1 March 2015, Riga – Women’s Economic Empowerment: Regions have their say! Gender Equality has been a key priority within the Assembly of European Regions (AER) for many years – a working group on Gender Equality was created in the late 1990s. The AER Standing Committee on Equal Opportunities was created by a decision of the AER General Assembly on 26 November 2009. AER is committed to empowering its members to guarantee equal opportunities for each and every one of their citizens. Within the AER structure, we promote gender parity in the various AER organs – this principle is promoted within the AER statutes and rules of procedure. Across AER, we encourage regions to acknowledge and implement the equal opportunities perspective in all policy areas. Women entrepreneurship & women’s employment opportunities is one of these policy areas. Many examples of best practices exist at regional level and can inspire national policies. To discuss these issues AER delegate, Mr Kenneth Johannesson, County Council Councillor, Värmland, was present at the Riga event.

The high-level political event has been organized in Riga by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs together with the European Commission, the Latvian government, and in close cooperation with civil society, specially women’s movement and private sector to highlight the importance of women and girls as central actors in moving towards sustainable development and to combine proposals for unlocking women’s full economic potential in context of post-2015 framework.

The event took place in March – the thematic month dedicated to women and girls during the European Year for Development.

For pictures, videos, and more information, please click here.