Kathmandu, September 10:

The Ministry of Finance has formed a six-member Gender Responsive Budget (GRB) Committee led by Ram Chandra Man Singh, joint secretary of MoF, Budget Division, to mainstream gender parity in all aspects of the budgetary process. This is the first time that the government has formed such a panel, following a ministerial level decision. The six-member committee was formed on August 31. The MoF commenced a Gender Responsive Budget Initiative in the current fiscal year, to adjust MoF’s policy on gender equity/equality and to ascertain that the budget is pro-women and also focussed on women’s programmes.

“The GRB will mainstream gender in all aspects of the budgetary process, such as fiscal, revenue and taxation policies so that adequate budget is assured for pro-women and women-focussed programmes,” said Dr Chandra Bhadra, gender consultant at MoF during the period of budget formulation.

“This would lead to reduction of women’s workload and an increase in their employment opportunities as well as income generation, apart from their participation in the budgetary process starting from the village to the national level.” “The GRB has been identified as a key to expediting the implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action (BPFA); to demystify assumptions of ‘budgets as neutral economic instruments’ and to overtly adopt a GRB to address the socio-economic discrimination against women. “ The GRB committee comprises coordinator Ram Chandra Man Singh, representatives of National Planning Commission, Ministry of Women, Children and Social Welfare, Ministry of Local Development and UNIFEM respectively, and MoF budget division undersecretary Madhu Kumar Marasini as member-secretary.