"Culture, gender equality and women's empowerment" is the theme of a thematic workshop organised recently in Guelmim, as part of the National Consultation "on culture and sustainable development in the post-2015 development agenda", launched on 9 September in Rabat.
This workshop, which brought together experts from the Ministry of Culture and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), aimed to deepen the debate and provide suggestions on ways to integrate culture into the achievement of sustainable development goals related to gender equality.
Speaking on this occasion, the coordinator, Youssef Khiara, noted that the National Consultation is part of an international framework aimed at determining post-2015 development priorities, which should replace the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) adopted in 2000, with the aim of collecting perceptions regarding ways to horizontally integrate culture into the development process at the national, regional and local levels.
According to him, the interest in culture as a lever for development stems from the preliminary results of the MDGs, which highlighted the need to include this element as a fourth pillar of development alongside economic growth, social integration and environmental balance.
Morocco is the only Arab country that has been chosen for the implementation, within the framework of cooperation between the Ministry of Culture and the UNESCO regional office, of this consultation, which will be concluded by a report that will be submitted next October to the UN General Assembly, he indicated.
This choice, he added, comes in light of the experience accumulated by Morocco in terms of new practices in the fields of culture and development, citing in this sense the National Initiative for Human Development, the Vision 2020 for tourism, as well as the craft development strategy and the Green Morocco Plan.
For her part, Ms. Sana Allam from the UNESCO regional office in Rabat, stressed that the city of Guelmim constitutes an example of gender equality, which justifies its choice to organise this workshop, hoping that this meeting will be crowned with conclusions and results likely to provide an image of the role of culture in gender equality.
Five similar workshops will be organised in different regions of the Kingdom and will focus on the relationship of culture with "the fight against poverty", "education", "sustainable cities and urbanisation", "environment and climate change" and "integration and reconciliation".
