PROJECT FIVE-O
1980 – 2005

Project Five-O 25th Anniversary Conference
3 September 2005 in Copenhagen

The 25th anniversary of Project Five-O was celebrated in its birthplace Copenhagen on Saturday 3 September 2005. The Danish affiliates of two of the five partner organisations joined in organising a conference to commemorate the 25 years of partnership, viz. Soroptimist International in Denmark (SI) and the Women’s Council in Denmark (ICW). The theme of the conference was

„Education and Empowerment of Women in Developing Countries“.

The conference was held at the Copenhagen Business School, which made their Tuborg Auditorium available for the conference free of charge.

The 125 participants came from 17 countries. The audience was dominated by Danish Soroptimists, but also Soroptimists and other NGOs from many countries were there. In the audience were two female ambassadors to Denmark, Céline Yoda of Burkina Faso and Ana Marija Besker of Croatia, and Henny Andries, Councellor of the Indonesian Embassy. The most honourable participant was Mme Gisèle Guigma, the Minister for the Promotion of Women from Burkina Faso.

Representing a Five-O project was Baiba Rivza, founder and chair of the project in Latvia.

As the participants entered the auditorium a video film from the Bangladesh project was shown, and during the Five-O Co-ordinator’s welcome speech a PPP with pictures from most of the projects was shown. At the closing of the conference a video film from the Samoa project was shown. These presentations gave the audience a good impression of the variety of activities of the projects and the Local Committees’ great efforts to manage them.

Ms Bente Kristensen, Vice President of the Copenhagen Business School, opened the conference with a warm welcome speech giving interesting information about the curriculum offered at the school, which has many international studies and many international students.

The long list of speakers started with Griselda Kenyon, President of International Federation of University Women (IFUW) and Convenor of the Five-O Committee. Griselda was Five-O Co-ordinator 1990-93 and remembered the days when funding was obtained from the UNESCO Co-Action Programme and the cumbersome UNUMs were the payment instruments.

Then followed Irmeli Torssonen, Past President of Soroptimist International (SI), who emphasised the need to educate women to help them out of poverty and the need for organisations and clubs to join forces in partnerships such as Five-O.

Randi Iversen, President of the Women’s Council in Denmark, made a review of the four UN Women’s Conferences, the first one, in Mexico in 1975, giving the impetus to the then five organisations’ presidents to form the Five-O partnership, which was formalised during the Second Women’s Conference in Copenhagen in 1980. The fourth Women’s Conference, Beijing 1995, was by no comparison the most important and influential with the adoption of the Beijing Declaration and Beijing Platform for Action, which was reaffirmed during Beijing +5 in 2000 and Beijing +10 in New York in March 2005 and thus remains the blueprint for women NGOs’ activities.

She was followed by Anamah Tan, President of International Council of Women (ICW) and member of the CEDAW Committee since 2004. Anamah Tan stressed the importance of international cooperation, such as Project Five-O, and the essential task of NGOs to help their governments combat poverty, by confronting them with their responsibility. She also reminded the audience that to put an end to poverty women must be involved. Talking about CEDAW she underlined the importance of this instrument to end all discrimination and for us all to hold our governments responsible.

From the UNDP Office for the Nordic Countries, which is domiciled in Copenhagen, Lotte Dahlmann gave an excellent overview of UNDP work to fight poverty and encourage equality. She said the UN needs groups from civil society such as NGOs to remind governments of their obligations to fulfill the Millennium Development Goals, but she also realised that even when these might be met by 2015, the struggle for gender equality will not be at an end, so women must continue their perseverance to obtain this. Lotte Dahlmann also mentioned Secretary General Kofi Annan’s report „In Larger Freedom“ and the four goals set: 1. Freedom from Want, 2. Freedom from Fear, 3. Freedom to Live in Dignity, and 4. the Strengthening of the UN system.

Chonchanok Viravan, President of Bussiness and Professional Women International (BPWI), brought greetings and presented a BPWI Certificate of Appreciation for Project Five-O’s funding support to the Nepal project, and Margit Webjorn, Past President of ZI, brought greetings from her organisation. Baiba Rivza gave an interesting overview of the successful Latvia project which has helped rural women to feel empowered through education in business entrepreneurship, micro credit and mentoring.

There are many NGOs in Denmark, and the chair of one of the oldest and most active when it comes to women’s empowerment and development, KULU Women and Development, was invited to speak. Janice Förde talked about the importance of linking globalised trade and women’s rights, considering that globalisation and trade agreements pose many difficulties and hindrances for women to achieve their full benefit of business. She mentioned the Fair Trade organisation as a good example of how to support small farmers in the marketing of their produce.

To complement the picture of international development aid, a representative of the Danish government was invited to speak about Denmark’s contribution. This was a young female MP, Helle Sjelle, who assured the audience that Denmark endeavours to make a good example internationally by contributing 0.8 percent of its GNP per year. She suggested the MDGs be used to measure the degree of goodwill shown by the UN member countries.

The last speaker was Annelise Thomsen, President of SI Denmark, who summarized what Danish Soroptimists have done during the last 10-15 years to fulfill the Beijing Platform for Action and the MDGs (even before they were adopted). Especially women in Eastern European countries have been helped and supported during their countries’ transition from totalitarian regime to democracy, by trainee sojourns in Denmark, educational seminars in their own countries, or moral and financial support.

In closing the conference, the Co-ordinator summarized the purpose of the conference: to update the participants on NGO development work and Five-O’s contribution to this, to raise awareness of the importance of NGO advocacy towards the UN and the UN work in general for the education and empowerment of women worldwide. The main message, however, was

„to pay tribute, to laud, to commend the members of the five organisations in the developing contries, who devote their skills and experience, their energy, their time, their money, to the setting up and running of the projects in each their country. Let us not forget that it is not a one-time activity, to set up a project. No, the responsibility and work continues year after year, and they do continue year after year, the members of the Local Project Committees.“

In compliance with their role as advocates for women’s issues at all levels the two Danish organisations hosting the conference decided, from the platform of the conference, to send a resolution to the Danish government urging it to commit itself to remember the women’s issues in all discussions and negotiations in the forthcoming UN summit meeting later in September in New York.

The conference was supported financially by Soroptimist International in Denmark and DANIDA (the Danish International Development Aid Agency). The profits from the conference will be donated to Project Five-O.

PPP was used throughout the conference, and the last slide to be shown on the screen summarized what Project Five-O stands for:

EMPOWERING WOMEN WORLDWIDE
LET’S DO IT!

Johanne M. Sorensen
Five-O Project Co-ordinator