IAWRT Gears up for CSW63
Community Media for Disasters Event
The sixty-third session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) will begin at the United Nations Headquarters in New York on March 11, 2019. IAWRT is planning a parallel event.
The CSW Priority theme is – Social protection systems, access to public services and sustainable infrastructure for gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls;
The Review theme for CSW 63 is – Women’s empowerment and the link to sustainable development (agreed conclusions of the sixtieth session).
IAWRT’s planned parallel event, in draft, is Models of Community Media for Disaster Preparedness and Risk Management. It will link to the CSW Priority Theme and the Review Theme by highlighting the role women play in preparing for any disaster; preparing for damages and loss, rebuilding and peace negotiations. More importantly, the event will show how critical community media is to sustainable development and gender equality.
Our UNCSW/International Committee is selecting panelists and discussants for the event who can highlight the role that women play in preparing for any disaster. Members with experience in community radio can send in their experience and short bios if interested in participating at the event (contact below)
The draft plan
IAWRT will showcase its Disaster Response Radio (DRR), established with the support of IAWRT-Philippines in in the wake of the on-going devastation of communities decimated by Typhoon Haiyan (also known as Yolanda) five years ago. IAWRT has already produced a community radio handbook documenting this project and the three-decade history of Philippines community radio, it is available online, Amplifying the People’s Voices: The Philippine Community Radio Experience and Challenges (2018).
The UNCSW/International Committee’s plan is for a gender-based discussion to follow accompanied with a workshop on the important role of various community media in disaster recovery and preparedness. The session will include risk reduction and recovery, including pre-disaster communications for warnings, evacuations and preparedness, and immediate post-disaster instructions for coping and avoiding further injury from damaged infrastructure, and responding to critical community needs.
The plan is for the event to be an interactive hands-on workshop with community media professionals and other stakeholders. Suitable panelists who can highlight the role women play in preparing for disasters and members who have experience in community radio can send in their experience and short bios if interested. Contact is below.
Objective
The discussion/workshop aims to create awareness of the important role and effectiveness of community media as an empowering medium for saving lives, restoring individual dignity and community cohesion after a disaster. The objective is to act as a call for the strengthening of media infrastructure with governments, NGO’s, and the corporate media sector, to garner support that will allay the impact of environmental catastrophe on people’s lives in the future, thus strengthening community media as critical infrastructure for social development.
IAWRT encourages self funded participation in the UN’s largest gathering which focuses on women. The deadline to Regsiter is 27 January 2019. NGOs in consultative status with ECOSOC, such as IAWRT, can approve the registration of a limited number of financial IAWRT members. You must first register indvidually as IAWRT delegates in Indico. CC to IAWRT ([email protected]) which then approves the individual registrations of our representatives. Once your registration has been approved, you will receive a registration approval via email.
click links – video and step-by-step instructions for the registration process in Indico
