UN Women welcomes the launch of Viet Nam’s first National Action Plan on Women, Peace and Security
Da Nang, Viet Nam – The Government of Viet Nam has launched the country’s first National Action Plan on Women, Peace, and Security (NAP WPS), a historic milestone in Viet Nam’s commitment to gender equality and women’s empowerment in the field of peace and security.
This first NAP WPS is built based on the four pillars of the WPS agenda, namely participation, protection, prevention, and relief and recovery. It also has a section on international cooperation, emphasizing Viet Nam’s dedication to collaborate with the global community to advance the WPS agenda.
“The launch of Viet Nam’s National Action Plan comes at a critical juncture with global challenges impacting us all. Women and girls all around the world continue to face disproportionate vulnerabilities and discrimination making this national action plan more crucial than ever. UN Women stands ready to support the government of Viet Nam to extend partnership, leverage resources to ensure that no woman or girl is left behind,” said Sima Bahous, Executive Director of UN Women in her video message.
Specifying the goals on women’s full, equal, and meaningful participation in politics, diplomacy, national defence, security, and addressing gender-based violence, the NAP WPS incorporates gender in its response to conflict, crisis, disaster, and emerging security challenges such as climate change and cyber security.
In conjunction with the launching, a workshop was conducted to develop the delivery plan of the NAP WPS led by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Viet Nam and UN Women for effective implementation of the plan. Clear coordination, strong partnership and investment were identified as key drivers for the plan to transform the lives of women and girls and the broader efforts to sustain peace in Viet Nam.
“The WPS agenda is wide ranging and cross-cutting. It requires effective coordination among multi-stakeholders, including leaders and managers at all levels: provinces, ministries, national women’s mechinary, academia, civil society, community-based and women’s organisations.
“A clear and measurable plan for implementation provides a strong basis for financing and calling for increased investment in the WPS agenda with results that can be measured. In turn, this will keep the momentum and continued to garner political support from key relevant line Ministries and agencies in Viet Nam,” said Ryce Chanchai, ASEAN Governance and ASEAN WPS Regional Programme Lead of UN Women.
Viet Nam has made significant progress in gender equality demonstrating the political will and drive towards gender equality including:
- Improved global ranking on gender equality from 83rd to 72nd out of 146 countries since the adoption of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development
- Enactment of Gender Equality Law (2006) and the National Strategy on Gender Equality (2021-2030), and the Domestic Violence and Protection Law (2022)
At international level, Viet Nam has been a vocal advocate on Women, Peace, and Security Agenda. Viet Nam had led the proposal of the UN Security Council Resolution 1889 in 2009 focusing on women’s role in post-conflict peacebuilding. During its tenure as a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council (2020-2021), Viet Nam hosted an international conference themed “Enhancing Women’s Role in Peace Building and Consolidation: From Commitments to Results,” adopting the Hanoi Commitment to Action with the co-sponsorship of 75 UN member states. Most recently, Viet Nam’s commitment to promoting gender equality is further highlighted by its recent acceptance to be part of the Executive Board of UN Women for the term 2025-2027.
UN Women provided technical support to the government for the development of the NAP WPS since 2021, through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, with the support from the Government of Canada, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, Australia, and Korea.
