NW China's Shaanxi Establishes 1st Silk Road Women's Home

The first Silk Road Women's Home is established in Yangling County.

The unveiling ceremony for the first Silk Road Women's Home was held in Yangling County, northwest China's Shaanxi Province, on July 1, 2016.

Vice-Chairman of the Provincial Women's Federation Shan Hong awarded the "Silk Road Women's Home" sign to the International Exchange Center of Yangling Demonstration Zone and the Women's Federation of Yangling Demonstration Zone.

During his speech at the Global Leaders' Meeting on Gender Equality and Women's Empowerment in September 2015, Chinese President Xi Jinping said: "Women's organizations in different countries should strengthen interactions with each other to enhance friendship, pursue development, and achieve progress together."

"We should continue to carry out women-related international development cooperation. Developed countries should scale up financial and technological assistance to developing countries and narrow the development gaps among women in different countries," Xi added.

Therefore, women's development and foreign exchanges and cooperation have become an important channel for the implementation of the Belt and Road initiative (BRI) and the exchange of thoughts between the peoples living in the countries along the Silk Road.

Since 2005, Yangling has hosted 64 agricultural science and technology training programs for developing countries. More than 1,400 students from over 100 countries have received training.

Shan said that the "Silk Road Women's Home" is an effective platform for the provincial women's federation to implement the requirements of President Xi, integrate and utilize the resources of the government and society to carry out women's foreign exchanges and cooperation, and actively promote the participation of Chinese and foreign women in the BRI construction. 

It is also a concrete measure to innovate the working mechanism and participate in the BRI construction action plan of the province.

She hopes that, on the one hand, the Yangling Demonstration Zone International Exchange Center and the Women's Federation of the Demonstration Zone will be able to innovate their working ideas, make full use of their rich resources for foreign exchanges and cooperation, undertake the task of serving women in developing countries to accelerate their own development, and support women's participation in the construction of the BRI.

On the other hand, they should actively explore ways to institutionalize women's non-governmental exchanges and cooperation, jointly promote women's participation in the BRI construction, share cooperation experiences as well as development results.

In May this year, Shaanxi Women's Federation awarded the friendly organization Inters International Language School in Barcelona, Spain, as the first Silk Road Women's Home outside China.

The Silk Road Women's Home under Barcelona's Inters International Language School will continue to meet the needs of humanities exchanges and cooperation between women and children, family education, etc. along the BRI, explore the functions of women's homes, serve Shannxi's new-staring-point strategy of developing the Silk Road, and serve as a station for exchange and cooperation between women and children in Shaanxi and women and children around the world. 

As of 2014, Shaanxi Women's Federation, closely around the province's BRI strategic deployment, has taken the initiative to incorporate women's foreign exchanges and cooperation into the BRI construction action plan by successively holding events including the International Development and Regional Women's Progress, Silk Road on Fingertips, and the G20 Women's Conference (W20).

All these have achieved good social repercussions and have played an active role in promoting Chinese and foreign women in the participation of the BRI.

(Women of China)