Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh emphasized the need to promote cooperation to develop women's potential and liberate their labor force, and strengthen the care economy and self-reliance.
At the invitation of Lao Prime Minister Sonexay Siphandone, on the morning of August 23, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh attended and delivered an online speech at the 3rd ASEAN Women Leaders Summit with the theme "Promoting a caring and resilient economy towards the ASEAN Community after 2025."
The conference was attended by senior leaders, Ministers in charge of women's development and gender equality, and many outstanding female business representatives from ASEAN countries, Timor-Leste, partner countries, and representatives of the United Nations.
Following Vietnam’s initiative during the ASEAN Chairmanship Year 2020, the third ASEAN Women Leaders’ Summit is a clear demonstration of ASEAN’s commitment and efforts in promoting gender equality, enhancing the role and great contributions of women and girls to their families and society. The focus of this conference is to discuss the challenges, difficulties, and burdens facing women when undertaking unpaid care work, along with multidimensional consequences such as gender inequality, limited access to education, employment, gender-based violence, etc.
On that basis, the Conference has proposed many practical directions to raise awareness of the important role of women in the care economy, promote gender equality, along with many specific proposals to increase investment in the care economy, solve complex and multidimensional problems, and better ensure the rights of workers, especially women.
Speaking at the Conference, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh emphasized the great contributions of women, who are both a solid supporter in improving the quality of life of each family and pioneers in promoting sustainable development of society.
The Prime Minister shared with the Conference the results of implementing Vietnam's national gender equality goals in 2023, of which 11/20 targets met and exceeded the targets of the National Strategy on Gender Equality 2025; 3/20 targets met part of the targets set for 2030, of which 12 targets achieved better results than in 2022.
In 2023, the average number of hours women do unpaid housework and care work is 1.78 times that of men, with the target set for 2025 being 1.7 times. Vietnam's gender equality index in 2023 ranked 72/146 countries, up 11 places compared to 2022.
Recalling the saying of beloved President Ho Chi Minh: "If women are not liberated, society is not liberated," the Prime Minister emphasized the need to promote cooperation to develop women's potential and liberate their labor, strengthen the care economy, self-reliance towards the ASEAN Community after 2025 with a comprehensive, all-people and global approach, and effective participation of the whole society, government, community and the whole region.
In that spirit, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh suggested that ASEAN countries focus on implementing solutions through "3 enhancements." That is, enhancing awareness and thinking about the role of women, promoting stronger policies to encourage equal participation of women in all fields, where they are not only empowered but also fully equipped with skills and knowledge to effectively contribute to the care economy as well as ASEAN's self-reliance.
Next is to strengthen innovation, improve infrastructure, build a system of public health services and health care that is high quality, accessible, and affordable, especially in poor, remote, and isolated areas. At the same time, continue to innovate and improve institutions and policies, integrate appropriate aspects of care work into regional programs, local and national socio-economic development plans, on the basis of an approach that promotes gender equality, adapts to rapid population aging, and climate change; invests in human resource training and vocational training for workers; mobilizes resources from the whole society, attracts private investment, and considers private investment as an important factor in efforts to develop a care economy.
Along with that is strengthening cooperation to protect the legitimate rights and interests of workers, preventing abuse, exploitation, discrimination and illegal activities, transnational crimes such as cross-border human trafficking.
Deputy Minister of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs Nguyen Thi Ha, attending the conference in person in Vientiane, shared her views on the importance of unpaid care work and the barriers and challenges in recognizing the great contributions of care work to human development and economic growth.
Ms. Nguyen Thi Ha also shared about the current state of the care economy in Vietnam, challenges of social prejudice against the role of women, limitations in care service providers, especially in rural, remote and isolated areas, and limitations in social security coverage for care workers, leading to gender and income inequality. From there, she proposed recommendations to promote the development of the care economy and enhance the role of women.
Lao Prime Minister Sonexay Siphandone highly appreciated the participation, speech and contributions of Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh and representatives of Vietnamese female leaders at the Conference and respectfully invited Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh to visit Laos and attend the 44th and 45th ASEAN Summits and related conferences in October 2024 in Vientiane./.
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