Abu Dhabi: Melinda Gates, co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, praised the UAE’s leading role in empowering women and eradicating polio across the world.
Gates told a packed house at the majlis of His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces, the UAE had become a model for empowering women and equality in the region and across the world.
Stressing the UAE’s far-sighted leadership that recognises the role played by women in building a society which is full of compassion and mercy, and gives equal opportunities to all its members, Gates also commended the partnership with the UAE saying, “Your unique access and special position in the region — combined with your extraordinary generosity — have been a tremendous asset to the world.”
Speaking about unlocking the potential of women and girls in global development, she emphasised the importance of women as agents of change: “To activate women’s potential as agents of change and position them to break the cycle of poverty, we need to ensure they have three fundamental things: access to health care, decision-making power, and economic opportunity. When we recognise the pivotal role women play in their households and communities and direct resources and programmes towards them, they become some of development’s strongest allies.”
Gates praised the vision of the late Shaikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al Nahyan, founder of the UAE, as well as the role played by Her Highness Shaikha Fatima Bint Mubarak, Chairwoman of the General Women’s Union, Supreme Chairwoman of the Family Development Foundation and President of the Supreme Council for Motherhood and Childhood, in advancing the role of women in the country to become a leader in the region.
She said: “You have an important voice in the global conversation and an important role on the global stage.”
The partnership between the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the UAE responds to the strong leadership and commitment demonstrated by Shaikh Mohammad Bin Zayed Al Nahyan to sustainable development around the world.
In 2011, the Gates Foundation and Shaikh Mohammad announced co-funding in the amount of $100 million (Dh367 million) to provide life-saving vaccinations to children in Afghanistan and Pakistan, including for polio eradication.
Building on this joint effort, in 2013 Shaikh Mohammad co-hosted alongside the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation the first-ever Global Vaccine Summit in Abu Dhabi where $4 billion was pledged for polio eradication, including $120 million by Shaikh Mohammad.
“In fact the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has formed a strong partnership with the UAE to deliver vaccines to the world’s poorest people. Today, the UAE and the foundation are working together to eradicate polio from the world once and for all. In 1988, there were 350,000 cases of polio across more than 125 countries. Last year, there were only 74 cases in just Afghanistan and Pakistan. Today, we have less than 10 cases in two places,” Gates said.
In addition to its close collaboration with Shaikh Mohammad, the foundation partners closely with institutions in the UAE such as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Khalifa Bin Zayed Foundation, Dubai Cares and others, on global health and development issues.
