On International Women’s Day, AMARC joins forces with UNESCO for Women Make the News

Montreal, March 6, 2015. The World Association of Community Broadcasters (AMARC) is joining forces with UNESCO and the Global Alliance on Media and Gender for the Women Make the News 2015 initiative. Under the theme ‘’Yes we must! Reaching Gender Equality in the Media by 2030’’, this initiative aims to push forward the involvement of women in all spheres of media, from the pen, to the microphone to higher management.

All around the world, community radios are a privileged place where women can make their voices heard, find a space for discussion, empowerment and emancipation. These radios are vectors of education, culture, knowledge sharing and development. Through them, women can enforce their role as major social actors.

“On March 8, we celebrate women’s contribution to the struggle for freedom of expression and the right to communicate. We also seize the opportunity to repeat that too many women still suffer from discriminations in the media field and that we must work toward an equal representation on the airwaves“, said Maria Pía Matta, AMARC’s President.

Throughout its projects and as part of its mission, AMARC defends gender equality and reinforces the importance of the role played by women in the field of communication and media. Launched at the beginning of 2015, ‘’On the road to Beijing+20’’, an international audio series produced by AMARC, in collaboration with UN Women celebrates the voices of women around the world, highlights important issues related to women and shares stories supporting a universal cause. Through these programs, AMARC wishes to empower women journalist, commentator, and journalist and give them air time.Another important tool towards achieving gender equality in the radio stations is the Gender Policy for Community Radio (GP4CR) which was developed by AMARC-WIN Asia Pacific and adopted by the World General Assembly of AMARC in 2010 in La Plata, Argentina. It is available in multiple languages.

On March 8, AMARC calls on all its members, partners and friends to continue to push towards gender equality and to pledge for equal air-time for women. Together, let’s achieve gender equality in the media by 2030!

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Through services to members, networking and projects implementation, the World Association of Community Radio Broadcasters (AMARC) gathers more than 4,000 community radios, federations and community media stakeholders in more than 150 countries. The International Network of Women (WIN) of AMARC is a large assembly of women communicators working to ensure women’s right to participate and communicate through the community radio movement.