Belgian Ambassador:Vietnam Has Made Remarkable Progress in Gender Equality

“Vietnam has made remarkable progress on gender equality in recent years and now ranks at 60 out of 188 countries in the 2014 Gender Inequality Index (GII),” said Mme. Jehanne Roccas, Ambassador of the Kingdom of Belgium to Vietnam. Vietnam Business Forum interviewed the Ambassador regarding gender equality and the ongoing Cartoon Competition entitled “Gender Equality: Picture it!” co-organised by UN Women, Belgium (Embassy of the Kingdom of Belgium and BTC Vietnam). Thu Ha reports.

Gender equality is one of the important criteria to evaluate the development of a society. How do you assess the implementation of gender equality as well as the progress that Vietnam has achieved in the empowerment of women in recent years?

Vietnam has made remarkable progress on gender equality those recent years and now ranks at 60 out of 188 countries in the 2014 Gender Inequality Index (GII).

It is important to mention that strong normative progresses towards achieving gender equality have been made in the past decade. To name only a few, laws on Gender Equality (GEL) and Domestic Violence Prevention and Control were passed in 2006 and 2007 and implementation of the GEL is supported by the National Strategy for Gender Equality (2011-2020) and the National Programme for Gender Equality (2011-2015) and the National Targeted Programme on Gender Equality 2016-2020.

Politically speaking, efforts have been made to increase women representation, particularly in the Vietnamese National Assembly (VNA). I hope that the target of 35 per cent of female representation for the next election will be reached.

Education gap between men and women has also been reduced. According to the World Bank, women have even surpassed men while talking about college degrees.

I am also very happy that Vietnam is among the top 10 countries in the world in terms of female CEOs (about 33 per cent of the companies in 2014 – most of them being SMEs, though). Nevertheless, the country still faces many challenges. It seems that 1 woman would die every 3 days because of domestic violence. Assessment of the situation of women in the criminal justice system in Viet Nam would reveal that 58 per cent of women in Vietnam experience some type of emotional, physical or sexual domestic violence during their lifetime. However, only 13 per cent of abused women sought help from the justice system. 

Besides, patriarchal norms have created a society in which violence against women is sometimes considered “normal” and women are encouraged to deal with its consequences outside the criminal justice system.

Also challenging is the rise in sex ratio at birth imbalance, resulting from prenatal sex selection in favour of boys (more than 112 male per 100 female births).

The Embassy of the Kingdom of Belgium and UN Women have co-organized the competition on gender equality in Vietnam. Can you share some information about the contest, as well as the ripple effect that it will bring?

The contest is called “Gender Equality, Picture it”. It calls for Vietnamese nationals above the age of 18 to make a drawing representing gender inequalities. The contest was symbolically organised between the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women (25 November) and International Women’s Day (8 March). With 116 drawings received and more than 10,000 persons participating to the Facebook vote, the contest has shown a great success. About half of the applicants were women. We received drawings from all over Vietnam.

The winners have been selected thanks to a procedure involving 50 per cent of the points granted by a jury and another 50 per cent granted according to the Facebook votes.

The first prize is a one-week tour to Belgium, famous for being the “Kingdom of comics and cartoons” (French-speaking Belgium is the world's biggest producer of comics per capita!). Further, the 40 first drawings will be exhibited at the Women’s Museum in Hanoi for a 10 days period (1 to 10 March).

Based on the number of drawings received, the success of the Facebook consultation and the highly media-ized launching event and award ceremony, I believe that this contest has raised awareness about gender inequalities in Vietnam.

The quality was so high that I thought we could never make a choice! Even without words, drawings made us laugh, cry or think. Art, specifically drawings, can be powerful tools to raise awareness and instill positive developments in society.

What are the strategy and specific actions that the Embassy will do to support Vietnam in the implementation of commitments on gender equality in the near future?

Human rights – including women’s rights and gender equality – are one of the pillars of the Belgian foreign policy. Further, striving for gender equality is enshrined as 1 of the 2 most important themes in the Belgian law of Development Cooperation.

Hence, all development projects in Vietnam which are supported by Belgium include gender equality as an essential dimension. As a female Ambassador, I am also personally committed towards gender equality.

In 2014 for example, our Embassy supported the organisation of a conference in Ho Chi Minh City on “female leadership” in Vietnamese companies, together with the NGO Tri Viet Centre for Social and Education Studies.

On the top of this, after the successful contest and the expertise of Belgium in comics and cartoons, we would be happy to reproduce this kind of initiative in the future.

Within our Embassy, we might also want to think about men when addressing gender equality: since our staff is currently composed of more than 70 per cent of women, we will probably need more male candidates to join us!