24th World Conf report.doc
Version date: Oct. 10, 2005
Page 34 / 52
ISGF 24
th
World Conference 2005
Conference Report
is the gem in the WAGGGS leadership calendar with its excellence and renown making it an
opportunity of a lifetime for the young women selected to attend.
Our four World Centres in London, Switzerland, Mexico and India enjoyed continuing
popularity with last year hosting the highest number of guests so far. During the year, 3000
participants took part in programmes at the World Centres. Sangam held 13 international
events while Pax Lodge enjoyed a record number of visitors from 45 Member Organizations.
One of WAGGGS' key strengths is its work with the United Nations. WAGGGS has teams of
UN representatives in six UN cities: Geneva, Nairobi, New York, Paris, Rome and Vienna.
These volunteers represent WAGGGS and its interests at UN meetings and during UN
activities. Each team speaks on behalf of girls and young women.
Through our UN representatives, WAGGGS enjoyed high profiles at the Commission on the
Status of Women in New York both in 2004 and in 2005. In 2004, two young women from
Africa spoke about their work as peace ambassadors at a packed workshop and in 2005, two
young women from Germany and Pakistan addressed delegates on gender equality. Other
key UN events attended included the World Summit on Information Society, World Health
Organization regional meetings in Denmark, the Maldives and the Philippines and UNESCO
and UNICEF meetings to discuss youth participation in decision making.
In Rome, our inspirational UN team has established an exciting partnership with the Food
and Agriculture Organization and are producing a cartoon booklet on the right to food. This
will be translated into many different languages and distributed around the world to help
young people understand more about their right to food. This is part of the WAGGGS
triennial theme: Our Rights, Our Responsibilities. The Greek Girl Guides Association have
also developed a new area of the theme: in 2004 they created the Olympia Badge to mark
the return of the Games to their birthplace in Greece. The badge promotes sporting activities
and the values of the games, such as peace and cultural understanding. So far 13 countries
have taken part in the badge curriculum and the World Bureau has sent out over 21,000
Badges.
The World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts continues its pioneering work against
HIV and AIDS. In 2004, Lesley Bulman Lever, the WAGGGS chief executive was invited to
become a founder member of the Global coalition on women and AIDS, part of UNAIDS.
Over 70 Member Organizations are currently working on the AIDS Badge curriculum, with
many countries taking an active lead in the fight against HIV and AIDS in their country. For
example, in Kenya, more than 2000 Girl Guides took part in the first International Women's
AIDS run through Nairobi. Kenya's peer education work on AIDS awareness and prevention
has been globally recognised. In Cambodia, young leaders are being trained as prevention
officers and five young leaders from the Thailand Girl Guides Association attended the
International AIDS conference in Bangkok last year where they ran an exhibition booth. In
Uganda, the Association has started a project called the `Uganda Girl Guides reaching out to
people living with HIV and AIDS'.
One of the main focuses of the project is to combat the stigma and ignorance about HIV that
prevails within Ugandan society. "Being part of a group helps you feel like you can live
again," said one member of the project. "The stigma is a real problem and teaches us to
associate HIV with dying. This project wants to show the world that HIV positives are often
happy and healthy, and that it is not HIV that will kill them but ignorance."
The group's main activity is education and advocacy through drama. They have been on tour
with their first performance a play based on one member's own testimony as to how she
contracted the virus and her experiences as a result. The drama not only allows the group to
