The contributions that women make to the economic, social, and political lives of their nations, communities, families and the next generation make them key actors in effective development. More than 800 million women are economically active worldwide -- in agriculture, small and microenterprise, and, increasingly, in the export processing industries that drive globalization.Over 70 percent of these women live in the developing regions of Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Women's unemployment rates remain high relative to those of men, and when employed, they are paid less than men for the same work. It is not surprising, then, that women constitute 60 percent of the rural poor.

Limitations on women's legal rights and participation in civil society are widespread. Political leadership positions are still largely occupied by men although women have increasingly provided dynamic leadership in the nongovernmental (NGO) and small enterprise sectors. Legal restrictions on women's land and property ownership continue to hamper women's ability to acquire productive assets and to reduce their vulnerability when family or other crises affect them. Girls' education has been shown to have a dramatic impact on women's earning power and on families' welfare but progress toward gender equality in education still lags, both in absolute terms and relative to those of boys.

Conflict and crisis appears to have a disproportionate impact on women. Not only do they suffer the immediate impacts of the conflict including violence, loss of income and displacement, but women must try to provide for and protect their families, as well as themselves from starvation, rape, trafficking, bodily harm and disease.

Promoting a stronger and more productive role for women in development demands a broad and flexible approach. USAID's approach to gender integration is to design programs that take both women's and men's participation into account. When this is done development programs are more effective.