Mr. President,
Excellencies,
Distinguished Delegates,
Ladies and gentlemen,

The world conference on the status of women in Beijing played an outstanding role in the development of the women’s movement in the entire world.  The Platform for Action, adopted at the conference, defined in many ways the direction of the development for the women’s movement in the end of the second and beginning of the third millennium.

We welcome the establishment of the UN Commission on the Status of Women following the Beijing forum, which is responsible for monitoring implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action and if necessary undertakes additional measures for its implementation activities.

The UN decision on establishing special gender programmes within the framework of UNDP in our countries was very timely.

The “Gender in Development Bureau” in Kazakhstan has done a lot in building women’s capacity, enlarging the network of women’s NGOs, introducing the gender perspective in all spheres of the society.

Following our initiative, it has currently transformed into a UN Gender Bureau, responsible for co-ordinating all UN agencies in the area of family and women, as well as for rendering assistance in resource mobilisation for implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action.

We highly value the activities of the UN in preparing for the present UN General Assembly session.  We have had the opportunity to participate in a number of preparatory conferences, where achievements, obstacles and problems were discussed in detail as well as perspectives for implementing the Beijing Platform for Action.  We had an opportunity to participate directly in the preparation of the draft conclusions to be adopted at the present session.

One of such conferences:  “Beijing+5:  conclusions and perspectives” for CIS countries, Mongolia and Turkey was organised in Kazakhstan.

At this conference, it was noted that countries in economic transition have a lot of common problems and that we should address them collectively.  That is why the participants of the conference suggested to form a regional intra-governmental group. We also considered the possibility to establish a Committee on Gender Issues within the framework of the Intra-parliamentary Assembly of the CIS Countries and the Regional Council of Heads of National Mechanisms for the Advancement of Women.  Currently all these issues are being discussed with governments of the countries – participants of the conference.

In order to facilitate the women’s movement in Kazakhstan, for the first time, a post of a Minister of the Republic of Kazakhstan - a Chairperson  of the National Commission on Family and Women’s Affairs under the Head of State was introduced and I have taken this position.

The main goal of the National Commission is to act as an institutional “catalyser” for addressing women’s issues.  It is given wide responsibilities and functions.  The mandate of the National Commission allowed us to work in close cooperation with all ministries and agencies and adopt at the level of the Government the National Action Plan for Improving the Status of Women in the Republic of Kazakhstan.  As the Beijing Platform for Action it consists of 12 priorities and reflects almost all spheres of life and activity of women.

To implement the National Action Plan in Kazakhstan, a significant work on political advancement of women takes place.

In accordance with the Constitution of the Republic of Kazakhstan, women and men in our country are given equal rights in all spheres of life and activities.

The Republic of Kazakhstan has joined over 20 international conventions and agreements, including the UN Convention on Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and to the Convention on Political Rights of Women.  Presently, additional five conventions are in the process of being prepared for ratification.  Among them, “Convention on Equal Pay to Women and Men for Equal Labour”, “On minimum age for work” and so forth.

Amounting to over 100, women’s NGOs are very active in the area of political advancement of women.  Last year, they have registered their first political party “Political Alliance of Women’s Organisations”

However, declared equality of rights between men and women is not always supported by real guarantees and equal opportunities for their fulfilment.

Women are underrepresented in all levels of decision-making.  For example, in the Parliament, out of 116 members, only 13 (11%) are women.  Among ministers, I am the only one female.  In the state bodies of executive power, among top decision-makers, there is only 7-8% of women.  There are few women in the decision-making positions even in traditionally female spheres of public life.

In order to achieve the gender balance in the society, we have started the gender expertise of the entire national legislation, as well as development of the draft law on equal rights and opportunities.

Since last year, a statistical brochure “Women and men of Kazakhstan” is being published to reflect all aspects of the gender situation in the country.

Gender issues are regularly covered on the pages of the journal of the National Commission “Women : East and west”, as well s in many other mass media.

The National Commission has agreed with almost all ministries and agencies on the reserve of women human resources. Therefore, we can say that concrete measures on achieving equality between women and men have been taken in Kazakhstan.   We think that this is one of the achievements following the Beijing Conference.

We have succeeded in drawing the attention of the politicians and society to such important issue as violence against women.

With the support of the mass media, the work is done to sensitise population on preventive measures against violence.  The first crisis centre-shelter for women victims of violence with the participation of state.  Currently a draft law on Domestic Violence is being developed.

We are supporting and will take an active part in the International Campaign of Zero Tolerance for Violence against Women, which is scheduled for the year 2001.

One of the main priorities of the National Commission on Family and Women’s Affairs under the President of the Republic of Kazakhstan is the economic advancement of women.

As many as experts rightly note women in a transitional period lost more than men did, especially in the labour sphere. Today among our unemployed, women constitute two thirds.

In Kazakhstan before perestroika the light industry was well developed and about 90% of women was employed there.  But, in relations with restructuring of economy, today these enterprises are shutdown or function not to full extent.

In order to revise light industry and provide employment to women, the Government of Kazakhstan is offering a number of significant incentives to enterprises of this industry.  There are tax holidays for three years on the payments to the budget, zero tax rate for value added, no custom tariffs for raw materials import, etc.  The situation has been immediately improved but today many enterprises need investments.

We have discussed these issues at the Eurasian Economic Summit, which was held in April 2000 in Almaty.  We also presented the participants of the summit with business plans of our enterprises. Therefore, I would like to appeal to the representatives of business and financial circles present here to invite you to Kazakhstan.  This will allow you to better understand our problems and to take part in programme investing.

We found out that one of the most successful strategies in widening economic opportunities for women is microcrediting. Since 1999 in Kazakhstan the micro-crediting programme for most vulnerable citizens is implemented.  Among beneficiaries two thirds are women, mainly from rural areas.  Experience proved that even a  small microcrediting amount plays a significant role in the development of women’s entrepreneurship.  In our conditions, it is primarily an effort to eradicate poverty.

To support women entrepreneurship, involved in the productive sphere following the initiative of the National Commission, a special credit line is established in one of the banks.  However, we are suffering from the lack of credit resources available.

That is why we are very glad that in the draft conclusions of our session, a special task is given to the UN country offices and international organisations to take measures to render assistance for the governments of the countries in transition in their elaboration and implementation of plans and programmes aimed at expansion of economic opportunities for women. We hope that United Nations could draw attention of the world financial institutions to this matter.

Another problematic sphere of our activity is women’s health.  In Kazakhstan the health index for women is only 30%, and in some regions, it is only 20% or less.  Two thirds of women are suffering from anaemia.  There is a growth of breast cancer diseases and a consequent significant increase in women’s mortality due to this cause.  This is all in a great degree attributed to the years-long nuclear tests on the Semipalatinsk nuclear test site and Aral ecological catastrophe.  The Government is taking all possible measures to improve the situation in health care.  But difficulties of the transitional period do not allow resolving them accordingly.

Using this chance, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to UNDP, World Bank, UNFPA, UNICEF and other international organisations for the assistance they are providing to us.

We highly appreciate the United Nations recommendations to international organisations to provide resources to national programmes  on implementation of the Platform for Action in all 12 critical areas. For us, women’s health is one of such   critical areas.

Mr. President,

The present special session of the United Nations General Assembly will define new tasks and directions for the activity for full implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action, further measures and initiatives to provide equality between men and women, development and peace in the XXI century.

In our turn, we will do all possible for the achievement of these noble goals. I suggest to adopt the text of a political declaration and draft conclusions of our session taking into consideration the aforementioned comments and suggestions.

Thank you.