TR
PRIME MINISTRY
General Directorate on the Status and Problems of Women

 

RESPONSE OF THE REPUBLIC OF TURKEY
TO THE
QUESTIONAIRE ON IMPLEMENTATION
OF THE
BEIJING PLATFORM FOR ACTION
May, 1999
Ankara

 

INTRODUCTION

PART ONE: Overview of the trends in achieving gender equality and women's advancement

PART TWO: Financial and Institutional Measures

 

Introduction: (This document was prepared by Professor Dr. A. Feride Acar, Selma Acuner PhD, and Nevin Senol (M.A.) for the General Directorate on the Status and Problems of Women)

The Republic of Turkey has had an exceptional and historically unique experience in regards to women. All decisions made for the advancement and empowerment of women today invariable reflect this historical significance. With the foundation of the Republic in 1923, Turkey experienced rapid social and political transformation. During the Ottoman Empire, communities were regulated by their own religious values and rules which meant that Islamic rules governed the Muslim population. The establishment of the republic brought forth a socio-political structure whereby religion and state were clearly separated and law was formulated according to strictly secular principles in a society where 99% of the population is Muslim.

Some of the main axis of this transformation were ensuring equality between men and women; state support for women in entry into the public sphere; radical changes in the legal system; and efforts to transform the social traditions and values which were inherently discriminatory. With the adoption of secular order, women’s entry and participation in education, employment and political life were made possible. Through egalitarian public policies the state, in fact, took an active role in encouraging and supporting the participation of women in the public spheres. As a result, Turkey accomplished in 1930s and 1940s, an unparalleled transformation in gender equality that was, by universal standards, most satisfactory at the time.

However, contentment with this rapid transformation coupled with the changing social, political and economic conditions of the Republic, prevented further expansion of women’s human rights to levels and areas reached by the western world.

The later, i.e. a new understanding of women’s human rights which emphasised the de facto rights as well as the de jure and sought equality in the private sphere alongside the public one demanded further empowerment of women in all walks of life, was difficult to incorporate into Turkish social and political system.

Nonetheless, such demands also found reflection in the Turkish society in the 1980s when women’s movement became a strong and increasingly vocal proponent of women’s human rights demanding a major overhaul of the existing laws, in particular Civil Code, in order to update them.

The current situation with respect to advancement of women and gender equality in the country is beset by some serious problem areas. Despite the gains made since the establishment of the Republic, educational attainment levels for women and the girl-child are not equal to that of male population; furthermore they vary in different geographic regions and exhibit serious differences along the rural / urban residence. On the other hand, sufficient gains have also not been made to ensure women’s equal access to health services; there are deficiencies in the reproductive health and mother-child health care fields. Rural to urban disparities persists in this regard too. Notwithstanding the legal rights, Turkish women are not able to enjoy de facto equal rights in political participation particularly in terms of access to decision-making positions; nor is their access to economic resources on a par with men.

In the background of this picture lies both economic factors and continuing existence of a socio-cultural structure that supports and perpetuates gender inequality and discrimination and has found visible political representation with the advancement of competitive, democratic political institutions in the country.

PART ONE

Overview of the trends in achieving gender equality and women’s advancement.

  1. Implementing the Beijing Platform for Action
Turkey prepared for the 4th World Conference for Women by participating in activities at the national, regional and international levels; and, participated in the Conference with an effective and large delegation composed of representatives of both the NGOs and the state, Turkey was among the countries who accepted the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action without reservations. Turkey made three main commitments and several lower level commitments thereunder the Conference. The commitments were as follows:
  1. To withdraw by the year 2000, all the reservations she had placed on the UN Convention for the Elimination of All Kinds of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) ratified in 1985.
  2. To reduce maternal and infant mortality with baseline year of 1994 by 50% by the year of 2000.
  3. To increase compulsory basic education from five to eight years, and eradicate female illiteracy (28.9% in 1994) by the year 2000.
An extensive and sensitive public opinion was fostered before and after the 4th World Conference on Women, in Turkey, on the meaning of the Conference themes and on the commitments made by Turkey at Conference. Starting with the State Ministry responsible for Women’s Affairs, Family and Child Protection, and The Directorate General on the Status and problems of Women, several state agencies, and women’s NGOs as well as the visual and written media and the Women and Gender Studies Centres of the universities have been active and influential agents in this effort. Benefiting from this public opinion the partnerships created between these social actors, the National Action Plan was prepared to implement the contents of the Beijing Platform for Action and to ensure the realisation of the commitments made by Turkey at the Conference. This National Action Plan was formulated by the specialised commission made up of the representatives of women’s NGOs, academic experts and relevant state institutions. It was finalised in December 1996 and conveyed to the United Nations.
  1. One of the most significant steps taken in Turkey towards the empowerment of women since the Beijing Conference has been the implementation of 8-Year Compulsory Basic Education Law of 1997. In Turkey one of the main shortcomings of women’s education has always been the relatively low level of secondary school enrolment for the girl-child. This has been attributed to economic and cultural factors which deter the girl-child from continuing school after compulsory basic education. Thus, it is aimed that the enrolment levels of the girl-child will rise with the increase of compulsory basic education from 5 to 8 years. It is also expected that the new law will ensure that the critically aged girl-child will remain in the education system for longer period of time and thereby enhance her awareness of her individuality. In addition, it is planned that the girl child – who is following only 5 years of compulsory basic education could be swayed into different vocational education fields (as well as into religious education) by conservative parents and communities – will now have enhanced opportunities and freedom in her choice of secondary, teriary and vocational education. 8-year compulsory basic education is also expected to raise the marriage and child birth ages by keeping the girl child in the educational system for a longer period of time.
  2. The national Strategic plan and Action Plan for the improvement of women’s health were formulated in follow-up to the Cairo and Beijing Conferences. This combined with enhanced inter-sectoral co-operation; the relevant legislation for family planning; and, the importance placed on physical infrastructure and human resource training has been a major preliminary result of 1998 Turkish Demographic and Health Survey confirm the overall improvement in women’s health. The preliminary results of the Survey reveal that: the rate of fertility has declined from 4,1 percent in 1980-1985 period to 2.6 percent in 1995-1998 period, a sharpen decline in infant mortality has been observed during the recent decades – it was estimated to be 53 per thousand live-birth in 1994 which is now 43 per thousand live-births, similar tendency has also been observed for maternal mortality.
  3. Another landmark gain has been the adoption of the Law for the protection of the Family, on 17 January 1998. With this piece of legislation, the issue domestic violence was addressed for the first time in Turkey. The law grants third partied the right to file complaints of domestic violence and makes it possible for judges to place restraining orders against the family member who has used violence in the home, thereby ensuring that the perpetrator is kept away from the victims.
  4. As of May 1997, an amendment has been made to Article 153 of the Turkish Civil Code, whereby women may now retain their maiden names following marriage if they wish to do so.
  5. With an amendment made to the Income Tax Law in 1998, the income declaration of married women, independent of the conjugal union has been made possible, Women can now independently declare their income as individual tax payers.
  6. In 1996, the Constitutional Court annulled Article 441 of the Turkish Penal Code on Adultery (of the husband) on the grounds that the said article violated the principle of equality before the law, because Article 440 of the same code regulated the adultery (of the wife) differently. Such different treatment of adultery for husband and wife respectively in Articles 441 and 440 had also ran counter to the provisions of the Convention on the Elimination of All Kinds of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). Subsequently in 1998, the Constitutional Court also annulled Article 440) on the adultery of wives) on similar grounds. Currently, adultery is no longer defined as a crime under the Penal Code; it, however, continues to constitute grounds for divorce equally for both spouses in civil proceedings.
  7. Declaration of civil status, entailing the descriptive phrases of “married/single/widowed/divorced” in officially issued identity cards has also been changed in 1997 and limited to the statement of “married” or “single” as applicable. This, it was envisioned, would protect individuals particularly single women, from the possible pejorative associations made with being divorced or widowed.
  8. Also, in 1998 for the first time since the establishment of the Turkish Grand National Assembly, a special parliamentary investigative commission for gender discrimination was formed. This ad hoc commission completed its work in July 1998 and in its first final report recommended that Turkey withdraw its reservations to CEDAW; that gender mainstreaming be integrated in all policies; and that temporary special measures be taken in the education, labour and politics to ensure equality. The ad hoc commission also recommended the formation of a parliamentary Standing Commission on Gender Equality.
A critical area that has not been prioritised in the National Action Plan of turkey was Women’s Human Rights this was because in the selection of the prioritised critical areas of Turkey human rights of women was viewed as an issue cross cutting all areas of concern. In this regard, improvements made within the regulatory policy frameworks (de jure) and de facto gains made towards the empowerment of women in Turkey have been effective in promoting protecting and enhancing the human rights of women. Thus in this field (human rights of women) there has been significant improvement compared to the situation in year 1995. Specific references have been supplied above in Under Major Achievements. It is difficult to claim that in Turkey, the goals of gender equality and advancement of women are pursued as priority goals in relation to other public policy issues. That bureaucracies are often not receptive to agendas which challenge their organisational patterns continues to be one of the major impediments to gender equality policies in general. Turkey is no exception in this resistance. Nevertheless, the national machinery for women in Turkey is targeted to establish strong ties with its constituency in order to create effective strategies for institutionalisation of women’s interest; and, to prepare strategies based on building multi-faceted alliances for change. Eight of the twelve critical areas identified in the Beijing Platform for Action have been prioritised in the National Action Plan for Turkey as per the national conditions and priorities and as per the commitments made by Turkey at the 4th World Conference on Women. The eight priority critical areas are as follows:

Education of Women

The Girl Child

Women and Health

Violence against Women

Women and the Economy

Women in Decision Making Processes

Institutional Mechanism for Women’s Advancement

Women and the Media

These selected priority areas of concern can be categorised under three main headings. The first concerns areas that are considered as indispensable background forces for the empowerment of women (education, health, economy, the girl child). The second category concerns (national mechanisms) those issues and areas related to securing the state’s active and leading support for the advancement of women, an area very familiar to and relevant for the Turkish historical experience. The third and final category concerns implementation areas which are considered most effective in transforming such forces as religion, tradition, custom and ‘private sphere’ values which often play the key roles in legitimising and perpetuating gender inequality and discrimination against women (Violence against Women, Women and the Media, Women in Decision Making Processes).

Mainstreaming the gender perspective in all polices, plans and programmes has been an on-going process in Turkey, albeit still at its initial stages. In its efforts to mainstream gender equality, with an agenda setting approach and to devise strategies to make institutions more receptive to and accountable for gender equality, Turkey employs a universal understanding which is also sensitive to the national local context.

The State Ministry Responsible for Women’s Affairs, Family and Child Protection has established policy dialogue with all relevant ministries in order to translate policy statements into concrete policies. One of substantive outcomes in this area of work has been the efforts to establish gender local points at governor’s offices within the context of ensuring a decentralised structure. Gender focal points have been established in 12 provinces in the absence of local branches of the Ministry. These local points have started to serve as centres of information dissemination and services provision.

The above referred effort to establish the parliamentary Standing Committee on Gender Equality is also considered as a gender mainstreaming strategy as the targeted goal is to ensure gender equality at all levels through legislative means and executive action. Also the State Planning Organisation with its five year development plans and annual programs gave a valuable source for gender mainstreaming activities.

Both the content and importance of the notion of gender equality as perceived by the public have been systematically and rapidly transformed since the 1980s until today. In this connection, it is observed that in the 1990s, political parties and the media in particular approach the subject of gender equality and the social status of women in a more egalitarian manner through an anti-discriminative perspective.

Following the activism of the women’s movement of 1980s, political parties perceived that integration of gender equality policies in party programmes would enhance their scope for receiving public attention, their visibility as well as public support. Though much of the party programmes cover the gender equality issues at the rhetoric levels, it has nevertheless become apparent to political parties that gender policies should comprise a substantial part of their discourse. In this context, several political parties, including some leading ones, have set women’s quotas in 1990s. These quotas have indeed been pioneer implementation of affirmative action, although most are limited to internal party politics and have not been reflected in parliamentary representation.

Lately, the issue of the increasing the representation of women in the parliament has been kept quite visible on the national agenda through the national press and particularly by the many prominent columnists commenting on the issue. Such visibility has been achieved due to the establishment and operation of a very outspoken non-governmental organisation (Association for Support and Training of Women Candidates – KADER) whose mandate is focused on women’s increased representation in the parliament and other governing bodies.

Much in the same vein in the recent past, media sensitivity to the issue of violence against women has been significantly increased through the efforts of the national machinery and the non-governmental organisations.

There has also been a proliferation of Women’s Studies Programmes and Research Centres in academic institutions throughout the country since the mid 1990s. the national machinery has been a key factor in the regard through channelling financial support for such operations. These research centres have been particularly successful in developing the necessary human resources for gender equality and for sensitising public officials – including law enforcement personnel and labour unions – through short term training programmes. The close co-operation between academic institutions and the national machinery for women has ensured the sustenance of a feminist perspective in the setting and implementation of the national agenda.

Turkey, as most countries in similar conditions, is effected by the political, social and economic implications of globalisation. Through the second half of the 1970s, Turkey abandoned its import substitution industrialisation policies in favour of export led growth policies to overcome the debt crisis and the accompanying budget deficit and high inflation rates. In 1980, the first Structural Adjustment Policies (SAPs) were implemented. As in all such programme, the adjustment policies in Turkey entailed two main elements: stabilisation and structural adjustment.

Structural adjustment commenced with monetary policies and money market (de) regulations, and soon shifted emphasis onto regulations pertaining to the public sector, the agricultural sector, and the state enterprises. Deregulation of the money market, followed by deregulation in the labour, goods and services markets and wage limitations impacted, albeit indirectly, women's equal participation in the economic and social spheres. Women's labour concentration in the free trade zone multinational corporate operations - as in the SAP experiences of South Asia and South America - did not take place in Turkey. Instead, women's labour became increasingly concentrated in the informal, non-registered economy. This is corroborated by much of the data indicating a significant and steady decline of the female labour force participation rates. While the female labour force participation rate was 34 percent in 1990, the same figure for 1998 is 27.9 percent.

Economic policies geared towards debt reduction directly or indirectly supported the informal sector. These policies rested on increasing the competitiveness of the export industries through shifting the production mechanism to labour intensive operations of small to medium scale sub contracting arrangements. The increased shift of production to the labour intensive informal sector has had the following consequences: (1) women have begun to enter the labour force at increasingly younger ages and some even at childhood; (2) women have been employed at substandard labour conditions with no social security: (3) due to low wages and difficult labour conditions in general, and due to pressures of household production (under the increasingly prevalent household production subcontract arrangements), women's recreational and sleep times have been reduced drastically.

The increased demand for skilled labour of the service sector particularly financial sector, on the other hand, led men to leave the public sector beginning by 1980s where the wages are traditionally lower than that of private sector. Instead, women have taken up the public sector jobs vacated by men. Women's labour in the public sector is concentrated in traditional jobs such as nursing, teaching. Nevertheless, 27.5 percent of middle to upper level public management cadres are occupied by women. Thus, although the public sector continues to shrink, it seems to provide some opportunities for women.

In the last two decades, unemployment levels in general, and women's unemployment in particular have risen significantly. Women's unemployment, on the other hands, is continuously higher than that of men's. Official statistics place urban women's unemployment rate at 19 percent. Recent studies, however, reveal that urban women's unemployment rate for the four major cities (Istanbul, Ankara, Adana, Izmir) runs in the environs of 35 percent. The unemployment rates are highest among young women of secondary school level education. While it may not be thoroughly warranted to relate unemployment to SAPs alone, the prioritisation of anti-inflationary policies has very much made unemployment an often invisible issue in government programmes, but a burning reality in everyday life.

The export led growth paradigm has also led to enhanced small and medium scale enterprise (SME) development. While SME development is often considered as a panacea against the negative social impacts of SAPs, it has had the externality of promoting women's entrepreneurship in Turkey. Credit policies have provided incentives to women entrepreneurs. Furthermore, training programmes for increasing women's financial literacy levels have been systematised. In this regard, the co-operation between The Directorate General on the Status and Problems of Women and the People's Bank (the national SME credit lending bank) in training activities is considered as a gain for women. Therefore, the Directorate General is presently seeking to institutionalise this co-operation framework. As of 1998, the percentage of women among the self employed in Turkey is 8.8.

Recent studies also point that SAPs - still being implemented at a certain extend - have has negative consequences on the income distribution. According to the income distribution survey conducted by the State Institute of Statistics in 1994, income distribution disparities are increasingly widening.

The largest income distribution disparity is between male headed households and female headed households. In the lowest 20 percent of income bracket, the household income for female headed households is an average US$ 1.484. In the highest 20% of the income earners bracket the same average figures for female and male headed household is UD$ 11.198, and US$ 27.720 respectively. The disparities are most acute in urban areas where household income for female and male headed households is US$ 4.854 and US# 10.472 respectively.

Women and children are clearly most affected by the income distribution disparities. The falls in income and consequently living standards, compel women to take on marginal jobs to supplement the falling earnings. Falling income levels also compel women to spend more time on household production activities - spending more time in the market to buy cheaper goods. Several studies indicate a negative correlation between income level and time spent on household production. Income losses due to sustained high inflation have the impact of increasing poor women's household labour. While not specifically treated in any empirical study, it is also argued that women's nutritional intake levels are declining as women prioritise the nutritional intake of other family members (especially of their children) and give up on their own nutritional needs to compensate for the low purchasing power.

Although the share of the agricultural sector in the national economy continues to shrink, this sector is still the largest employer of women. Women in this sector often work as unpaid family workers. Nevertheless, agricultural work has had the tendency to contribute to women's socialisation to a certain extend and thereby to social integration of women and to women's enhanced participation in decision making processes at the local context. However, increasing levels of urbanisation (internal migration) and as a consequence increased urban unemployment of women have meant that women have lost this limited opportunity for socialisation.

Furthermore, women and children face increased difficulties in accession to health and education services. Budgetary allocations for education and health have continued to decline. This in turn has further limited the access of women and the girl child to social services. The budgetary allocations for the health and education sector verify this statement. The latest (1998) budgetary allocation for education was 11.1 of the consolidated budget. Nevertheless, it should also be underlined that despite the limited allocation of financial resources to education services before 1997, the national demand for education, especially for girls, has become increasingly vocal over the years. This is especially important as Turkey is often susceptible to changes due to its unique position in the world.

PART TWO

Financial and Institutional Measures

  1. Historically gender equality and the advancement of women have not been addressed in the national budget at an adequate level. The budgetary allocations made for The Directorate General on the Status and Problems of Women constitute the only purely gender related national budget item. Nevertheless, some limited parts of the budgetary allocations of the Ministries of Health and Education have been utilised for gender equality purposes (budgetary allocations for technical vocational schools for girls, the allocations for the Ministry of Health Department for Mother and Child Health etc.). The lack of appropriate classification in the national budget system, does not permit us to present even the rough figures on gender related budgetary allocations. In addition, there is lack of pressure no governments to become gender sensitive, since women's NGOs and women bureaucrats historically do not have much of knowledge on budgetary issues. The Director General is presently planning to initiate "awareness raising programmes on gender budgeting" to create a frame work for gender sensitive budgetary policies.

    2. As indicated earlier, the SAPs have firmly recommended austerity measures in order to eliminate the budget deficits. These cuts have also affected the national machinery for women (The Directorate General on the Status and Problems of Women) and its capability both in qualitative and quantitative terms. Budgetary allocations of the national machinery have gone even further below than the 0.0001 percent of the consolidated budget. In addition, the national machinery is beset by staffing shortcomings.

    Furthermore, Turkey's status in terms of international technical co-operation programmes is not always consistent, with Turkey being an ODA recipient and donor country at the same time. This often disadvantages Turkey in attracting international funds for gender equality projects in the already very competitive process for funds mobilisation. Nevertheless, over the 1992-1998 period approximately US$ 2.750.000 has been mobilised from international technical co-operation agencies, such as UNDP, the Japanese Grand Fund and the World Bank for specific projects. Among these, partnership with UNDP since early 1990s have proved that significant contribution to enhance the various programmes of the Directorate.

  2. a. The national machinery which is entitled The Directorate General on the Status and Problems of Women (DGSPW) is the main national agency mandated to institutionalise the follow-up and implementation of the PFA.
This national mechanism was established in 1990. While such national mechanism are generally established during the governments of left wing or social democrat policies, in Turkey the DGSPW was established under the right wing party which encompassed four different political tendencies in it.

The Directorate General was established in this political conjuncture during which the women's movement was not adequately consulted. Therefore, the DGSPW mission statement contained some conservatism in its gender perspective which led to intensive criticisms at the civil society level. Nevertheless, the management and personnel who have staffed the Directorate since its inception have a keen feminist perspective. They maintain close dialogue with the national women's movement and academics and follow international developments in this regard with great meticulousness. All this has contributed to the Directorate's enhanced capacity to shape gender policies and set the national agenda on gender equality.

While women's right advocates of the 1970s and 80s all around the world, sought to "integrate women in development", the national mechanism in Turkey has instead adopted a "transformative" approach, in light of the specific national level conditions. It has sought to transform all public institutions that make up the society through "entryism" policies.

DGSPW was the co-ordinating body for the preparations of the 4th World Conference on Women, immediately following the Conference, organised a brainstorming session to put in place the follow up mechanisms and tools. One of the proposal emanating form these sessions was the establishment of a High Level Advisory Committee composed of all relevant actors. The Committee was envisioned as co-ordinating and realising a system-wide follow-up process. This Committee was also planned to be composed of high level representatives from state agencies and non-governmental organisations in order to facilitate gender mainstreaming. Due to frequent government changes, however, the planned High Level Advisory Committee did not convene. The DGSPW has instead arranged several small scale meetings to keep pace with the developments in line with the 12 critical areas of concern in the PFA. Indeed, the entire spectrum of the activities carried out by the State Ministry responsible for Women and the Family and by the Directorate can be considered as follow-up Activities realised in close co-operation with women's NGOs.

In 1996, a large scale meeting, convening all relevant state actors and NGOs as well as the academia was held by the Directorate General for preparation of the national action plan for the implementation of PFA. The DGSPW undertook translation and dissemination of the PFA as one of the immediate follow-up activities.

Women's Studies Programs and Research Centres (currently 13 women studies and research centres and programs exist) established at the national universities are also consider here as follow-up mechanisms since they have been instrumental in organising seminars and activities on follow up to the Beijing Conference, yielding to a substantial number of articles and documents.

Special Commissions on (1) Health; (2) Education; (3) Employment; and (4) Law were established in 1997 in follow up to the Beijing Conference under the co-ordination of DGSPW. These specialised commissions have brought together related non-governmental organisations and have functioned as consultative bodies for the implementation of the NPA. (Please see para. (c) below)

Gender dissaggragated data has been compiled, produced and disseminated as a tool to assess the performance of governments in specific gender development fields as well as to hold government accountable.

 3. b. Efforts to Co-ordinate Various Follow-up Activities to World Conferences National level follow up of the world conferences are co-ordinated by selected individual governmental agencies whose mandate corresponds to the sectors covered by the Conference in question. Despite the multiplicity of agencies, each tasked with follow-up of separate world conferences, the co-ordination among them has been quite smooth due to the establishment of specific inter-agency co-ordination mechanisms. Co-ordination committees have created the venue for representatives of the relevant ministries and other public bodies as well as NGOs to voice their points of view as well as specific demands and interests. In this connection, the Directorate General on the Status and Problems of Women (DGSPW) has made a special effort to work in co-operation and co-ordination with the related institutions. The DGSPW arranged several co-ordination meetings, along this line, to exchange views on the various global conferences and to identify common policies and strategies emanating from them. The main objective in this regards has been to build partnerships and alliances for gender mainstreaming.

In particular, mention should be made of the follow up activities to the Vienna Human Rights Conferences. Initial follow up activities were first carried out by the Board of Monitors established at the premises of the State Ministry responsible for human Rights. This board convened representatives of relevant government agencies. NGOs as well as experts. Following successful institutionalisation processes, the Board was replaced by the permanent Secretariat for the High Board of Co-ordination on Human Rights. The Secretariat is tasked with integration of human rights concerns in government plans and policies. It announced, soon after its establishment, the commencement of the International Decade for Human Rights Education. One of the most important achievements in this regard, has been the introduction of human rights, including women's rights, in primary and high school curricula in 1995.

The follow-up to the United National Conference on Population and Development in Cairo is being carried out under the supervision of the State Planning Organisation under whose auspices a Co-ordination Council was established. Representatives of relevant government bodies participated actively in the co-ordination works. As an executive body, the Ministry of Health played a crucial role to realise the commitments made at the ICPD and the FWCW. Some relevant follow up activities are as follows:

Traditional mother and child health and family planning (MCH/FP) approach has been replaced by women's health and a comprehensive reproductive health (RH) approach whereby RH problems of adolescents, reproductive age, post menopausal and elderly women are addressed.

Population and RH targets and strategies are included in the 7th Five Year Development Plan.

The "Population Planning Advisory Board" was reorganised as "Women's Health and Family Planning Advisory Board" following the ICPD. This Board convenes representatives from the government agencies and NGOs. The Women's Health and Family Planning Strategic Plan was formulated in co-ordination with all concerned parties. The Plan covers the fields of service provision, empowerment of women, public health education, gender sensitive training of health personnel.

In 1997, seventeen NGOs came together in a first time ever experience in Turkey to form a women's health commission entitled KASAKOM which was known as a health commission before (please see part 2.2). KASAKOM formulated and implements a project targeting improvement of RH levels of women in the less developed regions of the country. The KASAKOM project is supported by the UNDP under the execution of The Directorate General on the Status and Problems of Women.

 3.c. Role of Non-Governmental organisations The Directorate General on the Status and Problems of Women pays special attention to involving NGOs and supporting the government in implementing regional, national and international commitments. The DGSPW recognises the civil society as an important source of support and legitimacy and continues to strengthen its relationship with the civil society through regular consultations. The DGSPW engages civil society organisations in implementing capacity under the projects and programmes it executes through international technical co-operation programmes, notably with the UNDP. In addition, women's NGOs are partners to the activities of the DGSPW, especially through their strong representation and vocal participation in the four commissions established following the Beijing Conference. through these commission on (1) Education; (2) Health (KASAKOM); (3) Employment; and, (4) the Law. NGOs support the setting of the gender equality agenda and advocate women's interests. These referred commissions aim to expedite the implementation and monitoring of the PFA.