Applications Invited for the UN Women Asia-Pacific WEPs Awards

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About the Organization

UN Women is the global champion for gender equality, working to develop and uphold standards and create an environment in which every woman and girl can exercise her human rights and live up to her full potential. We are trusted partners for advocates and decision-makers from all walks of life, and a leader in the effort to achieve gender equality.

The Women’s Empowerment Principles are a set of 7 Principles, for business offering guidance on how to empower women in the workplace, marketplace and community.

They are grounded in the recognition that businesses have a stake in, and a responsibility for, gender equality and women’s empowerment. Gender equality is more than just a moral responsibility. It is also great for business.

Jointly promulgated by UN Women and the UN Global Compact, there are now nearly 9,500 CEO-level signatories from across the globe.

The Women’s Empowerment Principles (WEPs) are a primary vehicle for corporate delivery on gender equality dimensions of the 2030 agenda and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. WEPs signatories therefore stand in solidarity with the United Nations to  end gender inequality in the workplace, marketplace and community.

About the Award

The UN Women Asia-Pacific WEPs Awards is the first regional awards initiative that recognizes companies who are taking action for gender equality in the region aligned to the Women’s Empowerment Principles, with the ultimate objective to make good practices visible and encourage more business to take action by joining the WEPs.

The 2024 WEPs Awards is part of the new UN Women program Gender Action Lab (GAL): Innovation and Impact for Gender Equality in Asia-Pacific, powered by the Women’s Empowerment Principles (WEPs), supported by the Government of Australia Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. Under GAL, the WEPs Awards will become part of a two-year cycle with the WEPs Awards happening one year followed by a WEPs Forum the next year. The first cycle will begin with the 2024 WEPs Awards and culminate with the 2025 WEPs Forum.

In each of the following categories, one Winner, 1st Runner Up and 2nd Runner up will be awarded.

Leadership Commitment and Action (Aligned to WEP 1):

This category recognizes leaders (aged 35 and above) in corporations who have been instrumental in setting strong corporate commitments inclusive of progressive polices, regulations or practices that aim to promote gender equality in the workplace, marketplace and/or community.This may include company leaders taking specific roles and responsibilities in promoting gender equality within the company and making public commitments or delivering gender sensitive messages to the public.

Youth Leadership:

This special category will recognize youth leaders (under the age of 35 at the time of application)who have made significant contributions to promoting gender equality in the workplace, marketplace and/or community. This category will be highlighted in alignment with UN Women’s global Generation Equality campaign, which was launched in 2020 to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and has a strong focus on intergenerational and youth engagement to advance gender equality. Awardees in this category could be a young entrepreneur who developed products and services to advance gender-equality, initiated gender actions to lead their company towards becoming a more gender-inclusive workplace and/or creating a more gender-inclusive supply-chain or market-place, young leaders of start-ups that are promoting gender equality and women’s empowerment, or young employees who actively promote gender equality within their organizations.

Gender-inclusive Workplace (Aligned to WEPs 2,3):

This award recognizes achievements that corporations have demonstrated in adopting relevant gender-inclusive measures in the workplace.This may include innovative approaches to equal recruitment, support to provide flexible work arrangements, addressing specific needs of female and male employees,transformational initiatives to support family responsibilities of female and male employees to address the unequal care burden,and accelerative actions to guarantee the safety and well-being of female and male employees,accelerating progress towards equal pay, and promote women’s career development and leadership.

Gender-responsive Marketplace (Aligned to WEPs 4,5):

This category recognizes corporations for embracing a gender-lens throughout their value-chains from sourcing to disposal. This may include championing supplier diversity, gender-inclusive distribution and selling and gender responsive marketing and advertising.It may include supporting women entrepreneurs through capacity development or market access opportunities, implementing progressive programs and/or policies to incentivize procurement from women-owned businesses or other gender-responsive companies. This category will also award actions and programs that promote gender equality and women’s empowerment in advertisements and other sales and marketing activities.

Community Engagement and Partnerships (Aligned to WEP 6):

This category recognizes corporate champions that promote gender equality through community engagement and partnerships.This engagement may include integrating gender equality into their sustainability strategies, CSR or philanthropy programs, and especially supporting and collaborating withNGOs, international organizations, or other organizations committed to promoting gender equality within wider communities. Beyond community engagement, this category will also award actions to promote transformational action or systemic change through partnerships. This can include individual companies participating in any advocacy or multi-stakeholder platforms to promote gender equality, such as the Unstereotype Alliance, or also Industry Associations, Chambers of Commerce, and Stock Exchanges working with others working to promote change within and industry or among a large group of companies.

Transparency and Reporting (Aligned to WEP 7):

Tracking performance and progress towards gender equality and women’s economic empowerment is a core value of the WEPs since it allows companies to uphold their commitments to gender equality in the workplace, marketplace, and community. This category recognizes commitment to transparency and reporting of gender data that goes beyond minimum requirements and seeks to measure, analyze and report on performance of their gender policies and practices across the value chain. The category will reward companies and organizations that have accountability frameworks in place and have set targets and consistently reported and taken steps to improve their performance on gender indicators (i.e. recruitment and retention, women in management). This category may also be awarded to companies conducting an audit and analysis of a particular gender-related issue, such as the gender pay gap, or also to companies committing to increase the number of gender indicators they publicly report on each year. In addition, this category may be highly relevant for Industry Associations and Stock Exchanges integrating more gender criteria into their sustainability and/or reporting criteria.

 

Special Recognition: While organizations of any size or sector can be awarded, to recognize the valuable contributions of SMEs to the regional economy, three applicants from SMEs (smaller enterprises (< 200 employees)) across the 5 categories will be awarded as a WEPs Awards SME Champion.

 

Eligibility

Businesses, companies and enterprises (private, public, state-owned, cooperatives and social enterprises), including subsidiaries of multinationals and/or their branches, industry associations, stock exchanges and chambers of commerce from the listed countries are eligible to apply. For the Leadership awards, we encourage all individuals to apply and will consider of all nationalities as long as the nominated individual has established residency in the country of nomination and/or is a citizen of one of the Asia-Pacific countries.

How to Apply

Applications for the 2024 WEPS Awards open now through June 30!

Apply now

For more information please check the Link

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