by Xinhua Writers Jiang Biao and Du Yanqin
ROSEAU, Oct. 10 (Xinhua) — President of the Commonwealth of Dominica, H.E.Sylvanie Burton, arrived in Beijing on Saturday to attend the upcoming Global Leaders’ Meeting on Women. The meeting, co-hosted by China and UN Women, will be held in Beijing from October 13 to 14.
She spoke in an exclusive interview with Xinhua writers Jiang Bio and Du Yanqin.
“I want to thank President Xi Jinping for being an advocate for the women’s cause,” said President of the Commonwealth of Dominica Sylvanie Burton.
Convening the Global Leaders’ Meeting on Women on the 30th anniversary of the adoption of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action provides an opportunity to reflect on the progress achieved in promoting women’s development, Burton told Xinhua in a recent interview.
Preparing to attend the upcoming event in China, Burton said she looks forward to exploring how people can enhance the development of women’s causes worldwide, and what has been done in China to raise the living standard for women and their families.
The Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, adopted at the 1995 UN Fourth World Conference on Women, has had a very transformative influence on the international arena, Burton said. After that, the world started to look at the empowerment and equality of women in a more positive way.
“For us here in Dominica,” she said, “after the Beijing Declaration and the Platform of Action, we saw that the government of Dominica ensured that in every budgetary allocation we had to show that we would be empowering women or would be creating some avenues for gender equality.”
“We can look at what was done, what needs to be done, and where we go from there,” she said. “When you empower women, you empower families, you empower children, you empower young people, so the work that he continues to do is significant.”
China has made concrete efforts to promote women’s development by putting in the required and available funding for the grassroots and the most vulnerable women, Burton noted. So they can develop themselves, bring up their standards of living, and provide them with proper housing and education, she said.
“China can show us in many sectors how we can empower women and how we can bring up the standard of living, not only to employ them at the community level, but at the international level, how well we can see women representing, negotiating, working on behalf of their countries, communities, and their families,” Burton said.
Since the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Dominica in 2004, Burton said, Chinese-assisted projects have improved local livelihoods and expanded opportunities for women in Dominica.
For example, the first-ever cardiology operation performed in Dominica was made possible through a Chinese-assisted cardiology unit, and the beneficiary was a woman, Burton said. The Dominica-China Friendship Hospital allows women to give birth safely there instead of in remote districts, where a lack of facilities once led to tragic deaths.
She also highlighted other projects, including the Dominica-China Friendship Bridge, new housing for indigenous female-headed households, and the improved road between Roseau and Portsmouth, which made it easier and safer for women to travel, access education, and support their families.
Burton placed a high value on China’s vision of building a community with a shared future for humanity and the Global Governance Initiative, recognizing their significance in advancing women’s development.
She expressed the hope to learn from more advanced experiences at the upcoming Global Leaders’ Meeting on Women and bring back practical solutions for Dominica, to continue advancing women’s empowerment and gender equality, Burton said. “We hope that we will have a successful meeting.”