Global Economic Crisis Affects Women, Children

Dr. Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, the former South African Minister of Health. She is currently a cabinet minister within the presidency under Kgalema Motlanthe.
Originally uploaded by Pan-African News Wire File Photos

PRETORIA 30 March 2009 Sapa

ECONOMIC CRISIS AFFECTS WOMEN, CHILDREN: TSHABALALA-MSIMANG

The current global financial crisis will have harmful effects on the well-being of women and children, Minister in the Presidency Manto Tshabalala-Msimang said on Monday.

It was widely acknowledged that economic inequality was a cause of violence against women and children, she told a Convention for the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women seminar in Pretoria.

Economic trends created or exacerbated the enabling conditions for violence.

"Women's poverty and economic inequalities, concomitant with the discrimination and gender inequalities they face, reduce women's capacity to act and take informed and considered decisions."

She said this also correlated with their increased vulnerability to harmful traditional practices.

"This [economic crisis] will impact negatively in the sense that it will increase their vulnerability to acts such as abductions, forced and early marriages, trafficking in women and girls for sexual and economic exploitation, among others."

She said harmful traditional practices were recognised as the
manifestation of gender inequality and this was deeply entrenched and rooted in social, economic and political structures and practices.

It perpetuated normative gender roles that were unequal and harmful to women.