As we meet in the aftermath of the Asian Economic Crisis and the Seattle WTO meeting, it is urgent and timely for UNCTAD X to re-examine the appropriate approach developing countries should take towards globalization of trade, finance, investment and technology. At this important cross-road when sharpness of vision is urgently required, we need both eyes of humanity open, not one. We need to look at globalization and trade also through women's eyes.

From such a view there is a serious disconnection between trade, development and gender. We can begin to put it right at this meeting if we have the determination and wisdom to do so. Trade is regarded as one of the driving forces of economic development for all countries. Yet international trade is experienced, especially in the current period, as having strongly unequalizing tendencies both between and within countries along lines of gender, class and ethnicity. This puts into doubt the particular promise that trade seemed to bring, as a possible way of reducing poverty and bring about convergence of income between industrial, knowledge-based countries and the developing or transitional economies.

Equality, Development and Peace - the themes of the various United Nations conferences on Women are the bedrock upon which are anchored the aspirations of the United Nations system, its member states and its people. Discussions on globalization and the evaluation of the new multilateral trading system must take into account the consensus emerging from the Beijing +5 and the WSSD +5 reviews so that it can address issues of sustainable and equitable development.

Economic globalization in terms of trade, finance, investment and technology, if it is to work for all people must be steered and shaped according to the development consensus and targets reached at various United Nations conferences. The United Nations family has to take these targets seriously, especially when economic issues are discussed and decisions made. The targets include the following: halving the proportion of the world's absolute poor, especially women, by 2015; removing illiteracy from the human condition through universal primary education, progress towards gender equality by eliminating the gender gaps in primary and secondary education and reducing maternal mortality through better health care.

In other words, there is a pressing need to assist countries and the private sector itself to develop new frameworks that transform globalization to become pro-women and therefore pro-poor, a globalization that is more socially accountable.

The gender effect of globalization is complex and its effects are uneven. Overall globalization to date has done little to minimize gender inequalities. While in same circumstances it may have decreased them as it has led to the unprecedented employment of women in the manufacturing sector as low-skilled labour, in other area it has the potential to intensify inequalities. Very few women entrepreneurs have actually succeeded in entering international markers. The major obstacles include limited access to technology, capital, legal inputs of ownership and production inputs, information, business management and networking. In many cases, women are pushed into the informal casual sector of subcontracting and home-based work. Women's enterprises remain the smallest and are concentrated in a limited number of sectors, e.g. textiles and food. The inequalities and prejudice that confront many women and girls also hinder general progress towards sustainability. It is imperative to make global arrangements on trade more supportive of the greater participation and inclusion of women both as agents and as beneficiaries.

In fact, the Asian-Pacific regional fora such as APEC, the Joint Ministerial Statement of 1998 stressed that women have a crucial role to play in the successful planning, design and implementation of economic recovery programmes, not only as beneficiaries but also as economic decision-makers. The APEC meeting, held during the Asian economic crisis concluded that women's participation in trade and investment, as workers, entrepreneurs and investors contributed to the achievement of regional economic growth.

The goal of the trade and globalization must be human development. Therefore emphasis must be to remove obstacles to development, to provide opportunities for progress, to review and rectify policies and practices that are distorting development and our societies into a champagne glass civilization where increasing wealth is concentrated in fewer and fewer hands, where the middle class is disappearing and poverty and instability increasing.

The elimination and gender bias as a "development distortion" or "development bottleneck" must be a central objective of public policy not only in its own right for equality reason, but also as a necessity for the development gain from trade and globalization to be maximized.

The United Nations family has a special niche in this area and can do much to bring this about. UNIFEM, the United Nations' catalytic women's fund can share many good practices, and technical expertise in supporting women's access to new and emerging markets, in entrepreneurship and technological capacity-building, in economic literacy and developing women's leadership and participation in international trade, finance and investment as decision-makers. We assist countries and our partners to identify and develop policy options. We have assistance programmes so that our pilot initiatives and strategies can leverage greater investment to scale-up, replicate and turn innovations into standard practices and coherent development strategy to ensure equality, peace and a more stable future for ourselves and our children.

Dated: 15Mar2000