Your Excellency Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, Executive Director of UN Women,

Ministers,

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Dear Friends,

First of all, on behalf of the Chinese delegation, I wish to thank Kenya for its proposal, Demark and Mexico for their active cooperation and the UN Women for its great support. We are happy to have you here.

Last September, China and the UN Women co-hosted the Global Leaders' Meeting on Gender Equality and Women's Empowerment, a meeting jointly chaired by the leaders of the four host countries of the World Conference on Women and UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and attended by 85 heads of state or government where they made commitments. It was a history-creating event and ignited engines for new progress of the global women’s movement in the new era. President Xi Jinping called for women’s development in tandem with social and economic development, protecting women’s rights and interests and fostering a global environment favorable for women’s development. He also announced a number of specific measures supporting sustainable development of women in developing countries. We are ready to work with all countries to make greater efforts in promoting women’s all-round development and build an even better future for all.

Sustainable development is the common aspiration of people of the world. Gender equality is its key element and women’s participation is its major driving force. The international community should work together to realize this vision and encourage all countries to integrate it with their own development strategies based on their national conditions. Priority should be given to poverty reduction, health and other livelihood issues. Balance should be struck among economy, society and environment and development partnerships should be further enhanced.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

There are 660 million women in China. They hold half of the sky of the family, state and society. China supports and guides women in their efforts to be the main force in economic and social development. China values the wisdom and talents of women and works to build a favorable environment and platform for their equal participation in economic and social development. China incorporates women’s development goals into the overall planning on economic and social development. It has implemented dedicated programs in three successive phases to push for all-round development of women. So far in China, women account for 45% of the employed and 23.4% of the NPC delegates. Women outnumber man in university enrollment and their average life expectancy is 77.37 years. Good progress has been made by women in all areas and there are many outstanding women such as the Nobel Lauriat Tu Youyou, Astronaut Liu Yang who has traveled the space and women generals, sports world champions and business executives, etc.

China passed the Law against Domestic Violence at the end of 2015 which has taken into effect on 1st March this year. This is a new step taken by China in ensuring women’s rights and in respecting and protecting human rights. It is also one of the actions taken to meet the calls of President Xi made at the summit to protect women’s rights and goals set in the UN 2030 sustainable development agenda.

Eliminating all forms and manifestation of poverty, including extreme poverty, is the world’s biggest challenge. China has set the goal of finishing building a moderately prosperous society in all respects and lifting all 70 million poor people (45.8% of them are women) out of poverty in the next five years. We will carry out precision poverty alleviation and reduction. Efforts will be made in the following five aspects in women’s poverty reduction. First is to foster aspiration. Stories of women role models in poverty reduction will be publicized to carry forward the spirit of self-esteem, self-confidence, self-independence and self-reliance among women. Second is intellectual support. Efforts will be made to ensure equal access for women to education and training to help improve their skills of poverty alleviation. Third is to help women in business. Work will be done to make up for the funding deficiencies women encounter in starting their own businesses, develop start-up projects suitable for women and expand the policy effect of government subsidized micro-credit. Fourth is technology support. Women’s handcraft industrial chain will be developed and explorations will be made into the “company+association+production centers+women” model of industrial development. Fifth is health protection. Public health service and social security will be improved in poor areas to minimize the chance of returning to poverty due to illness.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

No pains, no gains. The road to gender equality and women’s empowerment is long and torturous. But I am convinced that as long as we work together tirelessly with confidence, courage, dedication and action, we will realize the dream of gender equality and sustainable development cherished by people of the world as well as each and every woman.

Thank you.