China: Law On Women

From the Peoples Daily Online:

A senior Chinese legislator has called for greater efforts to promote women's awareness and ability to safeguard their legitimate rights and interests.

Chen Zhili, vice chairwoman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, China's top legislature, made the remarks during a week-long inspection tour of the eastern Shandong Province ending Wednesday.

Chen was sent by the top legislature to inspect how local law enforcement agencies implemented the Law on the Protection of the Rights and Interests of Women.

The law, which took effect on Dec. 1, 2005, had played an important role in protecting women's legitimate rights, raising their social status and mobilized them in the country's modernization drive in an active and innovative manner, she said.

She called for more efforts to publicize the law to make people aware of the law's significance in protecting women's rights.

Women & Mathematics

From the Hindu:

The Minister said India would hold an International Congress of Mathematicians later this year in Hyderabad. It had won the bid to host the prestigious event against stiff competition from Canada and Australia at the ICM held in 2006.

The congress has been held continuously every four years since 1897 except for breaks during the two world wars. The coming session, from August 19 to 27, will be the first ever to be held in India. It will only be the third time Asia is hosting the Congress — after a congress in Kyoto in 1990 and another in Beijing in 2002.

Women & Science

From VOA - Too Few Women In Science:

Two new studies have investigated why fewer females, compared to males, study and work in the so called STEM subjects in the United States. Those subjects are science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

The American Association of University Women examined existing research. Its report, called “Why So Few?,” also suggested ways to interest more girls and women in the STEM fields. The researchers found that cultural and environmental factors make a difference.

Researcher Christianne Corbett says more boys than girls score very high on math tests in most countries. She says Iceland and Thailand are exceptions.

From Scientific American - Veteran Women BioMed Researchers Shortchanged:

You might expect young women scientists to make less than older men. But veteran female life science researchers, even in very advanced positions, still make less than their male counterparts. So finds a report in the journal Academic Medicine.

Women in the same academic positions as men worked more hours. But they made on average six to 15,000 dollars less per year than their male counterparts.

Jean-Claude Rochefort - Masculinist Activist

From the Toronto Sun:

Jean-Claude Rochefort, the man who defended the actions of killer Marc Lepine on his blog failed in his attempt to be released from jail Wednesday.

The court noted in its judgment that Rochefort's blog "invited men to kill women solely because they are women."

Rochefort, 61, defended his blog, which sung the praises of Lepine, the shooter behind the 1989 massacre that killed 14 women at Montreal's Ecole Polytechnique. Lepine committed the shooting after multiple failed attempts to get into the school himself. He blamed feminism for ruining his life and disagreed with women being allowed to work in jobs that had been traditionally reserved for men.

The Crown, meanwhile, tried unsuccessfully to bring charges of inciting hatred towards women against Rochefort.

Rochefort will stand trial on May 3 for other accusations of uttering death threats against women, which carries a maximum penalty of five years in jail.

Dinkum Assorted

From ABC North Queensland:

It's 1942. The men have gone to war and the women of a small Australian town called Warrabadanga rally together to... make biscuits ?

Townsville's Little Theatre's first production of 2010 is Dinkum Assorted.

Set against the backdrop of the Second World War, the play centres on the women who work in Jamieson's biscuit factory and the plan they are cooking up to save their jobs and keep their group together.

It also addresses the issues of isolation and uncertainty that those left behind by the war were facing.

Director Karen Vane says she was keen to present the human stories of war.

"A lot of the battle stories have been told, but when Linda Aronson wrote this for instance there was a great dearth of stories about the other people, the people who stayed at home".

Dinkum Assorted is bright, cheerful and musical, but Ms Vane says behind the upbeat Aussie larrikinism, there's a real poignancy to the play.

"Interspersed with that are stories about (little touches about) the fact that they are without their men and some of them they don't know where their men are".

The season of Dinkum Assorted starts on Wednesday the 7th of April.

Singapore: Women Honoured

From the Straits Times:

THE Singapore Council of Women's Organisations (SCWO), the umbrella body for women's groups here, has inducted two politicians to their Wall of Fame.

Cabinet Minister Lim Hwee Hua and Minister of State for Community Development, Youth and Sports Yu-Foo Yee Shoon were honoured last night for being pioneers in the public service.

Mrs Lim, 51, is the first woman to become a full Cabinet minister, while Mrs Yu-Foo, 60, was the first woman to become a mayor here.

They are among only nine women inducted to the Wall of Fame, launched in 2005 to recognise women who have improved the lives of other women here.

The accolades were part of the celebrations at the SCWO's 30th anniversary fund-raising dinner at the Shangri-La Hotel last night.

It was attended by 450 guests, including its patron, Mrs S R Nathan, who was guest of honour.

UK: Asian Women & Government

From BBC News:

It is a job that, so far, no British Asian woman has done - but that looks set to change after the general election.

A record 22 Asian women are running to become Labour, Liberal Democrat and Conservative MPs in England and Scotland.

It has taken quite a while to get to this stage.

The first Asian male MP was elected in 1892, when Dadabhai Naoroji, an Indian, took the seat of Finsbury, central London, for the Liberals.

Almost 120 years later nine Asian male MPs have been elected, but still no Asian women. So, 118 years after the doors of the Palace of Westminster first opened to an Asian MP, Asian women could be following soon.

Canada: Minority Women & Health

From UPI:

Immigrant women -- especially South Asian, West Asian or Arab women -- say they have trouble accessing healthcare in Canada, researchers found.

Researchers at St. Michael's Hospital and the Institute for Clinical and Evaluative Sciences found more than 50 percent of South Asian, West Asian or Arab adults say they were not very satisfied with their ability to get an appointment with a doctor for a regular checkup.

Nearly 40 percent of East and Southeast Asian and 34 percent of Aboriginal adults reported having difficulties when accessing a specialist compared with 22 percent of white Ontario residents.

The study also found that 15 percent of Canadian immigrants for less than five years do not have a primary care doctor, compared to 7.3 percent of Canadian-born men and women who say they don't have primary care doctor.

Business Council of Australia: Mentor Groups

From The Australian:

THE lack of women in senior positions in the top 200 listed companies has prompted the Business Council of Australia to launch a mentoring scheme to help rising female stars move into chief executive jobs.

The one-year pilot scheme is designed to develop a bigger pipeline of women executives as "we're simply not seeing enough women reach senior executive roles'', BCA president Graham Bradley said yesterday.

Under the pilot scheme, promising senior woman executives who have the potential to become a CEO or chief financial officer will be mentored by a chief executive from another company.

Eleven prominent male CEOs, including Commonwealth Bank chief Ralph Norris and Woolworths' Michael Luscombe, have signed up to be mentors.