To celebrate the International Day of Rural Women, Potohar Organization for Development Advocacy (PODA) organized its 15th Annual Rural Women Leadership Conference 2022, from 13 to 15  October 2022 at Lok Virsa, Islamabad. The conference was attended by over 700 rural women from 117 districts of Pakistan. The theme of this conference was: “Rural Women’s Leadership in Disaster Risk Reduction & Good Governance”. In addition, the conference was attended by university students, media persons, academicians, and researchers.

Federal Minister for Planning, Professor Ahsan Iqbal, Federal Minister for Human Rights, Mian Riaz Husain Pirzada also spoke in the conference. The Chairperson of National Commission on the Status of Women and Chairpersons of Provincial Commission on the Status of Women of Sindh, Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Balochistan, Azad Kashmir, and Gilgit-Baltistan also participated in the conference. The conference was widely covered by national and regional media. It was also broadcast live on PODA’s Facebook page.

The conference participants, especially those who had come from flood-hit areas, highlighted issues facing rural women and also took part in deliberations put together a Charter of Demand (Resolution), which was adopted by the conference participants. Post-conference, PODA will formally submit this Resolution with the relevant Federal Government Ministries, Provincial Government Departments, as well as the donor organisations, and will launch a follow-up plan to document the impact of the conference at policy and operational level.

This conference was supported by the EU Delegation to Pakistan, GIZ-Pakistan, UNICEF-Pakistan, National Endowment for Democracy, while Lok Virsa provided logistic support.