This year’s W20 summit, themed “Women-Led Development: Transform, Thrive, and Transcend,” washeld in Mahabalipuram, Tamil Nadu State, India, between June 14 and 17. KADEM, who was the chair forthe Turkish delegation, carried out activities aimed at empowering women under five main headings.

This year’s mission of Women 20, hosted by India, was determined to “remove all obstacles to women-led development and provide an enabling environment and ecosystem for women to develop and transform their own lives and the lives of other women.” At the W20 summit, where KADEM was the chair of theTurkish delegation and India was the hosting chair of the summit, activities aimed at empowering women in five basic areas were carried out. These were:

In the session titled “Call to Action: Breaking the Glass Ceiling”, W20 Türkiye Delegation Head Dr. Nursem Keskin Aksay participated as a panelist. KADEM Board Member Aksay talked about KADEM’s fields of activity and the women’s profile in Türkiye. She also shared her own glass ceiling experiences that she encountered in Germany as a headscarved Muslim academician.

Other panels held at the W20 summit focused on areas such as “the journey to achieve sustainable development goals, protecting our world with women-led climate movements, closing the gender gap in technology, breaking the glass ceiling, and economic empowerment through trade and investment.” The summit also featured stories of women entrepreneurs supported in rural areas in the Tamil Nadu region by the National Rural Development Mission of the Ministry of Rural Development of India.

W20 2023 Communique prepared to be presented to the G20 Summit in September

At the end of the four-day summit, the declaration and policy recommendations created by consensus by the delegates and the W20 secretariat were shared with the drafting committee. The draft committee edited all suggestions and recommendations and shared them with the chief coordinator and heads of delegations.

The W20 2023 Communiqué, which reached a consensus at the end of the last negotiations, was announced. The declaration will be presented by each country’s delegates to their sherpas, and their evaluations will be taken into consideration and forwarded to the W20 India Coordination Office.

It is intended that the decisions taken after these evaluations, as well as the policy recommendations and action plans proposed by the W20, will be included in the declaration at the G20 Leaders Summit, which will be held in Delhi between September 9 and 11.

Women’s empowerment, women’s rights advocacy, and making women’s voices heard in society are the main objectives of the W20. It also aims to ensure that the G20 Leaders’ Declaration includes commitments and measures that support gender equality and women’s economic empowerment.

In addition to the summit, the KADEM delegation visited NGOs and embassies in India

As the W20 summit came to an end, the KADEM delegation made institutional visits and field work in New Delhi. In addition to the courtesy visit to Turkish Ambassador Fırat Sünel, who served in India, Bhutan, and Nepal, meetings, experience sharing, and cooperation visits were made to the Smile Foundation and Muslim Women Welfare Organisation NGOs that carry out activities throughout India. Following the official meetings, the KADEM delegation examined the important works of Turkish-Islamic architecture in India. (Qutb Minar, Jama Masjid, Tomb of Humayun, Taj Mahal, and Tomb of Itmad’ud Daulah)