Mr. James Carruthers, Assistant President Programme Management Department speech inaugurating the workshop

It gives me great pleasure to be here with you on this occasion to discuss the subject of gender equality and women empowerment which lies at the heart of the mandate of the International Fund for Agricultural Development and is a key pillar for the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals.

Let me start by thanking His Excellency the Minister of Agriculture and Agrarian Reform, Dr. Adel Safar, and his team for the excellent stewardship of the rural poverty reduction programme and his commitment to the economic and social empowerment of rural women and men. I would also like to thank the Fund for Integrated Rural Development of Syria for their partnership in this endeavour. This type of collaboration with civil society is what we strive to achieve in our various programmes as we believe that civil society is a key ally in the fight against poverty.

The International Fund for Agricultural Development was established in 1976 to combat hunger and rural poverty in developing countries and to improve the livelihoods of poor rural people on a sustainable basis. In line with our mandate, we have invested to date approximately USD 8 billion in 115 countries with an outreach to an estimated 250 million persons living in poverty. In the Near East and North Africa region, we have invested approximately USD 1.4 billion which comes to 108 projects in 22 countries.

I have joined IFAD recently and I am pleased that my visit to Syria is my first trip to the Near East and North Africa region. My first hand assessment is that the IFAD programme in Syria is bringing tangible benefits to the rural poor by improving the value of their assets, capitalising on their knowledge, and promoting new economic opportunities for women and men. What we heard from the communities yesterday is clear development impact and farmers speak about it with dignity and pride.

Experiences like Agricultural Development Project in Jebel El Hoss make us feel more confident and hopeful that the fight against poverty can be won. As you know, there is a new international consensus on the need to halve poverty by the year 2015 translated into 8 Millennium Development Goals. The third Millennium Development Goal of Promoting Gender Equality and Promoting Women Empowerment is not just a goal in itself but also an instrument to achieve the 7 other MDGs. Indeed, how else are we to have significant and sustainable results in eradicating extreme poverty and hunger, ensuring universal primary education, ensuring environmental sustainability, improving child nutrition, decreasing maternal mortality, and combating HIV/AIDS and malaria? And of course institutional development and governance need to be inclusive of all women and men if they are to work effectively towards poverty reduction.

As part of this international effort and due to the centrality of gender equality in this effort, IFAD has invested with support from the Italian/Norwegian/Japanese Governments a total of USD 8 million to build the capacity of our organization, counterpart agencies at government level, project staff and organizations of civil society in gender and poverty analysis.

The gender mainstreaming capacity building programmes cover all the regions where IFAD works. These programmes have led to significant improvement in the way women inequalities are analysed and innovative and practical actions for women empowerment proposed and implemented. With the recently approved Plan of Action to Mainstream Gender Equality in IFAD Operations, IFAD has moved forward towards ensuring that it addresses adequately gender equality issues and that IFAD and its partners' performance is also defined in terms of how well the operations they support are achieving the women empowerment objectives. Inclusiveness and accountability on gender equality matters now constitute key pillars of IFAD operating model.

The Programme of Action to Reach Rural Women in NENA region started 4 years ago, with a total financing of little over USD 2 million. The Programme is supported by the Italian and Japanese Governments and the IFAD Trust Funds. The Programme of Action has sought to work with a selected group of projects and NGOs on developing and testing different approaches to mainstream gender in IFAD and Government joint rural development programmes.

I am very impressed and pleased to see such a large gathering of government officials, UN agencies, project and field staff from 11 countries and 22 projects who have collaborated to various degrees with the Programme of Action to Reach Rural Women in NENA region come together to discuss and guide efforts for bridging gender inequality and for enhancing women empowerment in our collective efforts to reduce rural poverty.

I would like to invite you all to examine the lessons learned from the implementation of this programme as well as the experiences from other gender mainstreaming initiatives sponsored by partner governments, NGOs and UN agencies, with openness and rigor to enable us as partners in development to strengthen our approach towards enhancing the role of women in the rural economy, towards their empowerment and towards the provision of equal opportunities for women and men in order to reduce rural poverty more effectively.

The outcome of this work will definitely influence and be integrated in the strategy of our interventions in the region. I wish you well in your stimulating deliberations.

I would like again to recognise the exemplary collaboration between the Government of Syria, the Fund for Integrated Rural Development of Syria and IFAD. I would like to sincerely thank the Ministry of Agriculture and Agrarian Reform and the Fund for Integrated Rural Development of Syria, FIRDOS, for their leadership, relentless effort in mobilising the needed expertise and experiences and the excellent organization. This collaboration is testimony of the type of collaborative efforts that we seek to build to make the most of the opportunities created by continuing social change and on-going national efforts to promote gender equality and women empowerment.