Its explicit message is that to promote the well-being of children world-wide, women must be given more power within the family. This is my strong belief: the interests of women and children are allied, and promoting women's rights is the best way to ensure that children get a fair share of the food, and other needful things.
In families where women are the main decision-makers, a far greater proportion of household resources is devoted to child health, nutrition and education than in families where women do not have a voice.
Empowering women, explains the report, saves children's lives ... a study by the International Food Policy Research Institute concludes there would be 13.4 million fewer undernourished children in South Asia if men and women there had equal influence in decision-making.
Men are not emasculated by giving women an equal say in how family resources are apportioned. Men have a massive positive impact on their children's well-being - and they can do this by respecting wives, and listening to their opinions. In the working class culture that I grew up in, men would hand over their entire pay packet to their wives - unopened.
