Achieving Gender Equality and Empowerment of all Women and Girls: WFWP CANADA Host Webinar in Honor of International Women’s Day

WFWP Canada held its celebration of International Women’s Day on Saturday, March 26, 2022 discussing, “Achieving Gender Equality and the Empowerment of all Women and Girls,” featuring a panel of dynamic and diverse young women, each bringing their unique experiences to the table. Blandine Stringer from the Capital Region Interfaith Council was the emcee of the online event which gathered 30 people from across the country. Lilly Tadin, President of WFWP opened the discussion by highlighting the many demands and expectations being put on women’s shoulders, while there is often little acknowledgement of their value. 

Our first speaker was Gabrielle Fayant, a Metis woman whose work for youth empowerment and Indigenous rights awareness has been widely recognized. She is currently a Helper and Co-Founder of the Assembly of Seven Generations, an Indigenous owned and youth-led, nonprofit organization focused on cultural support and empowerment programs/policies for Indigenous youth, being led by traditional knowledge and Elders’ guidance. Gabrielle is passionate about cultural resurgence and justice for all Indigenous peoples. 

In her speech she spoke about how all the matriarchs, the aunties, were like the back-bone of the community. They were strict and demanded accountability. She related the barriers and struggles of Indigenous women: facing double prejudice, violence, exploitation and problematic relationships with the legal and penal systems. She invited the audience to be responsible in addressing gender violence, to check our own biases and to make space for those with fewer privileges.

Our second speaker was Deepa Mahanti, a social activist, author, filmmaker and entrepreneur. She was born in Cuttack, India and educated in West Africa, UK and India. Her travels across various continents and countries have given her remarkable opportunities to work with women of different ethnicities and cultures. In her book “Pourquoi Myiesha” (2017) she relates her lived experience, the principles and values of integrity and self-respect that have guided her life. She is constantly striving through projects, fundraisers and filmmaking to bring positive changes to the community.

Deepa spoke on the importance of choices, and how one needs to value the relationship with oneself stressing trust, acceptance, respect, belief and authenticity. That is the path to becoming strong and free, through accepting experiences, persevering and learning to be positive in difficult situations with empathy and engagement. “Over all these years, time and life has taught me the lesson of building the relationship with myself and then reaching out to others. The mantra of happiness and contentment is YOU “.

Lindsay Hampton is an epidemiologist and public health specialist. She has dedicated nearly 20 years to the global prevention of blindness in over five continents and is the cofounder and director of So Kids Can See. Within her work, gender equality is a critical evaluation to ensure access and uptake of critical health resources for girls. Her presentation focused primarily on gender inequity from the healthcare perspective.

Gender inequality may be described as the differences in the opportunities women, girls, men or boys have to achieve optimal health, leading to unfair, avoidable differences in health outcomes. Education, employment status, and income level all play a role, and in many nations women and girls occupy the lower echelons of society. While overall women live longer, they experience more age related diseases, lower quality of life and suffer more from chronic conditions.

Women are the primary caregivers for children and spend more time with children and this puts them at higher risk for certain diseases, especially in remote rural areas with little access to clean water. The lack of access to sanitary facilities and feminine hygiene products in many nations is detrimental to women’s health; as is unequal access to food and nutrition, where men are often given priority. Also the home may be a poor health environment as women often are cooking over fires in their homes with lack of adequate ventilation.

Another factor, Lindsay noted was the “Gender Health Gap.” It primarily refers to women not being included in healthcare research prior to 1993. This means most of the drugs we are using today have only been tested on men, because of this, women are more likely to have a reaction to medications. 

Through this international women’s day event, participants learned the ways women around the world still have a long way to go for equal and fair treatment.  Overall, this was a very fruitful meeting stimulating many questions and spirited discussions between all who attended leaving the question hanging: How can we support women around us who are struggling?