KWDI Korean Women’s Development Institute

As international development community drew attention to gender issues, bilateral and multilateral aid organizations have given shape to implementation plans for gender equality in developing countries and have taken concrete actions. Not only is it high time for Korea to keep up with this trend as the 24th membr in DAC(Development Assistance Committee), but also Korea needs to integrate programs on gender equality and gender mainstreaming with its ODA.

This background motivated Korean Women's Development Institute (KWDI) to launch a multi-year ODA project for strengthening gender equality policy infrastructure in the Asia-Pacific in 2011. As the study in an extension of the first year targeting Cambodia and Indonesia, this research project has implemented two field workshops with intent to have policy dialogues. Also, the research made recommendations with tailored policies in three areas-women's political and economic empowerment and violence against women-as well as general gender policy model, thereby finding the intersection between the recipients' demands and Korea, the donor's supply with regard to women's policy.

This research report started from introduction of this multi-year ODA project and its methodology in Chapter One, followed by examination on recent paradigm of development cooperation focusing on capacity development. In this regard, knowledge sharing is one of the keys to stimulate these efforts. The Relationship between capacity development and knowledge sharing was described in Chapter Two as well as current status of other aid organizations.

This research has applied two methods to bridge the gap between the two sides. From the recipients' side, this research conducted in-depth interviews, policy development workshops, and consultation meetings on customized policy recommentations. The results and from in-depth interviews were presented and analyzed in Chapter Three.

From Korea's side, this study made an analysis of Korea's ODA policy basis and KOICA's existing gender mainstreaming projects in addition to exploration on gender-related projects of other aid organizations as introduced in Chapter Four. Furthermore, the research started out to systematically document Korea's experience in women's policy development, emulating Korea's ‘Knowledge Sharing Project(KSP)’ which modularizes Korea's economic development experience and improves effectiveness through high-level dialogue. Systematization has been centered on key women's policies, and three of the systematization topics-women's political, economic capacity development and women's human rights-were first used in this research report as an extension of the first year project. In Chapter Five, this study offered policy recommendations and implications tailored to Cambodia and Indonesia respectively along with overview of the current status in two countries. As a consequence, this report offered suggestions on system for gender equality, policy modal based on customizaion and systematization, and direction for Korea's gender-related ODA programs in Chapter Six.

This research paper is expected to contribute in the following aspects. First, through inter-governmental dialogues, Korean government officials or and their Cambodian or Indonesian counterparts agreed on the necessity and identified obstacles of women's policy and developed mutually feasible development agendas. Second, the outcomes and the workshop on capacity building will serve as a foundation for knowledge sharing on Korea's gender equality policies. Third, this research intends to develop women's policy tailored to local needs and make policy suggestions for recipient countries. This effort will be able to contribute to more gender projects and gender-sensitive perspective in Korea's ODA by encouraging the Korean government to put gender mainstreaming into practice.