March 8, IWD-International Women's Day

International Women's Day (8 March) is an occasion marked by women's groups around the world. This date is also commemorated at the United Nations and is designated in many countries as a national holiday. When women on all continents, often divided by national boundaries and by ethnic, linguistic, cultural, economic and political differences, come together to celebrate their Day, they can look back to a tradition that represents at least nine decades of struggle for equality, justice, peace and development.

International Women's Day is the story of ordinary women as makers of history; it is rooted in the centuries-old struggle of women to participate in society on an equal footing with men. In ancient Greece, Lysistrata initiated a sexual strike against men in order to end war; during the French Revolution, Parisian women calling for "liberty, equality, fraternity" marched on Versailles to demand women's suffrage.

The idea of an International Women's Day first arose at the turn of the century, which in the industrialized world was a period of expansion and turbulence, booming population growth and radical ideologies. Following is a brief chronology of the most important events:

1909

In accordance with a declaration by the Socialist Party of America, the first National Woman's Day was observed across the United States on 28 February. Women continued to celebrate it on the last Sunday of that month through 1913.

1910

The Socialist International, meeting in Copenhagen, established a Women's Day, international in character, to honour the movement for women's rights and to assist in achieving universal suffrage for women. The proposal was greeted with unanimous approval by the conference of over 100 women from 17 countries, which included the first three women elected to the Finnish parliament. No fixed date was selected for the observance.

1911

As a result of the decision taken at Copenhagen the previous year, International Women's Day was marked for the first time (19 March) in Austria, Denmark, Germany and Switzerland, where more than one million women and men attended rallies. In addition to the right to vote and to hold public office, they demanded the right to work, to vocational training and to an end to discrimination on the job.

Less than a week later, on 25 March, the tragic Triangle Fire in New York City took the lives of more than 140 working girls, most of them Italian and Jewish immigrants. This event had a significant impact on labour legislation in the United States, and the working conditions leading up to the disaster were invoked during subsequent observances of International Women's Day.

1913-1914

As part of the peace movement brewing on the eve of World War I, Russian women observed their first International Women's Day on the last Sunday in February 1913. Elsewhere in Europe, on or around 8 March of the following year, women held rallies either to protest the war or to express solidarity with their sisters.

1917

With 2 million Russian soldiers dead in the war, Russian women again chose the last Sunday in February to strike for "bread and peace". Political leaders opposed the timing of the strike, but the women went on anyway. The rest is history: Four days later the Czar was forced to abdicate and the provisional Government granted women the right to vote. That historic Sunday fell on 23 February on the Julian calendar then in use in Russia, but on 8 March on the Gregorian calendar in use elsewhere.

Since those early years, International Women's Day has assumed a new global dimension for women in developed and developing countries alike. The growing international women's movement, which has been strengthened by four global United Nations women's conferences, has helped make the commemoration a rallying point for coordinated efforts to demand women's rights and participation in the political and economic process. Increasingly, International Women's Day is a time to reflect on progress made, to call for change and to celebrate acts of courage and determination by ordinary women who have played an extraordinary role in the history of women's rights.


The Role of the United Nations
Few causes promoted by the United Nations have generated more intense and widespread support than the campaign to promote and protect the equal rights of women. The Charter of the United Nations, signed in San Francisco in 1945, was the first international agreement to proclaim gender equality as a fundamental human right. Since then, the Organization has helped create a historic legacy of internationally agreed strategies, standards, programmes and goals to advance the status of women worldwide.

Over the years, United Nations action for the advancement of women has taken four clear directions: promotion of legal measures; mobilization of public opinion and international action; training and research, including the compilation of gender desegregated statistics; and direct assistance to disadvantaged groups. Today a central organizing principle of the work of the United Nations is that no enduring solution to society's most threatening social, economic and political problems can be found without the full participation, and the full empowerment, of the world's women.

For more information, contact:

Development Section
Department of Public Information
Room S-1040, United Nations, New York, NY 10017
Email: mediainfo@un.org

Published by the United Nations Department of Public Information--DPI/1878--January 1997

Women's Month

Onstage with women: A Women’s Month Tribute
03/09/09
Posted under Women's Month
By Niña Terol
March 8, 2009
IT is no accident that today, International Women’s Day, is the day when I am able to write this piece. For yesterday and the day before that, I was blessed with a unique opportunity to share my words with women (and men) from different walks of life, and I feel a profound sense of joy knowing that I have used even just a bit of my time here on earth to touch other lives. It is a mission I take wholeheartedly, a responsibility I take seriously—and the gravity of it all humbles me. I am in still in awe of it all, and I dedicate this to all the women out there who have dedicated their whole lives to helping dreams take flight.
I dedicate this most especially to the women who have enabled some of my own dreams to be realized: my Surreality sisters: Carissa Villacorta, JV Wong, and Tricia Tensuan.
Yesterday, March 7, was the culmination of a dream held dearly by four women who had met just a few months earlier. For Carissa, JV (Joy), Tricia, and I, our meeting on August 22, 2008–Carissa’s 29th birthday–was no accident. It would be only the beginning of changing each others’ lives, and we had hoped that our story would touch other lives as well.
The Surreality workshop was an idea that we had thought of because we were all brought together in very surreal, synchronistic ways, and because it was the title of Carissa’s widely acclaimed book relating her experiences as a wide-eyed, twenty-something Filipina in New York City. The workshop took months of discernment and preparation to put together, and we were met by fears that–come Surreality Day, nobody would show up. Would people really be willing to pay for a workshop on “Making the jump from dreaming the life to living the dream”–and facilitated by non-celebrities at that?
Our doubts turned into amazement, however, when people and organizations started offering their support to make this workshop a reality. Enderun Colleges, Powerbooks, and Design Muscle came in to partner with Joy’s firm, People Ignite, in providing logistical and marketing support. People from everywhere in Facebook started sending us messages of encouragement. Newspapers gave us free space to share our story and promote our activity to their readers. We knew that we were onto something special, but nothing had prepared us for the magic that was about to unfold.
Our workshop’s mantra was “Believe. Begin. Become” and we also used it as a framework for our activities. We began the morning with a centering and visioning exercise, which I had framed and facilitated, and we walked our participants through some creative unleashing grounded by a healthy belief in self. Within an hour, our participants’ buried dreams were excavated, denied passions were confronted, and hazy visions were crystallized. I was moved by everyone’s willingness to let themselves go and come face to face with their inner selves.
Carissa’s session, which came after mine, was a generous showering of tips, to-dos, and realizations based on her experiences in fulfilling her dreams in New York and beyond.
For Carissa, Surreality the book was the culmination of a long series of serendipitous moments, but it was only the beginning of the influence that she was about to wield among thousands of readers from all around the world. For her awe-inspiring work, Carissa was awarded as one of the 100 Most Influential Filipino Women in the United States at age 28. And in her session, Carissa pushed each participant to begin walking the path to their dreams and to complete the sentence: “Nothing can stop me from being a ______.”
Joy’s testimonial came in the afternoon, and she shared her very powerful and moving story of clarity amid chaos; of triumph amid trials and tribulations; of faith in the invisible and faith in the impossible. In the span of five years, Joy had transformed herself from corporate workhorse to emerging entrepreneur, from cancer-afflicted to cancer survivor, from childless woman to mother. She shared with us how each of us is a warrior that finds the answers in the voice of silence and finds courage in the darkest of times. Joy’s story is, indeed, a story of “becoming.”
Until now, it is unclear to me how strangers become good friends, how acquaintances become kindred souls and how seatmates become accomplices in the fulfillment of each other’s respective missions. That day, however, as each session unfolded and as the facilitators and the participants fed off each other’s energies and together took steps toward self-actualization, I saw the cosmic forces at work once again. In sharing our stories and the birth of our participants’ buried dreams, Carissa, Joy, and I were fulfilling our own dreams of helping others rediscover and spread their wings. In joining us that day and patiently working through the exercises, our Surrealist friends were rediscovering their own paths and embarking on brand-new adventures of their own. I cannot even begin to describe in words how powerful the energy in the room felt that day.
What struck me most late that afternoon, during the sharing of “vision boards” and “roadmaps”, was how open and generous everyone was with praise, encouragement, and support. Just as we had hoped, once-disconnected people were now offering to help someone else in coming closer to his or her vision. People who had other concerns of their own were offering time, expertise, or connections in support of someone else’s mission. During her session, Carissa encouraged everyone to be someone else’s “fairy godmother” so that we could all have a chance to be Cinderellas. Our friends seemed to take her advice to heart.
And as we wrapped up and the day came to a close, it was evident that we were all exhausted–exhausted from exhuming the past, and exhausted with the knowledge that we had higher mountains to climb. Our bodies were evidently tired, but our spirits were alive and wide awake, and we all felt that another chapter in our lives had just begun.
As for me, I was—and still am—enveloped by a powerful feeling of peace. There is so much chaos and uncertainty out there right now, but when you are given the chance to share yourself and be part of someone’s life in the most fulfilling of ways, you just feel so much JOY and SERENITY in the knowledge that the world WILL become a better place—somehow.
When times are darkest and the tempest is strongest, leave it to women to bring a little bit of sunshine in. *Wink*
Niña Terol, 29, fuses her passion for people, causes, and ideas in her work. A Communicator, Enabler, and Organizer, she uses the power of vision, words, and connections to inspire, empower, and motivate others around her. A creative soul at heart, Niña established herself as a writer, having co-authored various publications for a long list of clients. She is also a budding poetess and performs her poetry with the women’s advocacy group, Romancing Venus. She is also an ardent advocate of progressive reforms in the Philippines, being a key mover of several advocacy groups. She handles political communications for a reform-oriented senator by day, but she believes that her being Filipino is a full-time undertaking that knows no limits.
(Source:philippine daily inquirer)




Philippine Family Planning Bill Nears a Vote
Run Date: 01/25/09
By Barnaby Lo
WeNews correspondent

A bill in the Philippines would create family planning programs for the first time. An attempt to reduce maternal deaths and curb population growth, it faces stiff opposition from religious leaders.

Doria Flores with two of her children in her home.

MANILA, Philippines (WOMENSENEWS)--Doria Flores, a scavenger in the Payatas dumpsite in the Philippines' capital city, almost died while giving birth a few years ago. She didn't, but she lost her seventh child.

That was the day she decided to have her fallopian tubes tied to make sure she does not get pregnant again. That was the day she realized enough is enough.

"How can one keep on having children? We don't earn enough to feed them, much less send them to school," said Flores, a 48-year-old mother of six.

The Philippines has a population of about 90 million people, the 12th largest in the world. If the annual growth rate of just over 2 percent persists, the population is expected to balloon to about 177.2 million by 2041.

Women from the poorest households have six children on average, while the national average is 3.5 children, according to the Manila-based University of the Philippines Population Institute.

This puts women such as Flores at the epicenter of a heated debate over a bill under debate here since September 2008 to create the Philippines' first national reproductive health and family planning program.

Last May legislators, led by Rep. Edcel Lagman, a five-term congressman, proposed the bill to create the program, which would cost the government about $42 million annually to distribute information and contraceptives. The costs would average about one cent per woman of reproductive age daily.
Optimism and Worry

Similar bills have failed in the past, but this time supporters are optimistic. A vote is expected in February and the bill has 113 co-authors and needs 120 votes to pass.

But supporters also worry that the Catholic Church--which has scuttled previous efforts--still has time to whittle away lawmakers' support. With national elections scheduled in 2010, delays in approval could mean that more politicians shy away from it.

"If the bill drags on, many of our politicians will play safe again and stay silent," says Beth Angsioco, secretary-general of the Manila-based Reproductive Health Action Network, a coalition of approximately 40 pro-choice groups lobbying to support the bill.

The Reproductive Health and Population Development Act of 2008 will promote maternal and infant health, Lagman says. The bill would also implement sex education for students beginning in the 5th grade and implement a national policy on contraception and make birth control more accessible to low-income women by distributing it through government-run clinics.

But more than contraceptives and sex education, Lagman says the bill is about rights, health and sustainable human development.

"Central to this would be the idea that women and couples should have informed freedom of choice to adapt what kind of family planning method they would like to use depending on their needs and religious convictions," he said.

Sixty-three percent of Filipinos support the bill, according to a Jan. 19 survey conducted by Pulse Asia, a research firm in Manila.

But in a country that is 80 percent Catholic, the church's opposition remains a formidable obstacle.
Denounced in Sermons

Bishops and priests are denouncing the bill in sermons. The church has been putting up posters and taking out full-page newspaper ads. Prayer rallies are being held. Although it does not openly fund political campaigns, the church has 500,000 names so far for a petition against the bill. One bishop threatened to deny communion to lawmakers who support it.
A church urges a no vote on health bill.

With the national election approaching, church leaders have been talking privately with congressmen, said the Rev. Melvin Castro, executive secretary of the Episcopal Commission on Family and Life of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines. "We don't want to exert too much effort on them as if we're blackmailing them. But we have to convince them that this is not the proper course."

Castro says the church considers some contraceptives to be tantamount to abortions because they prevent a fertilized egg from implanting in the uterus.

The bill explicitly states that abortion will remain illegal. Although the United Nations recognizes that abortion is permitted when the woman's life is in danger, that exception is not specified in Philippine law.

An estimated 473,000 women undergo illegal abortions each year in the country, and the majority of the women are poor, married and Catholic, according to the University of the Philippines Population Institute. About 800 women die from botched abortions annually.

"The Catholic Church is committing something that is bordering on a crime of encouraging abortion unwittingly by opposing family planning and reproductive health," said Lagman. "If we are able to prevent unwanted and unplanned pregnancies, then we would be able to reduce considerably the abortion rate."
High Maternal Death Rates

What is equally alarming, though, is that at least 10 Filipino women die every day because of pregnancy and childbirth complications, says Angsioco, from the Reproductive Health Action Network.

"That alone should make the whole nation raise our voices in protest. Any which way you look at it, it's unacceptable."

Angsioco attributes high maternal mortality rates--162 deaths per 100,000 live births--to the absence of family planning programs and lack of access to medical care. Over 50 percent of women give birth at home.

But the Catholic Bishops' Conference's Castro says the answer is not the Reproductive Health Bill. "If many women die because of pregnancy, then they should have a program addressing the health care during their pregnancy," he said.

Flores, the mother of six, says family planning is needed as a matter of family economics. "When you have many children, they're the ones who will suffer. You can't feed them, you can't send them to school. Some people even sell their children."

Ernesto Pernia, head of the School of Economics at the University of the Philippines in Manila, compares the country to its Southeast Asian neighbor, Thailand.

"In the 1970s, the Philippines and Thailand both had a population of about 37 million, growing at an average of 3 percent a year," said Pernia.

But Thailand pursued a strong family planning policy, and it now has 22 million fewer people than the Philippines and a 0.8 percent population growth rate. Thailand produces less rice but it is a net exporter; the Philippines is the world's largest rice importer.

Barnaby Lo is a Manila-based producer/reporter for CBS News. He graduated from New York University with an MA in broadcast journalism. He has covered war in the Philippines, the aftermath of the cyclone in Myanmar and last year's presidential elections in Taiwan, among others.

Women's eNews welcomes your comments. E-mail us at editors@womensenews.org.






Editorial
Not like Bush

Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 01:38:00 11/06/2008

As early as half past eight on Tuesday evening, Eastern Standard Time, only an hour and a half from the time the first polls closed, it became clear that the American political landscape had changed dramatically. The “very steep hill” that Republican candidate John McCain had to climb (the phrase is Karl Rove’s) had turned into a Himalayan peak. An hour after the Democratic Party held on to Pennsylvania, the only “blue” state McCain thought he had a chance of winning, the Republicans lost Ohio, and with it any hope of winning the most dramatic US general election in memory. The improbable victory of Barack Obama was assured.

Predicted, anticipated by all national polls since the middle of September—but still improbable. Obama, the son of a white American mother and a Kenyan father, became the first black man to win the White House. He did so resoundingly; his was not a victory like the fluke that benefited George W. Bush in 2000. Instead, Obama’s victory recalls the landslide triumphs of Ronald Reagan in the 1980s, Richard Nixon in 1972 and Lyndon Johnson in 1964, a year after the Kennedy assassination. Like them, he won with solid coattails, reinforcing control of both the US Senate and the House of Representatives. And he became, since Jimmy Carter in 1976, the first Democrat to earn an outright majority of the popular vote. Unlike, say, George W. Bush in 2000.

There will be time, in the days and weeks ahead, to describe the extraordinarily disciplined campaign that Obama ran: how he and his campaign made the 2008 contest a true 50-state operation; how they generated over $600 million in campaign contributions, largely through the Internet; how they mobilized the largest crowds ever seen in an American political campaign; and, not least, how they deployed a million and a half volunteers in the last few days of the longest campaign in US history. There will be time for all that; for now, let us focus on the clear meaning of the 2008 election: It was a complete repudiation of the Bush administration.

It was a repudiation of President Bush’s performance. Bush squandered the $500-billion budget surplus he inherited; doubled the US national debt to $10 trillion; and presided over the worst financial crisis to hit the United States since the Great Depression.

It was a repudiation of Bush’s policies. Bush wasted the global good will the United States earned in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks; launched two wars (the first necessary but hurriedly neglected, the second contentious and seemingly endless); and all but declared war on American civil liberties.

It was, finally, a repudiation of Bush’s personal style of leadership: intellectually incurious, stubborn and impervious to even constructive criticism, quick to take offense and, not least, indulgently self-righteous.

It was a thorough repudiation, because Obama promises to be the opposite of all that. If the quality of Obama’s economic team is any indication, the United States (still the world’s largest economy) under his administration may prove to be as fiscally conservative as that of Bill Clinton. Obama’s opposition to the invasion of Iraq from the start promises an end (in something like a year and a half) to American occupation in that country and a refocusing on Afghanistan.

As for leadership, a Republican strategist acknowledged on one of those endless live-analysis segments on cable television seen not only in the United States but followed closely all over the world that Obama’s victory speech struck him in part because he told those who did not vote for him: “I need your help.”

Activist Joshua Levy, writing in TPMCafe, one of innumerable websites that documented the dramatic election, explained how he would tell his son the story of the 2008 election:

“I’ll remind him that we were emerging from one of the darkest periods in our country’s history, a period in which our nation had been attacked by terrorists, an act that, rather than uniting us, inspired our leaders to lie to us, to offer false comfort, and to enact grave misdeeds that endangered not only our own physical safety, but the future of our democracy.”

In voting for Obama, almost 60 million Americans voted to stop cursing the darkness and light a candle instead.

English as Medium of Instruction



King’s English

Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 00:15:00 01/11/2009

Filed Under: Education, Language, Government, Laws
WHEN Congress resumes on Jan. 19, the House of Representatives is expected to be engulfed in a war of words—or languages—over the passage of House Bill 5619, the proposed Act Strengthening and Enhancing the Use of English as the Medium of Instruction. Authored by Cebu Rep. Eduardo Gullas, the bill seeks to junk the bilingual policy adopted by the old education department in 1974, during the Marcos era. The policy sought to make the “nation competent in the use of English and Filipino.” Gullas’ measure seeks “the reinstatement of English as medium of instruction” in Philippine basic education.
It is easy to sympathize with Gullas; apparently, there are many who are ruing the Filipinos’ loss of English proficiency and they blame this on the bilingual policy. But it is one thing to lament the loss of our English proficiency, and another to dictate that it be made the medium of instruction in our schools.
To be sure, the state should be in the business of looking for the best way to effectively transmit knowledge in its education system. But studies across the board show that the mother tongue is the best conveyor of instruction.
To some extent, the Gullas bill recognizes the above. It gives schools the option to use English, Filipino or the regional language as the teaching language from pre-school up to Grade 3. But from the intermediate grades up to high school, English will be the teaching language, except in Filipino as a course.
Just the same, the bill’s “English myopia” is hegemonic, and overlooks scientific evidence showing the mother tongue to be the best medium of instruction. For example, a study showed that non-native American children who were schooled for six years in their first language, before they were taught completely in English, scored in their Science and Mathematics—as well as English—tests higher than the average native English pupil. In contrast, non-native English students who began education completely in English learned the least English and scored lowest in their academic subjects.
All these findings should show that no science or reason propels the campaign for the reinstitution of English as instruction language in our schools—except for that uniquely Filipino science-—hiya or loss of face, the reverse of which is another uniquely Filipino science—yabang or conceit. Perhaps confronted by Melanie Marquez and other Philippine beauty queens and pretenders who, during question-and-answer portions, add to the rich vocabulary of English by their unwitting and very hilarious answers; and perhaps feeling guilty and embarrassed because their children speak their yaya’s “Barok” English, some lawmakers now like to efface the atrocious English around them, including their own, by mandating that everyone speak the King’s English. But this gesture is at best aristocratic pretension.
At the least, Gullas et al. are driven by other considerations in seeking to restore English, but these considerations hardly have anything to do with hastening learning or the absorption of lessons by our students. They may have more to do with their distaste of the Tagalog-based Filipino and their resistance to Manila imperialism. (Filipino promoters may protest that Filipino is democratic and is drawn from all the major regional languages, not just Tagalog, but they should recognize that the suspicion against it by the provinces remains widespread. In any case, even Filipino promoters quarrel among themselves on which word or coinage to incorporate in the new vocabulary, and their Babel-like quarrel may take another eon to resolve.)
Gullas et al. also want English proficiency because of the global scheme of things, such as the decided advantage of Filipino manpower abroad due to their English know-how and the relative prestige accorded to nations that speak English. But since Filipinos get the lower end of skills in global manpower, what level of English proficiency should they really have? To be sure, many Filipina maids abroad can speak English even better than their masters.
In the end, even if Filipinos had indeed reached the nadir of English proficiency, it has nothing to do with the bilingual policy or the rise of the regional languages. It has more to do with the poor system of instruction: defective textbooks, poor language instructionals, poor (or total lack of) facilities, incompetent teachers and education planners, corruption and mismanagement. We may have English as the sole medium of instruction at all levels of education, but the Filipinos will continue to speak and write the most dreadful English as long as the system of instruction keeps submitting a hideous report card.





‘Filipinos paying for RP’s migration policies’
KIMBERLY JANE TAN, GMANews.TV
10/31/2008 | 06:49 PM

MANILA, Philippines - Despite being frequently cited as a model for migration policies, the Philippine government is making its people pay for its policy of sending more and more Filipino workers abroad in order to keep the economy afloat, a civil society group said.

“Filipino society is paying a steep price for the massive exodus of its members," said Fr. Fabio Baggio of the Scalabrini Migration Center in his paper presented during the recently concluded Global Forum on Migration and Development (GFMD) at the Philippine International Cultural Center in Manila.

Titled “Enhancing Benefits and Reducing Costs," the paper said that brain drain or the transfer of knowledge, technology and resources may cause salutary effects on the growth of countries like the Philippines.

“The Philippines appeared to have produced little effort in this important area," he said.

Thus, he said that the Philippine government’s enthusiasm for the increased deployment of more highly skilled and professional migrants should be reviewed in the light of the political consequences of the brain drain and “professional exodus."

Moreover, he said the Philippine government’s reliance on migrants’ remittances has progressively taken the appearance of a real economic dependence.

He also said that the economic benefits driven by Filipino migrants’ remittances cannot be denied both at the macro and micro levels.

“At the macroeconomic level, for the last years the surge in remittances has been boosting the Philippine peso, easing the foreign debt burden and taming national inflation," he said.

In 2007, OFWs remitted about US$14.4 billion or more than P215 billion through legal channels, constituting 9.2 percent of the total Gross National Product (GNP).

“Nevertheless, while the substantial role remittances play in increasing the Philippines’ GNP should be recognized, little empirical evidence has been produced on how migrants’ money transfers have significantly improved the domestic economy," he said.

On the other hand, he said the families of Filipino migrants appear to benefit from foreign remittances on the microeconomic level.


Economic disparity

However, he also said that while the bulk of migrant remittances appear to produce positive effects at the national and the family level, the results at the local community level are not well-established.

Baggio said he believes that overseas remittances are likely to contribute to “a widening of the economic disparities across regions."

While remittances serve to enhance family incomes, the extent to which they represent a “net increase" has not been clearly assessed.

He said that empirical data show that families of migrants tend to rely on remittances alone, reducing progressively their work effort.

“The extended separation of family members (also) affects marital and parental relationships and constitutes a threat to the stability of the family unit," he said.

The Commission for Filipinos Overseas estimated that 8,726,520 Filipino nationals were living overseas as of December 2007.

According to data from the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA), 1,073,402 Filipinos migrated abroad as regular migrant workers in 2007, a slight increase from the 1,062,567 deployed in 2006.

With these figures, the Philippines is among the countries with the biggest number of migrants, the others being India, Mexico, Morocco, Pakistan, Egypt, Turkey, Lebanon, Bangladesh, Jordan and Sri Lanka.

In 2005, migrants around the world was estimated by the International Organization for Migration (IOM) at 191 million, of which about 40 million were “illegals.".


A continuing global reliance on worker deployment

In the 2nd GFMD, delegates from about 163 countries, including 18 foreign officials of ministerial level, discussed ways of “protecting and empowering migrants for development."

Next year’s GFMD will be held in Greece, with the integration of migration policies in development plans as the central theme.

Greek Deputy Minister of Interior Athanassios Nakos, who attended the 2nd GFMD in Manila, said: “We aim at ensuring the thematic continuity of the forum, but also at tackling new issues that constitute today’s challenges in the migration and development field," in his speech during the closing ceremonies of the GFMD government days.

“International migration needs to be an integral part of the development agenda, as well as part of national, regional, and international development strategies," said Nakos.

Moreover, he said that Greece aims to maximize the benefits from international migration and minimize its impacts.

“We should work so that migration becomes a choice instead of a necessity," he said.

He also said that there is an increasing interdependence of all countries, whether countries of origin, of transit or of destination in migration.

“Interdependence is the key issue that we need to take into account in conceiving, adopting and implementing our migration policies at all levels," he said.


Now a migrant-receiving country

Meanwhile, since Greece became a migrant-receiving country from being a migrant-sending country, Nakos said it has a lot of ideas to share with the world.

“Migration, in Greece, cannot any more be considered as a temporary phenomenon. Our policy is constantly reviewed and adopted to the evolving situation," he said.

However, he recognized the fact that even their country is having problems regarding the phenomenon.

“Our migration policy at an orderly migration, with due respect to the rights of individuals, the migrants themselves, and their integration in our society," he said.

On the other hand, he said that aside from their own ideas, they will be sure to include the inputs of the Manila GFMD.

“We will take back home a valuable trove of ideas and best practices presented by all of you," he told the delegates during his speech. - GMANews.TV

GFMD succeeded in wasting public money, protesters declare
11/01/2008 | 01:01 PM

MANILA, Philippines — A group that led protests against the recently concluded 2nd Global Forum on Migration and Development (GFMD) in Manila said on Saturday that the event only proved to be a waste of taxpayers’ money.

“The millions of pesos spent by the Arroyo government in hosting this useless event should have been used to rescue thousands of distressed Filipino workers stranded in foreign land, some of them ill and some on death row, in dire need of government's assistance," Migrante-Middle East said in a statement.

"What is mocking in the conduct of the 2nd GFMD is that migrant workers as the very subject of its discussion were not even heard by participating governments as they could best represent themselves in policy-formulation process. Therefore we could conclude that the 2nd GFMD like the previous one is but a useless inter-governments undertaking," said John Leonard Monterona, Migrante regional coordinator for the Middle East.

Monterona headed the group’s delegation to the International Assembly of Migrants and Refugees (IAMR), a gathering of various migrant groups in Manila to challenge the government sponsored 2nd GFMD.

Officials of the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) had said the Philippines was able to showcase its "best practices" in protection of its overseas workers in the GFMD. They also said the event was an opportunity to bring the issue of protection for the rights and welfare of OFWs to host countries.

Delegates from about 163 countries, including 18 foreign officials of ministerial level, attended the 2nd GFMD discussed ways of “protecting and empowering migrants for development." Next year’s GFMD will be held in Greece, with the integration of migration policies in development plans as the central theme.

Monterona noted that while the GFMD’s goals of discussing the problems of migration and development were laudable, its failure to come up with an action plan made it was useless exercise.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, in his keynote speech on Oct. 29, himself said the recommendations of the conference would be non-binding to the participating countries but he hoped these would help influence governments into adopting “best practices" on migration, especially in protecting the rights and welfare of migrants.

According to the International Organization on Migration (IOM), migrants around the world was estimated at 191 million in 2005, of which about 40 million were “illegals."

Of that number, 4.5 percent or 8,726,520 are Filipino nationals, many of whom are forced to seek jobs abroad due to lack of livelihood opportunities at home.

In contrast to the GFMD, Monterona said the IAMR which his group participated has developed an action plan which participants vowed to undertake in spite of their political and socio-cultural differences.

"Strengthening international solidarity between and among genuine, grassroots migrant workers organizations to advance migrant workers rights and welfare is one of the gains of the IAMR. This is most needed because migrant-sending governments are observed to be negligent to their respective migrant workers while receiving governments continue to resist in ratifying the United Nations Conventions on the Protection of Migrant Workers and members of their families," Monterona said.

Monterona further said that unlike the GFMD, the IAMR was a “genuine meeting of grassroots migrant workers' organizations where the numerous migrants' issues and concerns were properly discussed and ventilated by the very beings who were the subject of the discussions in the GFMD."

"Aside from the concrete actions to undertake for the protection and advancement of migrants' human rights and welfare, participating migrant organizations headed by the International Migrants Alliance (IMA) and Migrante International have also initially discussed the 2nd IAMR to counter the 3rd GFMD to be held in Greece next year," Monterona said. - D’Jay Lazaro, GMANews.TV



SAYS FORUM
20M undocumented migrant kids worldwide

By Veronica Uy
INQUIRER.net
First Posted 17:24:00 10/24/2008

MANILA, Philippines—Governments participating in next week's Second Global Forum on Migration and Development (GFMD) should pay attention to the plight of an estimated 20 million undocumented migrant children.

This was the call made on Friday by various non-government organizations and civil society groups gathered here for the ongoing People's Global Action on Migration, Development, and Human Rights -- a parallel forum to the governments-led and Department of Foreign Affairs-organized GFMD.

At their destination countries, these children are often deprived of the right to education and health services due to their status, the NGOs said. And when their parents have to be deported, they are expelled as well.

"We are asking governments to be more conscious and to study the phenomenon of children in the migration process, especially the undocumented -- who they are, where they are, so that [the governments] would know how to help," said Edelweiss Silan, regional cross-border project coordinator of the Save the Children.

"We want governments to come up with policies that are more supportive of children's rights," she added.

Silan reminded authorities around the world that the committee overseeing the fulfillment of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child holds countries responsible for all children inside their borders regardless of the children's status.

"The challenge is how to make this [provision] practical and implementable," she said.

Silan said it is difficult to put a number to undocumented migrant children, but said that of the estimated 100 million migrant workers worldwide, 20 percent are children.

She defined migrant children as those who have moved away from their country with or without their parents, or those who were born to migrant parents while in transit or in their destination country.

Silan said the flash points for this phenomenon include Malaysia, Japan, Taiwan, and Korea (for Filipino and other Asian migrants), and Europe (for African migrants).

"The magnitude is so immense and the lack of attention to their condition is equally gaping. Governments must look at the figures, not just of past remittances, but of the number of children affected. They are part of the cost of the migration process," she said.

Silan said that in many instances, not even the migrant workers enjoy their rights, much less their dependents.

"For instance, working conditions do not allow for freedom of movement; they are confined in a common housing area, 10 to 15 to a small room, with a CCTV (closed-circuit television) monitoring their every move," she said.

Edel McGinley, of the Ireland-based Platform for International Cooperation for Undocumented Migrants (PICUM), said the undocumented migrant children have "triple vulnerabilities" because they are children, migrants, and undocumented.

She said studies show that an undocumented person is two to three times more likely to suffer poverty than the documented migrants.

McGinley said these children suffer poverty, social exclusion, and discrimination. "We have very sparse data about them and as such, they are practically invisible," she said.

The PICUM representative said government policies of destination countries like those in Europe must balance between the protection needs of these children and the government concerns over immigration and security control.

McGinley cited the extreme measures adopted by France and the United Kingdom against undocumented migrants which have had bad consequences for the migrant children.

She said police in France raided schools to arrest undocumented migrant children, while the UK has forced undocumented migrants to destitution to compel them to go home.

"The children because they are children have no right to redress. Sometimes, when they are deported, they are brought to a third country first," McGinley said.

"Some are returned to the war situation in their country of origin," Silan said.

McGinley said undocumented migrants don't usually send their children to school or hospital (unless the situation is really life-threatening) for fear of being detected. "Many also don't speak the language," she said.

(Photo Source: Fotoverlag HUBER)

29.09.2008 Manila: Social Cost of Migration Hits Women, Families.
By Diana Mendoza
"You’re leaving again anyway"
(ips) Carla Danao is hit by guilt and pain every time she comes home to the Philippines for a visit. This was especially true in August, when she returned to realise that she had been far away and unavailable for her 12-year-old daughter when she had her first menstrual period. "She said there was no one she could confide in so she talked to her female teacher for advice on what to do," she said of her daughter. "How I wish I was here that time to ease her difficulty and to listen to what she wanted to ask me." But Carla, whose recent visit was just the third since she started working as an entertainer in Japan in 1999, also feels her daughter is so distant. Definitely, she was no longer the toddler who cried and clung to her at the airport the first year she left the Philippines, one of the world’s largest exporters of human labour.

She feels disrespected because her daughter is glued to her mobile phone and iPod. When Carla asked her one time to stop her texting and to remove her earphones for a while so they could talk, her daughter disobeyed her. "You’re leaving again anyway, and we talk on the phone often, so don’t worry," she told Carla, sulking.

Carla will be flying back to Japan in a week, just after this week’s international conference that saw more than 400 delegates from 42 countries discussing similar stories of migrant women and their families.

The two-day International Conference on Gender, Migration and Development, which ended Sep. 26, concluded with the adoption of the 19-point 'Manila Call to Action 2008'. This reiterated the urgency of addressing the issues of seizing opportunities to enhance gender equality and benefits of migration for women and their families, and upholding their rights, ahead of a global conference here on migration and development in October.

It is also time for an honest assessment of migration policies in labour-exporting countries, not just for their protection but for the preservation of their families, said Delia Domingo-Albert, Philippine ambassador to Germany and former foreign affairs secretary.

She echoed new calls from the conference for governments to look at ways on how to reduce the push factor in overseas migration for work, so that families and societies are sustained. "The separation of children from parents is the most painful and most recognisable social cost of migration," she told the conference.

Carla says she is aware of government and private sector efforts to help workers like her, but does not feel they affect her life. The paperwork alone in processing her next travel papers takes her entire vacation time in the Philippines, she says. The immigration staff at the airport looks down at her. "I have my own pains, so if possible, I don’t want to have anything to do with government," she pointed out. "It is not helpful."

There were 8.73 million Filipinos in 193 foreign countries as of December 2007, 10 percent of this being irregular migrants. Of this number, 3.69 million reside abroad and 4.13 million are temporarily overseas.

Experts, officials and non-government groups working with migrants also asked that the Call for Action’s concerns be taken up at the Second Global Forum on Migration and Development, which will be held from Oct. 22-30 also here in Manila.

Jean D’Cunha, regional adviser for the East and South-east Asian Regional Office of the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM), called on governments, organisations and civil society to concentrate on women at the lower end of global migration work -- those in entertainment, domestic work and even prostitution -- because they are not adequately protected.

"There are policies that are gender-blind, protectionist and disempowering," she said of countries that do not remove hurdles for women who undergo difficult credit procedures when applying for loans, and do not provide proper pre-departure programmes to help protect their citizens from exploitation and abuse.

Albert added that illegal recruitment, trafficking, undocumented work, violence and abuse and other problems have made concerns related to overseas workers a major component of diplomats’ work today.

"Diplomats now play a role in the global drama involving the national interests of countries -- they become instant legal advisers, marriage counselors, investigators and even forensic officers," she said.

In fact, the growing magnitude of migration issues owing to the increasing number of Filipinos going abroad is a key factor in the government’s efforts to increase its consular presence in all the continents.

Participants saw the conference as an improvement from the last one held in Berlin, where the issue of host government’s provision of health care to migrant workers was not taken up. This time too, discussion also touched on a new issue – the prospect of bilateral partnerships in handling migrant workers.

The conference also noted the calls to unite women migrant workers in organising themselves and strengthening their networks to facilitate learning and experience sharing.

As for Carla, she says that her imminent return to Japan will be for her last work contract in that country. She is now 35, still fortunate to have work as an entertainer at that age and lucky that she has not been harmed or killed, just "sexually harassed by male clients on many occasions". She is also proud that she no longer "entertains" in Japan’s night venues, but trains new women to work there instead.

After coming home for good, her savings and that of her husband’s, a bus driver, should be enough put up a small business so the couple can continue saving for the education of their 12-year-old and her nine-year-old son, and for the purchase of their own home.

She says life will continue to be difficult for couples like them and cited other options, such as looking for a new job abroad as a domestic worker or office assistant in case their plans do not work out. What prevents her from leaving again, however, is her husband’s, and family’s, incessant complaints about her absenteeism and warnings that her family is falling apart.

"It’s terrifying," she cried, "because our family is indeed already broken.

Carla’s plight is repeated everyday in the lives of over 2,000 Filipinos who leave their country daily to work abroad, most of them opting for migration as a way out of poverty.

Sixty percent of overseas Filipino workers are women, reflecting the increasing global need for more women workers rather than men. The trend has prompted many to recognise the "feminisation of migration" with the attendant acknowledgment of women’s vulnerability to abuse while working in foreign countries.

Japan, where Carla has lived and worked for almost 10 years, is the third top country of destination for Filipino workers. The first two are Hong Kong and Saudi Arabia, according to the National Commission on the Role of Filipino Women (NCRFW), the government body on women’s advancement and one of the organisers of this week’s conference.
(Sourcehttp://www.globaliamagazine.com/?id=447)


'More inequality' in rich nations

The income gap has grown prominently in the US since the 1980s

The gap between rich and poor in most wealthy nations has widened, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has said.

Across the 24 OECD countries where data was available, the cumulative rise in inequality was 7% over the past 20 years, the Paris-based group said.

But this was not as large a rise as had been expected, it said.

Since 2000, income inequality had risen sharply in the US and Germany and declined in the UK, Mexico and Greece.

But the OECD report, which covers a period of two decades between 1985 and 2005, said the UK still had one of the highest levels of income inequality in the developed world.

The 'Hello' effect

The report found that the income of the richest 10% of people was, on average, nearly nine times that of the poorest 10%.

Graph showing income gap between rich and poor

But the size of the income differentials varies, with the greatest disparity in Mexico, which has a ratio of 25 to one, followed by Turkey and the US.

The most equal distribution of wealth is in the Nordic countries, including Denmark, Sweden and Finland.

"The increase in inequality, though widespread and significant, has not been as spectacular as most people probably think it has been," the report said.

It added that the difference between what the data indicated and what people thought was likely to reflect the "Hello magazine effect", meaning that people read widely about the super-rich and imagined many people lived the life of luxury.

Children and low-skilled workers were more likely to be poor than the population in general, said the OECD, which represents the world's richest countries.

Meanwhile, pensioner poverty has fallen in many countries, with those around retirement age seeing the biggest increases in incomes over the past 20 years.

Labour market changes

Launching the report in Paris, OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurría warned of the dangers posed by inequality and the need for governments to tackle it.

"Growing inequality is divisive. It polarises societies, it divides regions within countries, and it carves up the world between rich and poor," he added.


THE GROWING GAP BETWEEN RICH AND POOR
The US has the highest inequality rate after Mexico and Turkey
In the past five years, the gap between rich and poor has grown the fastest in Germany
Since 2000, income inequality and poverty have fallen faster in Britain than in any other OECD country, but the UK still performs poorly against its neighbours
France is one of just five countries where inequalities have fallen in the past 20 years
Source: OECD Growing Unequal report

Rich and poor gap 'narrows' in UK

In developed countries, governments had been taxing more and spending more on social benefits to offset the trend towards more inequality, but the effectiveness of these policies had declined, the OECD said.

As an example, OECD countries spend three times more on family policies than they did 20 years ago and yet single-parent households are three times as likely to be poor.

Poverty is defined as applying to households with less than half the median income.

"Trying to patch the gaps in income distribution solely through more social spending is like treating the symptoms instead of the disease," said Mr Gurría.

He urged governments to act to increase education opportunities and job prospects for blue collar workers and to offer welfare-in-work to working-class families to boost income.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7681435.stm

An Inspiring Forward
(Thanks Bing!)

A lunch date with Friends
One day I had a date for lunch with friends. Mae, a little old "blue hair" about 80 years old, came along with them---all in all, a pleasant bunch. When the menus were presented, we ordered salads, sandwiches, and soups, except for Mae who said, "Ice Cream, please. Two scoops, chocolate."
I wasn't sure my ears heard right, and the others were aghast.
"Along with heated apple pie," Mae added, completely unabashed.
We tried to act quite nonchalant, as if p eople did this all the time.
But when our orders were brought out, I didn't enjoy mine.
I couldn't take my eyes off Mae as her pie a-la-mode went down.
The other ladies showed dismay. They ate their lunches silently and frowned.
The next time I went out to eat, I called and invited Mae.
I lunched on white meat tuna. She ordered a parfait.
I smiled. She asked if she amused me.
I answered, "Yes, you do, but also you confuse me.
How come you order rich desserts, while I feel I must be sensible?
She laughed and said, with wanton mirth, "I'm tasting all that is Possible.

I try to eat the food I need, and do the things I should.
But life's so short, my friend, I hate missing out on something good.
This year I realized how old I was. (She grinned) I haven't been this old before."
"So, before I die, I've got to try those things that for years I had ignored.
I haven't smelled all the flowers yet. There are too many books I haven't read. There's more fudge sundaes to wolf down and kites to be flown overhead.

There are many malls I haven't shopped. I've not laughed at all the jokes.
I've missed a lot of Broadway hits and potato chips and cokes.
I want to wade again in water and feel ocean spray on my face.
I want to sit in a country church once more and thank God for His grace.
I want peanut butter every day spread on my morning toast.
I want un-timed long distance calls to the folks I love the most.

I haven't cried at all the movies yet, or walked in the morning rain.
I need to feel wind in my hair. I want to fall in love again.
So, if I choose to have dessert, instead of having dinner,
then should I die before night fall, I'd say I died a winner,
because I missed out on nothing. I filled my heart's desire.
I had that final chocolate mousse before my life expired."

With that, I called the waitress over.. "I've changed my mind, " I said. "I want what she is having, only add some more whipped cream!"

This is my gift to you - We need an annual Friends Day! If you get this twice, then you have more than one friend. Live well, love much & laugh often - Be happy.

Be mindful that happiness isn't based on possessions, power, or prestige, but on relationships with people we love and respect. Remember that while money talks,
CHOCOLATE SINGS!

It starts when you care

Alone, you can fight,
you can refuse, you can
take what revenge you can
but they roll over you.

But two people fighting
back to back can cut through
a mob, a snake-dancing file
can break a cordon, an army
can meet an army.

Two people can keep each other
sane, can give support, conviction,
love, massage, hope, sex.
Three people are a delegation,
a committee, a wedge. With four
you can play bridge and start
an organization. With six
you can rent a whole house,
eat pie for dinner with no
seconds, and hold a fund raising party.
A dozen make a demonstration.
A hundred fill a hall.
A thousand have solidarity and your own newsletter;
ten thousand, power and your own paper;
a hundred thousand, your own media;
ten million, your own country.

It goes on one at a time,
It starts when you care
to act, it starts when you do
it again after they said no,
it starts when you say We
and know who you mean, and each
day you mean one more.

by Marge Piercy

Women For Peace Culture