Handbook issued for gender issues

This evening, the Women’s Issues Network unveiled the publication: Definition of Gender in the Belizean Context. It is a guide that will assist organizations on how to better integrate and serve their male and female employees. WIN says it recognizes that both sexes have different needs, perspectives and interests and therefore every policy, project or programme may affect them in a different way. The guide will help planners to design projects that will reflect these differences and at the same time promote gender equity and equality through partnership.

Carolyn Reynolds, Coordinator, WIN

“People see gender synonymous to women. And what we were doing was to get them to realise that no, it’s a relationship, a power relationship between men and women. And so to integrate it into whatever programmes you have, if it has to do with education, with health and whatever issue. And so this guide can help you to formulate, to see how the two fit into the programmes and how to make it more effective so that you can meet the needs of both men and women.”

“The research was done by Minerva Johnson, she was our consultant. And it first started with consultations with our member agencies, because we have fifteen member agencies. And so we did consultations with them first, then we had a roundtable discussion, and then we took it out in the district to different organisations.”

Jacqueline Woods

“Basically looking at the workplace and how both sexes, men and women are treated.”

Carolyn Reynolds

“And so this, even when you have your staff meetings, or you have projects you’re working on, you can see how the disparity or see how you can get it to mesh more, even with decision making. So it’s to help in those areas.”

Some of the areas covered in the book include culture, education and politics.