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Women’s meet concludes

— Photo: Xinhua

Proud moment: Luisa Dias Diogo, first woman Prime Minister of Mozambique, receives the Global Women’s Leadership Award in Hanoi on Friday.

HANOI: The Global Summit of Women 2008 (GSW) or the “Davos for Women” concluded here on Saturday with the participants calling for further efforts to help women worldwide to cope with opportunities and challenges brought by globalisation.

The three-day event included a pre-summit ministerial roundtable and several sessions on megatrends affecting the world’ s economies, corporate social responsibility and a women CEO Forum on opportunities in the Asia-Pacific region.

The topics focused on discussions on entrepreneurial, micro-enterprise and leadership development issues, including expanding micro-enterprise sales, engaging young women and girls in entrepreneurship, closing the pay gap, overcoming cultural chasms in business in Asia, improving negotiation skills, ensuring women’s health and ending the trafficking of women and children.

Summit president Irene Natividad said at the opening ceremony, “Women account for over half of the labour force in the world, but they are put at the greatest disadvantage, are disproportionately victims of poverty and are unable to access loans. No economy in the world can flourish if women are not given economic opportunities.” According to the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific, a Bangkok-based U.N. regional body, the cost of ignoring the economic potential of women is a substantial loss.

Themed “Women and Asia-Driving the Global Economy”, the summit brought together over 900 women from about 70 nations including Mozambique Prime Minister Luisa Dias Diogo , First Lady of Burkina Faso Chantal Campasore, and 32 ministers. — Xinhua

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