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WOMEN'S UN REPORT NETWORK - WUNRN®

WOMEN – FOOD SECURITY - CONFLICT & PEACE

United Nations Human Rights CouncilMarch 11, 2014

Geneva, Switzerland

WOMEN’S UN REPORT NETWORKWUNRN®


IRAQ - WOMEN ON FRONTLINES OF WAR - FOOD SECURITY?

© Panos Pictures / M. Saman

http://www.undp.org/mdg/goal8.shtml

International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights

Article 11

1.The States Parties to the present Covenant recognize the right of everyone to an adequate standard of living for himself and his family, including adequate food, clothing and housing, and to the continuous improvement of living conditions. The States Parties will take appropriate steps to ensure the realization of this right, recognizing to this effect the essential importance of international co-operation based on free consent.

2.The States Parties to the present Covenant, recognizing the fundamental right of everyone to be free from hunger, shall take, individually and through international co-operation, the measures, including specific programmes, which are needed:

a) To improve methods of production, conservation and distribution of food by making full use of technical and scientific knowledge, by disseminating knowledge of the principles of nutrition and by developing or reforming agrarian systems in such a way as to achieve the most efficient development and utilization of natural resources;

b) Taking into account the problems of both food-importing and food-exporting countries, to ensure an equitable distribution of world food supplies in relation to need.




SYRIA CONFLICT - PAIN & ANGUISH OF WOMEN & GIRLS

A woman weeps as she prays during an anti-government demonstration in Idlib, north Syria, Friday, March 9, 2012. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)

In this Saturday, March 10, 2012 photo, Hana, 12, flashes the victory sign next to her sister Eva, 13, as they recover from severe injuries after the Syrian Army shelled their house in Idlib, north Syria. Their father and two siblings were killed after their home was shelled. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)


FEMININE REALITIES IN WAR & CONFLICT

The overwhelming majority of armed conflicts are started, organized, and led by men. Yet women represent a large proportion of war victims. During conflicts, civilians not participating in the hostilities, are often forced to flee their homes to avoid being caught up in the violence. Women, children, the elderly, the ill and disabled, are now the main victims of war. Some 80% of casualties by small arms, which are the main weapons used in armed conflicts, are women and children. Women and girls are particularly vulnerable in times of conflict because of their social inequality their victimization from gender based violence, the reality that they are the majority of the poor, and the awareness that they have fewer options and less mobility in times of conflict and war. In conflict and war, women often suddenly have to bear all the daily responsibility for ensuring their own survival and that of their families. Displaced women often have to travel long and unsafe distances to find basic needs as food, water, firewood. Women and girls in conflict often suffer from hunger and malnutrition, illness and disease, and have less access to medical care including reproductive health. Pregnant women during conflict and their babies, are especially at risk.




ISRAEL - WOMEN IN THE CROSSFIRE OF CONFLICT

Menahem Kahana/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images



FOOD SECURITY

FOOD SECURITY EXISTS WHEN ALL PEOPLE, AT ALL

TIMES, HAVE PHYSICAL AND ECONOMIC ACCESS TO

SUFFICIENT, SAFE, AND NUTRITIOUS FOOD THAT

MEETS DIETARY NEEDS AND FOOD PREFERENCES

FOR AN ACTIVE AND HEALTH LIFE. FAO World Food Summit 1996



ZIMBABWE - A STARVING MOTHER WITH HER CHILD ON HER BACK, FLEES ACROSS THE BORDER TO ESCAPE CONFLICT-RIDDEN ZIMBABWE

A Zimbabwean starving woman with her child on her back flees across the border into South Africa at Beitbridge Border Post


HOW DOES IT FEEL? WOMEN - CONFLICT - HUNGER *She is the mother in Guinea who has lost her husband, was raped by the enemy, and now trudges along a dirt road to an unknown destination, knowing she is malnourished and losing her milk to feed her underweight fifth child in her arms. *She is the woman in her 60’s in Bosnia, who in the privacy of a room of women victims of war crimes, takes off part of her clothes to show the scars of how she was abused in the war and cries as she lost her husband and sons and is a religious woman and was violated by the enemy. She has lost her home, her land, and she is desperately lacking food and money for food. *She is the adolescent girl in Colombia, who is conscripted by the rebels, and forced to fight, to work, and to be a sexual slave at their demand. She is the last to eat, needing medical care, having no money of her own as to buy food. *She is the young woman in a Palestinian refugee camp, born there, never knowing peace, always hungry, wondering if she should consider marriage as she sees no hope and considers suicide.. *She is the young Afghan woman, told she could go to school after liberation, then captured on the route to school and raped and now pregnant and with HIV/AIDS. Her family wanted to force her into early marriage, but is now ashamed of her, and she is vulnerable to an honor killing. *She is the Cambodian grandmother who never recovered from illness during the war, who hides under her bed at night and screams at the gunfire that remains in her mind. She has no resources, no family to care for her, never enough food, always hunger and malnutrition. *She is an American woman, deserted by her husband, without a pension or income, ashamed at her poverty, living in one-room, surviving on cat food and food stamps.

*She is everywoman, trying to provide for her children, her family, herself, reeling in the storms of war, conflict, refugee status, internal displacement, political and social insecurity, lack of basic services as health care, unaware of her human right to food, safe water, sanitation.




WOMEN OF THE EGYPTIAN REVOLUTION

Food stores were raided, looted, almost empty. Street markets were at risk during the protests. Banks closed. Fear prevailed. People became desperate for food and basic supplies.


WOMEN'S RIGHTS & THE RIGHT TO FOOD



The Executive Director of the World Food Programme, Ms. Ertharin Cousin has stated in a CNN interview: “Most of the wars in more recent history have originated over issues of food and water.”

The World Food Programme is the world's largest humanitarian agency fighting hunger worldwide. In emergencies, WFP gets food to where it is needed, saving the lives of victims of war, civil conflict and natural disasters. After the cause of an emergency has passed, World Food Programme uses food to help communities rebuild their shattered lives.


SYRIA - INSIDE & ACROSS BORDERS, LITTLE GIRLS ARE STARVING, HUNGRY, DYING

One-year-old Rana, who starved to deathWhen she was brought to a field hospital in rebel-held Moadamia, one mile north of Syria’s capital, Rana Obaid had all the signs of severe malnutrition—a bloated belly, glassy eyes, hollow cheeks, and bloodied gums. Doctors examined her but there was little they could do.The one-year-old died within the day. Cause of death: starvation.


INDIA - CONFLICT CAN INCREASE INFANT GIRLS' MALNUTRITION, HUNGER, HEALTH

CONFLICTS CONTINUE, AS TENSIONS ON INDIA'S KASHMIR BORDER, RELIGIOUS FIGHTING, ETHNIC FRICTIONS, TRIBAL & VILLAGE DISPUTES.

ADD THE COMPLEXITIES OF DROUGHTS & FLOODS, EXTREME POVERTY, CORRUPT FOOD PROGRAMS, LOSSES OF LAND FOR GROWING FOOD

For every starving child, there is a mother, hopefully

alive, also hungry, likely poor, and in deep despair that

she cannot provide her child with adequate food and

nutrition for health, for survival.



MONEY FOR MILITARY & WAR OR FOR WOMEN'S EQUALITY, FOOD SECURITY & SOVEREIGNTY, PEACE


WOMEN - FOOD SECURITY - CONFLICT & PEACE - INTERSECTIONALITY OF RIGHTS ISSUES

*Nutrition/Malnutrition*Health - Physical & Mental *Reproductive Health*Maternal & Infant Mortality*Poverty*Water & Sanitation*Education*Child Labour*Child Marriage & Motherhood*Forced Marriage*Preference for Males*Land, Housing/Shelter*Land-Grabbing, Forced Evictions*Homelessness – Slums*Disabilities, Handicaps

*Refugee Status*Internal Displacement*Safety - Violence – Rape*Foraging for Food, Firewood +*Prostitution*Trafficking*Migration*Minority & Indigenous Issues*Culture & Traditions*Climate Change Issues*Natural Disasters*Widows Discrimination*Lifespan - Ageing Women - Survival*Exposure to Environmental Hazards


PALESTINE-GAZA - POVERTY, HUNGER, LOSSESCONFLICT IMPACTS & TENSIONS GO ON...AND ON...

Meriam tries to give her children nutritious food, but can hardly afford it. Half of Gaza's population rely on the UN for their staple foods. Many families have had to sell their

personal belongings to keep going.


CONFLICT CAN TAKE MULTIPLE TRAUMATIC DIMENSIONS – LOCAL, NATIONAL, GLOBAL

A woman wails as workers begin to destroy her house - her possessions CAMBODIA - LOCAL CONFLICT - LAND GRABBING - FORCED EVICTIONS -

LOSS OF FOOD, WATER, SHELTER


CONFLICT, WAR, REFUGEE STATUS, INTERNAL DISPLACEMENT - IMPACTS ON FOOD SECURITY FOR WOMEN &

GIRLS

A Syrian-Kurdish refugee woman walks along a road in the Domiz refugee camp, 20 km southeast of Dohuk city, in northern Iraq, July 2012. (AFP Photo/Safin Hamed)


SOMALIA - FLEEING CONFLICT & DROUGHT - COMPOUNDED CRISES


WAR & CONFLICT - REFUGEE & DISPLACED WOMEN

The often-cited statistic that as many as 80 per cent of displaced populations are women and children fails to convey the complete devastation that displacement visits upon women and communities. Leaving homes, property and community behind renders women vulnerable to violence, disease and food scarcity, whether they flee willingly or unwillingly. Internally displaced women face additional dangers as they are often invisible to the international community within the context of violent conflict. Camps for refugees and the internally displaced have been criticized for not addressing women’s needs and concerns in their design and procedure. Failure to account for women’s security and health needs can make a camp that was intended to provide refuge a dangerous and deadly place for women and girls. Fortunately, the UN, governments and civil society organizations that serve displaced women are beginning to rise to the challenge of including women and a gender perspective at every stage of policy-making and implementation.


PAKISTAN - HOW CAN RURAL REFUGEE & DISPLACED WOMEN FIND FOOD SECURITY, FOOD SOVEREIGNTY?

In earlier times, food in refugee camps used to be distributed to the men heads of households, leaving the women and girls, especially female heads of households, disadvantaged. This situation as there was increased awareness of the specific needs and issues of refugee and displaced women and girls. In some cases, refugee women and girls have been sexually abused while gathering firewood to cook, attempting to negotiate for adequate food, or being far from sanitary facilities. Women without men, all ages, and girls alone, are significantly more vulnerable to violence and abuse.


INTERNALLY DISPLACED PERSONS IN NON-CAMP SETTINGS: UNDER THE RADAR SCREEN - WOMEN & GIRLS - FOOD & NUTRITION?

The Brookings-LSE Project on Internal Displacement - October 2013


Dear Food Security & Nutrition Forum - FSN – Participants

We have come to the end of our online discussion on Mainstreaming Food Security into Peacebuilding Processes. We wish to thank all who took the time to participate for your thoughtful and stimulating inputs, which will nourish the Agenda for Action for Addressing Food Security in Protracted Crises (CFS-A4A) to be submitted to the Committee on World Food Security (CFS) at its October meeting.

In our message of 19 December 2013, we summarised the key messages and principles emerging from the discussion at that point. Since then, we have had rich, experience-based contributions from Henk-Jan Brinkman of the UN Peace Building Commission, George Kent of the University of Hawai’i (USA), Florence Egal from Italy, Petr Skripchuk of the National University for Water Resource Management (Ukraine), Stephanie Gill of Tearfund (UK), Noura Fatchima Djibrilla of ACFM Niger, Karim Hussein of IFAD, the European Union, Manuel Castrillo from Proyecto Camino Verde in Costa Rica and Adam Kabir Dickinson from IAFN, also Costa Rica . We thank you all.


GIRL CHILD SOLIDERS - NEPAL - FOOD SECURITY?


COMFORT WOMEN OF WORLD WAR II – INADEQUATE FOOD, CARE - SEXUAL SLAVES


UKRAINE - MASSIVE PROTESTS - UPHEAVAL IN FOOD SECURITY


Latin America indigenous peoples suffer more severely from poverty and hunger than the rest of the population, and this discrimination magnifies for females, and in rural areas. Continuing displacement and conflict over land rights, corporate land disputes, internal fighting, and lack of fulfillment of state obligations, keep a pervasive connection of food security (and lack thereof) and conflict in indigenous women's lives.


YEMEN - WOMEN BURN VEILS TO STOP CRACKDOWN ON PROTESTS

"The act of women burning their clothing is a symbolic Bedouin tribal gesture signifying an appeal for help to tribesmen, in this case to stop the attacks on the protesters."


Mama, I'm hungryMy tummy hurts, also at night,I am only 8 years old.I want peace and not this fight. My baby brother cries.He is hungry, too.You say your milk has stopped.The baby rations will not do. Daddy was killed by the rebels.He went out to buy us bread.Now I stay inside, as I am scared.My joy has turned to dread.

Winter time is oh so coldIn this refugee place, can we survive?I am so very hungry, Mama.Can we really stay alive?

Will I grow up? I am not so sure.I get very sick. I cannot play.With this war and no home now,How can we live; where will we stay? I have hopes and I have dreams.They seem so far away.Like our food, dreams disappear.I can only hope and pray. Mama, I'm Hungry!

MAMA, I'M HUNGRY

WUNRN

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