievement of gender equality and the empowerment of women and its contribution towards the full realization of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development through a gender perspective, as well as to ensure the acceleration of the implementation of the Platform for Action and with a commitment to ensuring the mainstreaming of a gender perspective into the preparations for and the integrated and coordinated implementation of and follow-up to all the major United Nations conferences and summits in the development, economic, social, environmental, humanitarian and related fields so that they effectively contribute to the realization of gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls,
1. Reaffirm the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action,1 the outcome documents of the twenty-third special session of the General Assembly2 and the declarations of the Commission on the Status of Women on the tenth, fifteenth and twentieth anniversaries of the Fourth World Conference on Women3 and commit to their accelerated implementation;
2. Welcome the regional reviews that have been undertaken by the regional commissions and the outcomes of intergovernmental processes at the regional level which have fed into the 2020 review by the Commission; 3. Recognize that the implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and the fulfilment of the obligations under the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women4 are mutually reinforcing in achieving gender equality, the empowerment of women and girls and the realization of their human rights, and call upon States that have not yet done so to consider ratifying or acceding to the Convention and the Optional Protocol thereto;5
4. Emphasize the mutually reinforcing relationship among achieving gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls and the full, effective and accelerated implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and the gender-responsive implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, and reaffirm that the full, effective and accelerated implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action will make a crucial contribution to the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and to progress across all the Goals and targets;
5. Welcome the progress made towards the full implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action through concerted policy action at the national, regional and global levels, also welcome the review activities undertaken by Governments in the context of the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on Women, noting the contributions of all other relevant stakeholders, and look forward to the high-level meeting of the General Assembly on the twentyfifth anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on Women, to be held on 23 September 2020 on the theme of “Accelerating the realization of gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls”;
6. Express concern that overall, progress has not been fast or deep enough, that in some areas progress has stalled and even reversed in the face of persistent structural barriers and growing pushback, and recognize that 25 years after the Fourth World Conference on Women, no country has fully achieved equality and empowerment for women and girls, that significant levels of inequality between women and men and girls and boys persist globally, that many women and girls experience multiple and intersecting forms of discrimination, vulnerability and marginalization throughout their life cycle, and that women and girls who experience multiple forms of discrimination have made the least progress;
7. Recognize that new challenges have emerged, and reaffirm our political will and firmly commit to tackle the challenges and remaining implementation gaps in all 12 critical areas of concern, namely, women and poverty, education and training of women, women and health, violence against women, women and armed conflict, women and the economy, women in power and decision-making, institutional mechanisms for the advancement of women, human rights of women, women and the media, women and the environment, and the girl child;
6. Reiterate our pledge to make this decade one of action and delivery for sustainable development by accelerating our common efforts to reach this vision by 2030 and to this end, pledge to take further concrete action to ensure the full, effective and accelerated implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and the outcome documents of the twenty-third special session of the General Assembly and of the gender-responsive implementation of the 2030 Agenda, including by:
• removing all discriminatory laws and ensuring the full implementation of laws, policies, strategies and programme activities for all women and girls;
• strengthening institutional mechanisms for gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls at all levels;
• integrating gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls across the economic, social, political and environmental dimensions of development, as well as the peace and development continuum;
• ensuring that laws, policies and programmes benefit all women and girls, and that policies are systematically evaluated to ensure they do not create and reinforce inequalities and marginalization;
• matching commitments to gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls with adequate financing through the mobilization of financial resources from all sources;
• strengthening accountability for the implementation of existing commitments to gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls;
• transforming discriminatory norms and gender stereotypes and promoting social norms and practices that recognize the positive role and contribution of women and eliminate discrimination against women and girls;
• harnessing the potential of technology to improve women’s lives and addressing the risks of technologies for gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls;
• closing data and evidence gaps through the regular production of gender statistics to monitor the implementation of the Platform for Action and the Sustainable Development Goals;
7. Reaffirm the primary responsibility of the Commission on the Status of Women for the follow-up to the Fourth World Conference on Women and the outcome documents of the twenty-third special session of the General Assembly and recall the follow-up work of the Commission in that regard, also reaffirm its catalytic role in promoting gender equality and the empowerment of women and in promoting and monitoring gender mainstreaming within the United Nations system, and further reaffirm that the Commission also contributes to the follow-up to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, so as to accelerate the realization of gender equality and the empowerment of women;
8. Welcome the tenth anniversary of the establishment, and recognize the important role of the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN-Women) in promoting gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls and the central role it is playing in supporting Member States and in coordinating the United Nations system and in mobilizing civil society, the private sector and other relevant stakeholders, at all levels, in support of the full, effective and accelerated implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and the gender-responsive implementation of the 2030 Agenda;
9. Call upon the United Nations system to continue to support the full, effective and accelerated implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, including through systematic gender mainstreaming, the mobilization of resources to deliver results and the monitoring of progress with data and robust accountability systems;
10. Welcome the contributions made by civil society, including non-governmental organizations and women’s and community-based organizations to the implementation of the Platform for Action, and pledge to continue supporting, at the local, national, regional and global levels, civil society efforts for the advancement and promotion of gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls, including by promoting a safe and enabling environment for them;
11. Recognize the importance of the full engagement of men and boys for the achievement of gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls, and commit to taking measures to fully engage men and boys in efforts to achieve the full, effective and accelerated implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action; 12. Commit to engaging all stakeholders for the achievement of gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls, and call upon them to intensify their efforts in this regard; 13. Also commit to the full realization of gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls by 2030
_ 1 Report of the Fourth World Conference on Women, Beijing, 4-15 September 1995 (United Nations publication, Sales No. E.96.IV.13), chap. I, resolution 1, annexes I and II. 2 General Assembly resolution S-23/2, annex, and resolution S-23/3, annex. 3 See Official Records of the Economic and Social Council, 2005, Supplement No. 7 and corrigendum (E/2005/27 and Corr.1), chap. I, sect. A, and Economic and Social Council decision 2005/232; see also Official Records of the Economic and Social Council, 2010, Supplement No. 7 and corrigendum (E/2010/27 and Corr.1), chap. I, sect. A, and Economic and Social Council decision 2010/232. 4 United Nations, Treaty Series, vol. 1249, No. 20378. 5 Ibid., vol. 2131, No. 20378.
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