Mingalarbar!

Welcome to the June Edition of GEN Monthly Newsletter! We had had a busy time with workshop and meeting for the inclusion of gender in different sectors. Each month, we will ask a GEN member, friend or staff for some insight into their participation with GEN. This month we ask, Dr.Htet Htet (Pyoe Pin Programme) who actively participated in GEN's activities as a member, to share about her feelings and experience with GEN.

Mingalarpar to all members of Gender Equality Network and Coordination Unit.

Special thanks for giving me an opportunity to contribute in the monthly newsletter of June. It’s almost four years I have been a GEN member by representing Pyoe Pin Program. During this four year, I could closely engage with a lot of GEN members and I’m so glad that I’ve got a range of knowledge and experience while working with different members. I also have a chance to participate actively in various working groups such as Research Working Group, 16 Days of Activism working group and Engaging Men working group, and together we implement many activities to promote gender equality. I will support GEN for the best in the future as well. I would like to share some updates on our organization. Pyoe Pin Program has been working in the development field for about a decade. During these days, we have done evaluations on our activities. As a result, we are going to change our organization name to Sone Si programme to move forward with the new energy. The team leader of Sone Si programme is U Salai Cung Lian and we hope that GEN members will warmly welcome our new programme as always. Thank you.

GEN's Highlight

CSO Capacity Assessment Workshop (Taung Gyi)

Two days of CSO Capacity Assessment Workshop was held on 2018 June 25th and 26th at the location of Gender Equality Network Office, Nyaung Shwe Haw Kone Quarter, Bo Gyoke Aung San Street, Taung Gyi. Gender Equality Network and DCA-NCA co-facilitated the workshop and 2 representatives from 13 CSOs joined the workshop.

Working Group Meeting

Gen's Acting Director, Program Manager and Steering Committee Members attended the prevention and protection from the violence against women law drafting working group meeting on 12-13 June 2018. At the meeting, the working group discussed the comments from the attorney general office and about the advocacy plan.

Inception Workshop IDRC Research:Understanding Barriers and Working Pathways to Women's Political Participations in Myanmar

On 7th-9th June 2018, together with our research collaborating partners, Asian Institute of Technology (Gender and Development Studies) and McGill University of Canada, and our research working group members, GEN had an inception workshop from 9:00 am - 5:00 pm at GEN office. The workshop was a first time meeting with all partners including McGill and it was a key activity for the research way forward. While the facilitating was led by Professors from AIT, GEN also presented its previous studies on women's political participation. The workshop managed to discuss desk reviews, conceptualize the concept of "Pathways", review research objectives, qualitative and quantitative methods, data collection, and brainstorm the key points for questionnaires formulating. The workshop was very productive and ended the sessions by identifying next steps and wrap up from GEN's adviser, Daw Pansy Tun Thein.

Gender Mainstreaming Technical Working Group Meeting

GEN/Oxfam and UNDP organized the "Gender Mainstreaming Technical Working Group Meeting" was conducted on 6 June 2018 at the Sule Shangrila Hotel and about 15 members of the NSPAW Mainstreaming TWG from the Development Partners attended. The TWG discussed the 6-month plan (April - Sept 2018).

Meeting with Chairperson of the Shan State National Committee

GEN's Acting Director and staff, and the representative from DCA-NCA met with the Chairperson of the Shan State National Committee of the Women and Department of Social Welfare on 8 June 2018 at Shan State Government Building in Taunggyi and discussed the GEN's activities and collaboration with the Shan State Government.

Gender And Diversity Training

On 21 June 2018 Ma Kyawt Kyawt Khaing from SC gave Gender And Diversity Training from 1:00 pm to 2:00 pm at Myanmar Red Cross Society (MRCS) in Nay Pyi Taw. She teached and shared for Conflict Assessment and Flood Assessment .It was very useful and effective training. Most of participants came from Conflict area and other places that we need other Organization Achievement to mimic and to implement for our project and program.

Meeting and Workshop attended as GEN's Representatives

8-20 June 2018 GEN's Director attended "Responsibility of Religion for Peace" meeting in Berlin, Germany, organized jointly by Federal Foreign Office of Germany and Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Finland and discussed on 4 main themes such as - Religious Peacemakers and mediation, Religion in the Media and Public domain, Religion and Peace Education, Religion, gender, and peace-building. The 72 (45 Male + 27 Female) participants were from 20 countries in Asia/Pacific Regions and most participants are from South East Asia. Seven Myanmar participants attended (5 Male + 2 Female).

22 June 2018 GEN's Director met with the Director of the US Holocaust Memorial Museum together Founding Dean and Professor of International Studies from School of Global and International Studies at Indiana University.

26 June 2018 GEN's Director Met with Researcher from the Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO) on her research project about the roles of smartphones and social media in armed conflict and the peace process in Myanmar.

27 June 2018 GEN's Director Joined as a panelist at Youth Forum: Legal Protection on LGBT Community in Myanmar at American Center Yangon.

9-17 June 2018 The first Constitution Academy in Myanmar, organized by IDEA, participated by about 40 representatives from CSOs, Government, MPs, lawyers and teaching faculty from government institutions. The academy enabled the participants to understand the components of constitution development and comparisons of various types of constitutions. GEN ADVISER led the two days sessions (16 a 17 June) on "Constitution Assessment on Women Empowerment (CAWE) and led the group in understanding CAWE and how to assess Myanmar constitution for addressing women empowerment and gender-related issues.

18-19 June 2018 GEN ADVISER went to Korkreit and Hpa-An in Kayin state to meet with Department of Social Welfare for Kayin State and met with several leaders (many women leaders) and the local authorities at the "Peace and Development Centre" and shared activities of GEN and distributed GEN publications.

20-22 June 2018 GEN ADVISER attended the second APR session which was held in Naypyitaw from 20-22 June to review the achievement of education sector during 2016-2017 and plan for 2018-2019. There were about 400 participants, mainly from Education sector, UN and development partners, with very few CSOs.

21 June 2018 GEN ADVISER attended the IDRC Advisory Group Meeting which was participated by the representatives of the Canadian Embassy, IDRC staff, representative of McGill University and 5 CSO representatives. GEN ADVISER shared about IDRC programme in Myanmar and the challenges faced by CSOs in current situation. The Think Tank program and the Research activities funded by IDRC had been discussed including the two projects funded by IDRC to Gender Equality Network.

25 June 2018 GEN ADVISER represented GEN at the Parliamentary Centre, Canada, and Enlightened Myanmar Research Foundation (EmRef)’s Workshop on Parliamentary Research and Support Program, Inya Lake Hotel, Yangon. Shared experiences on the development of the Parliamentary Research Manual and the training program for the Parliamentary staff for Shan State Hluttaw.

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