Taking into account the needs, priorities and opinions of both women and men of the territory, ensuring that both benefit equally from social change and economic growth, and that gender inequalities are eliminated, are all essential for the success of any local economic development (LED) strategy aimed at creating decent work opportunities. However, in societies where women’s participation in public affairs is severely restricted by tradition, economic disadvantage and lower education this is easier said than done.

Obtaining the full participation of women in an LED process will require overcoming deeply entrenched discriminatory attitudes and challenging existing power structures. Where women enjoy relatively equal access to decision-making structures and resources, the LED approach will serve to strengthen their participation in the private sector, paying greater attention to their needs in terms of business development services (BDS), access to financial resources, association-building, knowledge about rights, rules and regulations, etc.

While national policy should provide an enabling environment for gender mainstreaming, it must be accompanied by targeted interventions at the local level. These, if carried out consistently over a certain period of time, generally yield perceptible results.

Objectives of this module
This guide is designed to assist LED practitioners – staff from international organizations, international development agencies and local authorities– in identifying and addressing the sometimes different needs and priorities of women and men, facilitating their full participation at every stage of the LED process, and contributing to gender equality objectives and outcomes.

Using this guide will enable practitioners to:

• understand why gender equality should be pursued at the local level;
• be aware of the barriers to women’s participation that may be encountered; and
• identify and implement strategies for addressing gender concerns throughout the LED process.

Since gender mainstreaming should be context-specific, the recommendations made must be considered as indicative guidelines rather than recipes for action. Under each section, reference is made to tools, further readings and checklists that can be used in project design, implementation, and monitoring and evaluation.

Structure
The first part of this module introduces key concepts, describes the potential role that women and men can play in the local economy, and points out the barriers to women’s representation and participation that need to be overcome. Questions that this guide strives to answer in this section are:

• How are gender equality, gender mainstreaming and gender budgeting defined?
• What is the link between gender equality and decent work?
• Why is gender equality important for local economic development?

The second part recalls the basic characteristics of LED and identifies strategies that have been and can be used to reduce gender gaps and strengthen women’s participation in each of the six phases of the LED process. Questions that this section answers are:

• Which measures can enhance an equal participation of women and men in decisionmaking structures at the local level?
• How can the potential contribution of women and men to the local economy in their different capacities be promoted and strengthened?
• How can local economic development strategies and implementation structures be made gender-responsive?

The module concludes with a precautionary note about the time frame required to achieve gender equality at the local level.