Strengthening Canada's international leadership in the promotion of gender equality : Consolider le leadership international du Canada en matière de promotion de l'égalité entre les sexes : une réaction de la société civile à l'évaluation de la mise en œuvre de la Politique de l'ACDI en matière d'égalité entre les sexes de 1999

STRENGTHENING CANADA’S INTERNATIONAL LEADERSHIP IN THE PROMOTION OF GENDER EQUALITY 1. INTRODUCTION Advancing gender equality and women‟s rights around the world is fundamental to the development mandates of both the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) and Canadian civil society organizations (CSOs) involved in international cooperation. [...] At the beginning of February of 2009, CIDA published the Executive Report of the Evaluation of 3 CIDA‟s Implementation of its Policy on Gender Equality , along with the CIDA Management response to this evaluation. [...] We start from the belief in and commitment to the centrality of gender equality and women‟s rights as fundamental to poverty reduction and the achievement of social and economic justice. [...] STRENGTHENING CANADA’S INTERNATIONAL LEADERSHIP IN THE PROMOTION OF GENDER EQUALITY 6 Given the trends in gender equality disbursements highlighted in the previous section, we conclude that there has been a likely decrease in the actual overall impact of CIDA‟s policy on programming and gender equality outcomes. [...] STRENGTHENING CANADA’S INTERNATIONAL LEADERSHIP IN THE PROMOTION OF GENDER EQUALITY 8 4.5 Enhance good practice in partnerships for gender equality results The evaluation report cites the variance that exists in the ability of CIDA and CSOs to promote gender equality from country to country.