Not far into the future, we are sure, our nation will pay homage to whomever conceived of the initial idea of a project to do research on all Jamaican women and girls, if it comes to pass after today’s symposium ‘Research for All Women and Girls in Jamaica’ at Mona, St Andrew.

This afternoon, the Institute for Gender and Development Studies (IGDS) at The University of the West Indies (The UWI) will team up with United Nations Women and the UN country team in Jamaica to stage that ground-breaking symposium in continued celebration of International Women’s Day.

For the sake of our Jamaican women, and our nation in general, there might be no better way to spend four hours than at The UWI Undercroft. For, if anything is certain, it is that we know not nearly enough about the status of our women and girls — that vital half of our nation.

This special gathering of experts, students, faculty, researchers, and the broader public, we are told, is in keeping with The UWI’s Research Day 2025 theme ‘The UWI Mona: Driving Jamaican, Caribbean and Global Development’, to facilitate impactful conversations on women’s empowerment and offer tangible tools to this end.

It will not be by chance that the symposium coincides with a powerful message from the UN secretary general commemorating International Women’s Day on March 8 but also marking year 30 since the International Year of Women in Beijing, China. Jamaicans will remember it for the leadership of our delegation by Mrs Beverley Anderson-Manley.

Speaking of that momentous occasion, the UN leader said the year of observance was designed to reaffirm women’s rights as a human right and strive to achieve “equality, development and peace for all women, everywhere”.

“Of course, we always knew that would never happen overnight — or even over years. But, three decades on, that promise feels more distant than we might ever have imagined. Women’s rights are under siege. The poison of patriarchy is back — and it is back with a vengeance,” he lamented.

In the past 30 years, he suggested, the world has moved forward in boosting girls’ education, cutting maternal mortality, increasing legal protections, and more. But immense gaps persist.

“Age-old horrors like violence, discrimination, and economic inequality are rife. The gender pay gap still stands at 20 per cent.

Globally, almost one in three women have been subject to violence. And horrific sexual violence in conflict is happening from Haiti to Sudan…

“In many countries, women and girls are still denied the most basic of rights [including] the right not to be raped by your husband… And around the world, hard-won gains are being thrown into reverse [such as] reproductive rights, and equality initiatives.”

It is tragic to hear from him that new technologies, including artificial intelligence, are creating the conditions to allow new platforms for violence and abuse, normalising misogyny, and online revenge.

“Up to 95 per cent of all online deep-fakes are non-consensual pornographic images; 90 per cent depict women. And unequal access to technologies are inflaming existing inequalities.”

Fortunately, he believes that there is an antidote — action. We hope that action of a consequential nature will come out of today’s symposium which promises so much for our Jamaican women and girls.