Women and Development; Final Report of a Workshop Held at Washington, DC. on March 26-27, 1979

摘要

Although comprising half the human resource capital, women have often been treated marginally by planners in the area of Science and Technology Development. Assumptions that project benefits to male heads of households will automatically extend to females ignore the large percentage of female-headed households in developing countries (33%), and the vital role of every adult member in ensuring a poor family's survival. This paper summarizes proceedings of a workshop on Women and Development conducted by the American Association for the Advancement of Science between March 26-27, 1979, at the Brookings institution, Washington, DC. The workshop was held in order to determine issues of vital importance to women, for inclusion in the upcoming UN Conference on Science and Technology Development (UNCSTD) scheduled for August, 1979. The major theme running through the workshop was the need to include women and development issues as an integral part of all recommendations and projects emanating from UNCSTD. Working groups addressed 3 main discussion topics: national policy for development; education and training for development; and technology for development. Resulting recommendations focused in 2 priority areas, scientific and technical education for women professionals, and skill training for poor, illiterate women. These recommendations were organized within two categories: those concerning integrated planning, and those concerning the inclusion of women in the making of technology policy.