The workshop will gather Gender Focal Points from 29 African countries, namely Benin, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo Brazzaville, Côte d'Ivoire, Gabon, Guinea-Conakry, Ethiopia, Eritrea, ...among others.

The purpose of this workshop is to identify areas that require increased technical and program support from UNFPA in gender programming within the changing development context and ways that the support can be provided. The specific objectives are to: (1) increase participants knowledge on priority gender issues in the region, (2) increase participants common understanding of the priority areas of UNFPA support to gender equality and women empowerment programs, (3) share practical experiences and lessons learned in gender programming in order to promote the adaptation of effectives strategies, and (4) to strengthen partnerships and networks among UNFPA staff and partners and with regional, sub-regional and national gender and women promotion institutions and NGOs to enhance knowledge sharing for effective programming.

Since 2000, UNFPA has adopted "gender equality and women empowerment" as its strategic corporate programming goal which is reflected in its 2008-2011 Strategic Plan. UNFPA's position on gender equality is in line with the International Conference on Population and Development Programme of Action (ICPD/PoA) which firmly establishes the centrality of women in development and affirms that the emancipation and empowerment of women to a level equal to that of men are important to the achievement of sustainable development.

In Africa, UNFPA has increasingly gained experience in supporting governments and civil society organizations to implement programs that aims at promoting gender and equality and women empowerment.

UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund, is an international development agency that promotes the right of every woman, man and child to enjoy a life of health and equal opportunity. UNFPA supports countries in using population data for policies and programmes to reduce poverty and to ensure that every pregnancy is wanted, every birth is safe, every young person is free of HIV/AIDS, and every girl and woman is treated with dignity and respect.