The first cohort of young thought leaders have been recruited through UN Women’s flagship 30 for 2030 Network. The talented group of 32 gender-equality leaders aged 14-35 were recruited from 15 countries across Asia and the Pacific, and will engage with the regional and country offices to provide expertise on youth and gender issues and will be supported by UN Women to co-design new campaigns and initiatives.

Reti Khatun is a mother who lives in Kulpala village in Chuadanga, a district in southwest Bangladesh that is extremely vulnerable to climate change and long, devastating droughts in the summer. Her husband cannot work because of a disability, so she is the breadwinner of the family as well as caregiver. She used to clean houses for a living, but people stopped calling her during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The brunt of the pandemic has been borne by women and girls. Emerging evidence suggests that the COVID-19 pandemic has compounded existing vulnerabilities faced by women and girls and threatened to further widen gender and socioeconomic inequalities. Yet, during this difficult time, women around the world have exhibited remarkable resilience in contributing to the response effort as well as economic recovery.

Today, the Australian Government in collaboration with UN Women launched a new programme to tackle gender inequality in procurement systems.

A roadmap for Thailand’s journey to gender equality in business was presented in Bangkok on March 16, laying out guidelines for policies and business practices to improve women’s empowerment in the workplace and, by extension, the country’s progress towards sustainable social and economic development as a whole.

UN Women spoke with two of the winners, Thai female university students Raweekarn Amarachgul and Asmanee Chesuemae. Raweekarn spent the day with Sarah Knibbs, officer-in-charge of UN Women Asia and Pacific, and Asmanee with Maria Holtsberg, the office’s humanitarian and disaster risk reduction advisor. The students talked about the climate crisis and gender inequality, and the importance of technology and education in possible solutions.

Madam Maa Zenai stands proudly at the entrance to her brand-new shed. Inside is the small herd of cattle that has changed her life, thanks to a project that employed a ground-breaking partnership between IFAD and UN Women to empower rural women in China.

I believe in a world where everyone is equal. I also believe in the power of our generation. We have come to an era when youths are empowered to speak up for themselves and for others. I believe in changes that include everyone in our communities, leaving no one behind, and I am confident that we, all together, can build a better world for us all.

Over 60 participants from government agencies, embassies, United Nations agencies, academia and business enterprises attended the dialogue, Biodiversity and Climate Change from a Gender Perspective. Over 320,000 other people participated via online livestreaming. Smriti Aryal, Country Representative of UN Women China, said that in order to strengthen the resilience of women to climate shocks and enhance their participation in climate action.

Thailand’s stock exchange opened with a ceremonial bell-ringing event on March 8 in celebration of International Women’s Day.

[Press release] Rising violence and insecurity are forcing women in Myanmar to stay away from jobs and healthcare services, says a new UN survey of over 2,200 women, which signals a deterioration of development gains in the country.

Private sector industry leaders from around Asia came together for the Asia Gender-Smart Investing Forum, presented by Gobi Partners and co-organized with UN Women's WeEmpowerAsia programme funded by the European Union.

Seven distinguished companies and individuals were named winners in the latest edition of the EU-supported UN Women 2021 Thailand Women’s Empowerment Principles Awards, which recognize outstanding initiatives and practices that promote gender inclusivity in the business sector. The event marked the first time that the Awards were held in Thailand at a national level.

Eleven Chinese businesses were granted Women’s Empowerment Principles (WEPs) Awards by UN Women China, in partnership with the EU Delegation to China. The award ceremony took place during the 2021 International Conference on Gender Equality and Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). The WEPs Awards celebrate the efforts of private-sector companies in addressing gender inequalities in the new normal of a post COVID-19 world.

Pannapa (Aimee) Na Nan has more than 14 years of experience coordinating disaster management at national, regional and international levels. As the director of International Cooperation Section at the Department of Disaster Prevention and Mitigation (DDPM), Ministry of Interior of Thailand, she co-chairs the Technical Working Group on Protection, Gender and Inclusion (TWG-PGI) convened by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Committee on Disaster Management.

Ramida Juengpaisal, 24, from Thailand, is a digital product designer and front-end developer from 5 Lab Group co., ltd. a creative software company that created the COVID-19 Tracker in Thailand. She aims to bridge design and technology to make a better society.

When UN Women first began to consider the way that climate change was hitting rural women in China, it was Qinghai that first came to mind. A large, sparsely populated province stretched high across the Tibetan Plateau, Qinghai has seen an unprecedented jump in precipitation and extreme weather, wreaking havoc on rural livelihoods. Its rural labor force also has a largely female face, being around 70-80 per cent women.

Women-owned businesses that have been hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic are receiving support with recovery efforts from a new project jointly implemented by UN Women China and the All-China Women’s Federation.The project, Supporting Women to Recover from the Socio-Economic Impacts of COVID-19, was launched in Wuhan on 16 September. It is funded by China’s Rockcheck Puji Foundation. The project will target women-owned small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in two of the Chinese cities most-affected by the pandemic, Wuhan and Tianjin.

From cooking and cleaning to taking care of children and the elderly, household care work is the backbone of thriving families, communities and economies. Yet many cultures traditionally have regarded men as the breadwinners and women as the caregivers, with unpaid care work their “natural responsibility”. In China, women spend around 2.5 times as much time as men on unpaid care work.

Migration can be a life-changing experience, but migrant workers are especially vulnerable to human trafficking and gender-based violence. San May Khine, a social worker in Thailand who was once a migrant worker herself, is supporting her fellow women migrant workers to move past experiences of violence and build a stable and bright future in a COVID-19 world.