Revised National Gender Policy (Updated Version 2013).

This Revised National Gender Policy builds on the achievements of the previous Policy. It is based on an updated Situation Analysis of Gender Issues in Belize and is aimed at continuing national efforts to achieve gender equality and gender equity. Policy objectives are: To safeguard women and men’s right to work regardless of their childbearing status and support women and men in their reproductive roles so that they can remain productive citizens; To provide additional social safety nets to women, men and children living in poverty. The Policy is based on the vision of «A society in which all men and women, boys and girls are able to achieve their full potential through the enjoyment of their human rights; live together in mutual respect, dignity and harmony; and are equal partners as they participate in services and resources for realizing and sustaining their economic, social, political, and cultural development for equal enjoyment of all».
This Policy sets out to achieve the following general objectives to: protect the human rights of women and men; ensure national accountability for commitments made in national policies and programmes as well as relevant International Conventions, particularly CEDAW; address the fundamental causes of gender inequality and inequity and place the family and the community at the centre of this process of change; act as a basis for transforming gender relations within the family and the community, and across all levels of public and private institutions; enhance and support national efforts towards human-centred development in which women and men participate fully and from which they benefit equally; ensure the involvement of men in all aspects of productive and reproductive life and recognize their important role within the family and as agents of change in the wider society; ensure that development policies, programmes and related budgets are gender responsive, human rights-oriented and provide real spaces and opportunities for de jure and de facto gender equality and equity, etc.