Concord — International Women's Day is an occasion to review the ongoing struggle for women's rights and gender equality.

It is an opportunity to celebrate the progress made, as well as condemn the ongoing difficulties many women and girls face in their efforts to assert their rights to equality and justice.

March 8 is also an opportunity to renew our commitment to the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination (CEDAW) which, if implemented, would help to ensure that women and girls were guaranteed access to education and lives free from violence.

Many are literally starving because of the food crisis, loss of jobs, lower wages and cuts in social benefits. Many are illiterate and have no access to education. Two thirds of the one billion illiterate adults who have no access to basic education are women.

The implementation of the Millennium Development Goals and achievement of the Education for All commitments are under serious threat.

The bail-out money for the financial and corporate sector is twenty times more than the amount needed to achieve all of the Millennium Goals at once!

"The time has come to invest in people and focus global recovery strategies on social justice - women are central to this process," said Fred van Leeuwen, General Secretary of Education International.

The group insists that education is a human right and a public good, and it is the responsibility of all governments to provide all women and men, boys and girls, free quality public education.

Investing in women and girls is part of the solution to building a sustainable future. Educated women have a multiplier effect on the levels of education and health of their families and on productivity for sustained economic growth. Educating girls and women enables them to become agents of change. It allows them to become part of the solution to the economic and environmental crisis, instead of mainly suffering its consequences.

Important progress has been made in ensuring access to education for 40 million boys and girls over the last nine years, according to UNESCO. However, in the current scenario of widespread economic recession and political instability, Education International is seriously concerned about the potential for consequent setbacks to the implementation of the Development Goals in many countries.

Teachers and their trade unions play an important role. They are committed to fighting for pay equity, the reconciliation of family and work, and equal opportunities for all women and girls. They are concerned especially about those who, every day, have to try to balance their multiple tasks while confronted with precarious work and low salaries.

Trade unions also promote the rights of women and men to participate on equal terms in the political and economic decision-making processes which affect their lives.

Every year International Women's Day is marked on 8 March to celebrate the economic, political and social achievements of women around the world. This date is commemorated at the United Nations and in many countries is designated as a national holiday.

Highlighting the occasion in Sierra Leone, the Voluntary Services Overseas (VSO), gathered a series of inspiring images involving VSO projects across the country showing women's strength and dignity.

VSO is an international development charity with 1,500 volunteers across 42 countries working with women to improve their access to crucial services, helping them speak out about political decisions that affect them.

A Fillipino VSO volunteer, Estrella Hernandez, who was working as a community nurse at Magbenteh Theraputic Feeding Centre in Makeni said hundreds of experienced female volunteers every year help women across developing and poor countries to fulfil their potential and increase their chances of making an income, by sharing skills, learning and achieving positive change together.