Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action

The Beijing Declaration, signed in September of 1995, was the most inclusive agenda on gender equality and women’s empowerment to date, and focussed on important issues like equality in political participations and leadership, access to education, reproductive rights and healthcare, and assistance to women experiencing gender-based violence.

Since 1995, Canada has been committed to implementing the objectives set by the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action (BPfA), which remains the most progressive global blueprint for advancing gender equality.

Every five years, UN Women conducts a global review on the progress made across the 12 critical areas of concern in the BPfA. The Government of Canada supports this process by preparing a national report on its implementation progress in collaboration with departments and agencies from across the federal government, as well as with provincial and territorial governments.

Read Canada’s National Review, which includes trends, achievements and remaining gaps and challenges, as well future plans to accelerate implementation.

Generation Equality Forum

In July 2020, Canada was announced as one of the co-leads of the Generation Equality Forum Action Coalition on Feminist Movements and Leadership to mark Beijing +25. The goal of the Generation Equality Forum is to make meaningful progress to advance gender equality by launching concrete actions over five years through Action Coalitions – partnerships between countries, civil society, and the private sector – in six key areas:

• gender-based violence
• economic justice and rights
• bodily autonomy and sexual and reproductive health and rights
• feminist action for climate justice
• technology and innovation for gender equality
• feminist movements and leadership.

Canada and the Netherlands were names co-leads of the Feminist Movements and Leadership Coalition.