WMG Highlights from HLPF 2022!
HLPF 2022 has been an amazing two weeks with our members and allies in New York and online. The challenges of participation and process were still very much there, further heightened by the Covid-19 pandemic. Many of our members and allies could not be physically present with us due to several political and logistical reasons. We also faced challenges with regards to virtual modalities. However, we were still ready to demand and advocate for system change. We have been present in all spaces possible and created impact. We turned 30 this year and were able to celebrate together!
We thank all our members and allies deeply for their fierce feminist advocacy. There is still much work needed to ensure that we move towards a more accountable and effective Agenda 2030, for a peaceful, sustainable and equitable future for all, and to recover from the pandemic to a system centered on human rights and care. It uplifts us, however, to know that we’ll work together to bring this transformative change, and to bring to reality this system that we, feminists, have envisioned collectively.
Here are a few highlights from all the hard work that were undertaken by the fierce feminists of WMG during HLPF 2022:
WMG turns 30!
This year the Women’s Major Group celebrated 30 years of activism within the UN. The WMG was founded at the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where governments recognized “Women” as one of 9 key constituencies under the “Major Groups and other Stakeholders” (MGoS). The MGoS has been crucial for civil society to have a voice in UN processes and monitor the 2030 Agenda & its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Just as critical to its presence in official UN spaces is the WMG presence outside of them. One of the WMG’s biggest successes has been strengthening regional knowledge sharing & coordination efforts—adopting the MGoS system to the regions, but making it even stronger. As we move forward, we will continue to raise the demand that #FeministsWantSystemsChange! We were joined by WMG members, feminist civil society, Major Groups and other Stakeholders, member states, and UN representatives for a rooftop reception!
Theme
HLPF 2022 discussed in depth Building back better from the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) while advancing the full implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. You can read WMG’s position on the SDGs in our HLPF 2022 Position Paper here.
Statements & Interventions
- 8 interventions (including VNRs questions/statements) in official sessions
- 2 panelist in the official sessions
- 2 lead discussants
- 1 intervention was dropped citing ‘lack of time’
We uploaded the videos of all our interventions and VNR statements to our website and Youtube
Events
We had one WMG official side event this year : Centrality of Human Rights to SDG 5 and Agenda 2030. We also hosted a special event : WMG Strategy Session: Synergies between CSW66 & HLPF 2022, and co-sponsored 7 other side events. The full list are available soon on our website!
WMG supported the organization of the MGoS CM Side Event and Official Session, WMG political discussion, an SGDs Learning, Training & Practice Session focused on various data, tech and advocacy for SDG5, with our segment on “Nourishing Feminist Advocacy for Transformative Change”, a civil society demonstration to say: “The People Want System Change!” and co-hosted a feminist coffee meet up!
Our members were active as organizers, moderators, and speakers well over 10 other events.
Delegation Meetings
We had five official meetings with delegations. We hope to stay in touch with all the delegations we’ve met, to share information and advocacy priorities with them throughout the year. We can be reached at contact@womensmajorgroup.org for meeting & collaboration possibilities.
Colour Campaign
It was heartwarming to see the level of solidarity, physically and virtually, for our color campaign, and to see everyone looking so amazing in that day’s color in our morning caucuses and the virtual meetings! It was also awesome to see allies wearing our colors, tying the scarves to their name plates, mentioning the color campaign in their speeches & amplifying the color campaign online too! In many of the Official Sessions, the panelists wore our scarves, and we even got shoutouts from Member States who supported our color campaign and demand of the day!
You can find all our photos from the color campaign inputs at the photos section of our Facebook & Instagram accounts. Our colors were very visible on social media! Please find the graphics prepared here! You can find photos for all days here.
We also prepared a social media toolkit in English and Spanish! Many thanks to our members who’ve supported us with the translation to Spanish & French, and provided us with the Alt text for accessibility of the English graphics, that are in the toolkit for you to use.
This year’s incredible messages, graphics and Zoom backgrounds will always remain available. So please please support us by bookmarking the link to the social media toolkit, and using the materials whenever you can throughout the year, to show WMG’s advocacy on gender equality and sustainable development is year-round work!
Digital Engagement
Twitter: Overall through the HLPF 2022, we’ve sent 180 tweets from the @Women_Rio20, and our tweets got over 90.4K total impressions. We were able to bring in 23.2K new profile visits, 336 mentions, and 158 new followers.
The #FeministsWantSystemChange hashtag had been used in more than 1500 tweets during HLPF2022, and had 9.2 million possible reach!
Instagram: We reached 1129 accounts, engaged with 292 new accounts and gained 90 followers.
WMG also supported the preparation and dissemination of the MGoS CM statement on the Ministerial Declaration adopted on the 15th of July.
Please see all our incredible digital outputs at our social media channels, and please do not forget to follow us :
Twitter: @Women_Rio20
Facebook: Women’s Major Group
Instagram: @womensmajorgroup
Youtube: Women’s Major Group
You can subscribe to WMG listservs here.
We thank all our members and allies for all their support, expertise, work, time and solidarity. We are already very much excited for our collective, fierce feminist advocacy in the upcoming days and months. Next year, HLPF 2023 will be under the auspices of UNGA. With the SDG Summit in September, our fierce feminist advocacy ahead is much urgent and important.
In solidarity.
