Marc-André Franche, the UN Resident Coordinator in Sri Lanka, has urged immediate and concrete action to achieve gender equality, marking the 30th anniversary of the Beijing Platform for Action.
He acknowledged the substantial progress women and girls have made over the past three decades, breaking barriers and demanding equal participation in society.
However, he stressed that progress remains uneven, with gender equality still far from reach.
Franche pointed out that, in many parts of the world, including advanced economies, there is resistance and, in some cases, regression.
Violence, discrimination, and economic inequality continue to persist, especially in Sri Lanka, and new threats such as biased algorithms and online inequalities are creating more opportunities for harassment and abuse.
With only five years left to meet the Sustainable Development Goals, Franche warned that gender equality progress is off track, and at the current rate, it will take 134 years to achieve full equality.
He highlighted ongoing injustices faced by women in Sri Lanka, including high rates of violence and low prosecution rates, as well as increasing restrictions on women’s rights organizations, particularly in conflict areas. Despite some progress, women remain underrepresented in leadership, politics, and business.
Franche called for significant investment in women and girls, emphasizing that such investments benefit everyone.
He also called for urgent actions to close the gender pay gap, create equal opportunities for decent work, enforce laws to end violence against women and girls, remove barriers in STEM fields, and ensure equal participation of women in decision-making roles.
