Girls and women menstruate. Period

2020-02-24

Last fortnight, officials at a hostel in Bhuj checked residents so those who had their periods could be isolated. Such attitudes perpetuate gender inequalities.

Menstruation is a natural and essential part of a woman’s reproductive cycle. Without it, men, boys, women, girls would not exist. Yet, it is surrounded by myths, misconceptions and taboo.

Stigma related to menstruation reinforces discrimination and perpetuates gender inequalities. And while we know that these attitudes still prevail in some homes and communities, it is shocking to learn that educational institutions and leaders – those that are expected to bearers of light – still adopt extreme forms of shaming and blaming.

A United Nations Population Fund-commissioned photo essay in 2017 on girls’ experiences around menarche, the first occurrence of menstruation, revealed harmful practices girls are subjected to in many parts of India: Prohibition from entering the kitchen or the prayer room, being made to stay outside the house, being forced to eat in separate utensils, or not being allowed to touch certain kinds of food because they could get spoilt. These social norms isolate girls from friends and family, in turn impacting their reproductive and mental health.

Girls start considering themselves to be “impure” and “unclean” during their periods. And their trauma doesn’t end there: inadequate access to clean water, sanitation, affordable menstrual management means, and privacy, all serve to reinforce the stigma. They experience shame, fear and embarrassment. And as they grow up to be women, they internalise these gender inequitable values.

Adding to their woes, in some parts of world, including South Asia, puberty and especially menarche, are considered to signal that girls are ready for marriage and motherhood. In such contexts, parents may view child and early marriages as viable options to control girls’ sexuality or to protect against fears related to the “family’s honour”.

Breaking taboos

In 1994, during the landmark International Conference on Population and Development, and then again in 2019 during the Nairobi Summit to mark ICPD@25, the right to quality sexual and reproductive health services was squarely confirmed as pivotal to women and girls’ participation in family, community and national processes, as well as to the attainment of overall development goals.

The development goals include equal opportunity to education for girls and boys, by ensuring access to clean water and sanitation, medication to treat menstruation-related pain, and creation of safe spaces for girls.

If girls are to miss five days of school every month, how will countries attain that goal? And if women are to be confined during those five days, how will they participate in the labour market, politics, or any decision-making activity in their community?

The good news, however, is that today, India has several policies in place that address awareness about menstruation and menstrual hygiene. Many states have adopted and integrated life skills that include comprehensive sexuality education into their lower- and upper- secondary school curricula. Many civil society organisations promote girls’ education and work with parents and communities to break these taboos.

Thanks to these initiatives, the discomfort around menstruation and menstrual hygiene is beginning to gradually fade. It is now widely accepted that girls’ and women’s access to effective means of managing menstrual hygiene is strictly linked to realising their human dignity.

e must join efforts to break these taboos that have been built over centuries and are ingrained in people’s minds. Until we allow young girls to feel “normal” about menstruating, the best-intentioned policies will fall short of attaining the desired goals of equal participation of women and men.

Girls and women menstruate. Period.

Argentina Matavel Piccin is the India Representative at United Nations Population Fund or UNFPA.

https://scroll.in/article/953924/girls-and-women-menstruate-period

Stepping up in the Pacific at the expense of Pakistani women and girls

2019-11-26

Young girl doing her school-work in Karachi.

Cutting aid has a cost – and Australia should be embarrassed
to take aid from other countries to give it to the Pacific.

Since coming into office in 2013, the Coalition has cut aid by 17% in nominal terms and 27% adjusting for inflation. More cuts are in the pipeline, and by 2021 aid will have been subject to a real cut of 31%.

Given that the Coalition’s justification for cutting aid was the budget deficit, you might have thought that now Australia is heading for a surplus, there might be room for increasing aid. But no – in a recent interview with the podcast Good Will Hunters, International Development Minister Alex Hawke said that the last election had been a referendum on overseas aid, that the voters had rejected Labor’s proposed aid increase, and that no aid increases were in the offing. “We’re not revisiting that envelope,” Hawke said.

The suggestion that any election is a referendum on aid is laughable. Find me a person who bases their vote on foreign aid policy. As far as I know, not a single question to either major political leader during the election campaign concerned aid.

But clearly, foreign aid is the lowest priority for the Coalition. It has been singled out. Aid has been cut by 27% since 2013, but total expenditure has increased by 18% over the same period. Answers by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade to the most recent Senate Estimates hearings confirmed that next year Australia’s aid-to-gross national income (GNI) ratio will fall to 0.2%, the lowest ever. Among 36 countries in the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, only the much bigger United States and a few much poorer (e.g. Poland) and/or newer (e.g. South Korea) and/or crisis-ridden countries (e.g. Spain and Greece) provide 0.2% or less of GNI in foreign aid.

Because of the cuts, the Coalition has been on the defensive on aid, but that tactic is now changing. In the same podcast, Hawke noted that Australia’s aid to the Pacific was “at the highest level ever”. Likewise, at Senate Estimates last month, Foreign Minister Marise Payne stressed that the $1.4 billion Australia will be providing the Pacific this year is a “record contribution”. Hawke went further – perhaps letting the cat out of the bag, or simply saying what everyone already knows, which is that the proportion of aid to the Pacific is going to continue to “tick up”.

Under what scenario can it make sense to cut total aid, yet increase aid to the Pacific? The government has not yet been able to develop a supportive narrative. Strategic competition with China appears to be the underlying driver, but no one wants to admit it. The best that Hawke could come up with were references to the Pacific as “our backyard” and “our family”.

Given the government’s position, the opportunity cost of more aid to the Pacific is less aid to other countries. Bilateral aid to Africa has already been virtually wiped out, and aid to Asia almost halved.

I personally work a lot on Papua New Guinea and count myself as a friend of the Pacific. But the current practice of taking aid from other countries and giving it to the Pacific makes no sense.

The case of Pakistan is instructive. Australian bilateral aid to Pakistan has already been cut by half, and will be eliminated altogether next year. DFAT has no qualms in documenting that “funding in Australia’s overall aid program [to Pakistan] has been redirected to support new initiatives in our immediate Pacific region”.

What will be sacrificed by abolishing aid to Pakistan? The latest DFAT review of Australian aid noted the strong focus on gender equity of our aid to that country. Specifically, the review noted that in the last year, as a result of Australian aid, 1.7 million Pakistanis received conditional cash and food assistance (55% women and girls). In addition, nutrition supplements were provided to “117,140 women, 14,165 adolescent girls, and 212,510 children under five,” as well as “14 newly renovated, 24-hour health facilities provided reproductive health services to 12,253 women”.

Australian aid also supported 2 million more Pakistani girls going to school. All this (and much more) with only $50 million of aid – just 4% of the amount going to the Pacific.

Of course, the Pakistani government could and should do a much better job of supporting the country’s development, yet the same point could be made just as strongly of the governments of the Pacific. I challenge anyone to find benefits of a similar magnitude to those claimed in Pakistan from our much larger aid program to the Pacific. Indeed, I challenge anyone to argue that the benefits of more aid to the Pacific (already the most aid-dependent region in the world) outweigh the cost of withdrawing our support to Pakistani women and children.

One can debate whether more aid to the Pacific is warranted, but more aid to the Pacific at the expense of aid to countries such as Pakistan is a national embarrassment.