The United Nations General Assembly recently approved a resolution establishing the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women.

UN Women/ONU Femmes is a positive response to the demands of the global women’s movement. The Nobel Women’s Initiative and groups around the world have long advocated for the creation of an agency to facilitate engagement with women’s civil society organizations.

UN Women reflects a movement within the UN to focus resources and mandates in order to have the greatest possible impact.  The new entity pulls together four existing UN agencies that worked on gender-related issues, and will seek to affect policy-level decisions, while also working to support implementation of programs and policies at the country level. It will be headed by an Under-Secretary-General, and will become fully operational in January 2011.

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UN Creates New Structure for Empowerment of Women, United Nations, 2 July 2010.

UN to set up agency promoting women’s rights, BBC News, 2 July 2010.

UN Women Born! Civil Society Celebrates Creation of Gender Equality Entity After Four Years of Advocacy, Gear Campagin, 2 July 2010.