Gender and mine action: practical recommendations
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Contents |
DEMINING
Women’s Participation in Assessments and Survey
- Consult each component of society – women, men, girls and boys – for assessments and surveys
- Conduct separate assessment and survey interviews for women and men when needed
- Conduct house-to-house visits to reach women, men, girls and boys who are not able to participate in public survey meetings
- Ensure gender sensitive times and locations to conduct assessments and surveys that are appropriate and accessible to both women and men
- Spread information on assessments and surveys objectives, time, and location, to ensure that both women and men understand the importance of bringing up their views and delivering their information on landmines
- Collect sex and age disaggregated data in the surveys and assessments in order to know who is affected and how
- Link with women’s organisations to organise childcare support at the community level to enable women to attend meetings, training sessions and other activities outside home
Gender Balanced Survey Teams
- Train and hire both women and men to conduct assessments and surveys
- Ensure employment offers are gender sensitive (see below)
- Link with women’s organisations to organise childcare support at the community level to enable women to attend meetings, training sessions and other activities outside home
Prioritisation of the Land to be Cleared
- Consult both women and men in the process of prioritising the land to be cleared
Handover of Cleared Land
- Ensure that both women and men are informed about and involved in the process of hand over of cleared land.
Employment of Female Deminers
- Train and hire both women and men in all demining activities
- Provide separate facilities needed for women and men to carry out the work
- Train local deminers to overcome mobility obstacles for women
- Provide appropriate facilities for women to come with their children during training sessions
- Link with women’s organisations to organise childcare support at the community level to enable women to attend meetings, training sessions and other activities outside home
Gender Sensitive Employment Offers
- Revise job requirement profiles, assess and select on the basis of qualifications – not perceptions
- Ensure that posting vacancy announcements mention that both women and men are encouraged to apply
- Expand recruitment channels, use local networks to spread information about equal employment of women and men in demining activities
- Ensure job descriptions do not contain qualification demands, characteristics or experiences that could be perceived as connected to only one sex, for example military background or physical strength
- Ensure advertisements use photos of both women and men
MINE RISK EDUCATION (MRE)
Female MRE Trainers
- Train and hire both female and male MRE trainers
- Ensure employment offers are gender sensitive
- Link with women’s organisations to organise childcare support at the community level to enable women to attend meetings, training sessions and other activities outside home
Access to MRE Sessions
- Ensure gender sensitive times and locations to conduct MRE sessions that are appropriate and accessible to both women and men
- Conduct separate MRE sessions for women and men when needed
- Spread information on MRE sessions objectives, time, and location, to ensure that both women and men understand the importance of bringing up their views and delivering their information on landmines
- Collect sex and age disaggregated data during the MRE sessions in order to know who receives – and attends - MRE sessions
- Link with women’s organisations to organise childcare support at the community level to enable women to attend meetings, training sessions and other activities outside home
Obstacles to Women’s Participation: illiteracy, mobility restrictions, domestic work and childcare
- Produce gender sensitive awareness raising material (see below)
- Conduct house to house visits to spread information on MRE
- Ensure suitable timetables for MRE sessions, for instance when the children are at school
- Link with women grassroots organisations which could provide mothers with alternative ways for childcare within the community
Gender Sensitive Awareness Raising Material
- Produce gender sensitive awareness raising material which takes into account female illiteracy and access to information
- Use locally produced material with which the community feels familiar and which portraits women, men, girls and boys in situations they recognise
- Produce gender sensitive awareness raising material to which both women and men can understand and identify with. Avoid using gender stereotyped pictures and/or material (showing for instance only male deminers)
Building on Local Resources
- Train people with influence in the village such as TBAs, teachers or medical staff to become MRE trainers
- Ensure gender balance amongst identified leaders
- Use existing relationships between parents, siblings and children to spread information on landmines risks
VICTIM ASSISTANCE
Access to Assistance
- Collect and analyse all data from casualty rates in a disaggregated manner by sex and age
- Make sure that all services for victim assistance are available and appropriately targeted to women, men, girls and boys
- Ensure sex-segregated accommodations for women and men in medical facilities and training/education opportunities
- When possible, ensure free transportation for victims to overcome financial obstacles
- When possible, favour mobile clinics to overcome mobility obstacles
- Ensure gender equity in the allocation of reintegration activities
Victims as Caretakers
- Collect and analyse all data from injured families – direct victims and its dependants - in a disaggregated manner by sex and age
Psychological Trauma
- Collect and analyse all data from injured families – direct victims and its dependants - in a disaggregated manner by sex and age
- Make sure that all services for victim assistance are available and appropriately targeted to women, men, girls and boys
- Ensure sex-segregated accommodations for women and men in medical facilities and training/education opportunities
- When possible, ensure free transportation for victims to overcome financial obstacles
- When possible, favour mobile clinics to overcome mobility obstacles
- Ensure gender equity in the allocation of reintegration activities
Female Doctors
- Ensure gender balance amongst medical and psychological staff
ADVOCACY
Gender Sensitive Awareness Raising Campaigns
- Train staff at all levels on the importance of gender mainstreaming in mine action
- Set a good example in gender balance and gender equality within your organisation. You cannot demand of others that which you are not implementing yourself
- Call for more extensive research on the effects of cluster munitions and gender
- Call for the systematic the collection of disaggregated data, by sex and age, in order to gain a more comprehensive and representative picture of the effects of cluster munitions on all individuals in affected communities
- Call for equal access and opportunity for the employment of women in cluster munitions clearance and risk education programs
- Call for greater awareness of the unique problems facing women in affected communities - in barriers to medical care and risk awareness, social stigmatization and psychological trauma, divorce and abandonment, providing for dependents with little access to employment, and risks of extreme poverty
- Call for making gender mainstreaming and gender balance priority considerations in formulating and implementing cluster munitions policies and programs at all levels
- Call for mainstream gender into all laws, policies, planning activities and documents, including sector-wide efforts
- Call for the creation of budgets for gender initiatives. If donors are serious about gender equality, they will realize the costs of these initiatives and will allocate sufficient funding
Gender Sensitive Advocacy Material
- Train staff at all levels on the importance of gender mainstreaming in mine action
- Ensure the pictures used in advocacy material are gender sensitive
Using Existing Channels of Communication
- Use existing structures, policies, guidelines or channels and incorporate them into the mine action context. Do not hesitate to replicate successful methods or programs. There is no need to reinvent the wheel
Mainstreaming Gender at Policy Level
- Train staff at all levels on the importance of gender mainstreaming in mine action
- Analyse all programs from a gender perspective to identify specific areas where further efforts are needed to maximize effectiveness of mine action
- Set a good example in gender balance and gender equality within your organisation. You cannot demand of others that which you are not implementing yourself
- Design and develop gender programmes within all pillars in collaboration with mine action actors
- Include concrete examples and integrate them with local cultural values and programming priorities. Demonstrate how gender mainstreaming adds value to the mine action sector
- Share role models and lessons learned from gender mainstreaming – including efforts targeted to men and boys – with policy makers and program officials in other sectors
- Support mine action organisations with relevant channels, networks and contacts and provide access to female leaders and women’s groups to facilitate the integration of gender in mine action
- Enforce stringent policies and guidelines making gender mainstreaming mandatory, not only “desirable” – a conditional funding. Demand measurable outcomes
