Women and Health
1. Develop strategies to address current high levels of maternal mortality through improved equity in access and service delivery, especially with respect to emergency obstetric care;

2. In line with the Maputo Plan of Action, compile and disseminate data on the magnitude and consequences of unsafe abortions, enact and disseminate policies and laws to protect women and adolescents; and provide clear instructions, guidelines and appropriate training to service providers in the provision of comprehensive abortion care services;

3. Address health financing as an important catalyst of MDG short, medium and long term implementation within the context of the Maputo Plan of Action and ICPD +15 outcomes; and

4. Address the impact that the shortage of medical staff is having on African health delivery systems, especially at the rural level.

5. Strengthen monitoring and evaluation systems to capture the diversity of women and girls by developing gender-sensitive indicators and collecting sex-and agedisaggregated data to better understand the differential impact of HIV on women, girls, men and boys and take appropriate action;

6. Strengthen the prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV/AIDS within the framework of maternal and child health care programmes; and

7. Integrate HIV/AIDS concerns into all reproductive health programmes, with a view to taking account of the gender dimensions of the pandemic, such as the need to increase the use of contraceptives by both men and women.

Violence against women
1. Institute measures to prevent violence from occurring and protect victims;
2. Enhance the capacity of enforcement agencies responsible for the protection of women and children by providing adequate training on existing laws and policies, and the equipment and mechanisms for effective record keeping;

3. Ensure that awareness-raising on women’s rights includes messages that work to reverse the culture of silence surrounding violence, in addition to its treatment as a private issue, and the impunity with which violence is perpetuated;

4. Work to sustain successful prosecutions of perpetuators and protection of victims of trafficking;
5. Document, disseminate information about and replicate best practices taking place in some countries in the establishment of specialized institutions (e.g. police stations, courts and shelters) for the protection and rehabilitation of victims;

6. Implement the Africa Wide Campaign on VAW recommended at the Sixth Africa Development Forum (ADF-VI ) on Action on Gender Equality, Women’s Empowerment and Ending Violence against Women; and

7. Work to ensure that regional, subregional and inter-country approaches to trafficking are adopted by countries by advocating for and entering into bilateral and multi-lateral protocols of co-operation to strengthen and under-score enforcement regimes.

Women and armed conflict
1. Create awareness about Security Council Resolution 1325 at the national level, beyond countries in conflict or those emerging out of conflict and put plans of action in place to effectively implement it;

2. Place responsibility for implementation of Resolution 1325 in the line Ministry responsible for Gender in addition to other Ministries such as Defense, Justice, Home Affairs and others;

3. Provide compensation and psycho-social support to women survivors of sexual crimes;
4. Build and reinforce the capacities of women at all levels to participate effectively in peace-making, peacekeeping and peace-building/post–conflict reconstruction programmes;

5. Ensure that States parties include women in the designing, planning, implementation and monitoring of peace and security programmes at local, national and regional levels and develop mechanisms to hold the State accountable for these measures;

6. Operationalize all the mechanisms in the African peace and security architecture so that they function effectively and include women in all conflict prevention, management and resolution process; and

7. Organize the Dialogue for Peace in Africa to strategize on a lobby for - among other issues - the restricted sales and ban on dumping arms into African countries by weapon manufacturing industries as recommended by the Seventh African Regional Conference on Women (Beijing + 10).

Women and the economy
1. Review existing legal frameworks protecting women’s access to land with the view to removing discriminatory provisions, which work against   their interests;
2. In collaboration with traditional and religious authorities and women’s groups, embark upon a comprehensive review of customary and         religious norms which serve as barriers to women’s equal rights to land;

3. Encourage and provide support to CSOs to increase their assistance to women to seek redress against discrimination in access and control over land and sensitize judges on emerging issues affecting women’s land rights; and

4. Design and implement effective linkages with local universities to develop appropriate local technologies that would accelerate the reduction of drudgeries associated with household food processing and transportation of heavy loads by women.

Women in power and decision-making
1. Recognize gender equality in political participation as a democratic right and integral to good governance;

2. Increase commitment and action towards the AU Solemn Declaration on Gender Equality (2004) and the African Charter on Democracy, Elections and Governance (2007) which call for gender balance and equality in governance processes;

3. Concretize commitment to affirmative action (CEDAW, Article

4); breaking of gender stereotyping in appointment processes, especially as they relate to positions which are traditionally dominated by men at political party, executive, ministerial, judicial and civil society levels; continuous capacity-building programmes for prospective women candidates; public education and sensitization against stereotyping of women’s roles in society; and

4. Give greater emphasis to supporting increased local-level participation for women, given that the majority of women are located in rural areas; and

5. Develop and implement capacity-building programmes to support women aspirants and potential candidates.

Institutional Mechanisms for the Advancement of Women

1. Ensure that responsibility for the advancement of women is vested in the highest possible level of government; in many cases, this could be at the level of Cabinet Minister;

2. Based on a strong political commitment, create national machineries where they do not exist, and strengthen existing national machineries as appropriate, for the advancement of women at the highest possible level of government;

3. Machineries should have clearly defined mandates and authority; critical elements would be adequate resources and the ability and competence to influence policy and formulate and review legislation; among other things, they should perform policy analysis, and undertake advocacy, communication, coordination and monitoring of implementation;

4. Establish procedures to allow machineries to gather information on government-wide policy issues at an early stage and continuously use it in the policy development and review process within the Government;

5. Report, on a regular basis, to legislative bodies on the progress of efforts, as appropriate, to mainstream gender concerns, taking into account the implementation of the PoA; and

6. Encourage and promote the active involvement of the broad and diverse range of institutional actors in the public, private and voluntary sectors to work for equality between women and men.

Human Rights of Women
1. Ratify the OP-CEDAW and African Women’s Protocol as a matter of urgent priority for the Governments that have not done so to date;

2. Include in policies and plans specific issues affecting African women as highlighted in CEDAW and its Optional Protocol, and the African Women’s Protocol;

3. Review and reform customary and religious laws in collaboration with stakeholders, such as traditional and religious authorities, to ensure their progressive conformity and harmony with local legislation and international treaties and ensure implementation and enforcement;

4. Give visible attention to the African Women’s Protocol as the reference point for the implementation of the gendered aspects of other regional African initiatives, such as NEPAD, by setting high standards of reporting and monitoring of commitments on its provisions;

5. Integrate rights-based approaches in all interventions affecting women and affirm women as holders of rights and consequently equipping them with the tools with which to enforce them; and

6. Integrate Human Rights Education (HRE) into school curricula at the basic level of education and ensure that it is fully mainstreamed into inductions and orientations at higher levels of education.