Family Policies In Arab Region, Global Best Practices Discussed

(MENAFN- The Peninsula) M Mazharul Haque | The Peninsula

Doha, Qatar: The 30th Anniversary of the International Year of the Family conference on Family and Contemporary Megatrends yesterday, on its second day, discussed the challenges facing families in different sessions, including the 'High-Level Ministerial Session: Arab Family Policies in Comparison to International Best Practice, organised by the Ministry of Social Development and Family.

The panel discussed family policies in the Arab region in comparison to international family policies, showcasing best practices and identifying challenges and solutions to the most pertinent issues.

Panellists included Iran's Vice-President for Women and Family Affairs H E Zahra Behrouz Azar; Mauritania's Minister of Social Work, Childhood and Family H E Svfia Mint N'tahah; Minister of Labour and Social Affairs of Armenia H E Narek Mkrtchyan; Minister for Social Development Palestinian Authority H E Samah Hamad; and Libya's Minister of Social Affairs Wafaa Al Kilani. The session was moderator by Assistant Secretary General, and Head of Social Affairs Sector at the League of Arab Sates H E Dr. Haifa Abu Ghazaleh.

Zahra Behrouz Azar, said:“The family, despite the diversity and difference of cultures, constitutes the nucleus and the pillar of society. It is the backbone of development and progress, and remains a safe haven in the face of life's challenges.”

“Today, the family faces profound global challenges, in particular because of the transformations to the structure of society, immigration, and demographic and economic changes caused by technology. These have a significant impact on the family structure, requiring the development of plans to reduce their negative effects, the adoption of economic, social, and cultural support policies, and improving laws and regulations that boost the situation of families.

“Strengthening the foundations of the family involves respecting community values, the ability to adapt and be flexible, and strengthening the bonds of solidarity among family members. Protecting families requires developing programmes and initiatives for awareness, education, and support, and these programmes cannot be a single, global version – they must be locally repurposed, taking into account the specificities of each society.

“We need to revive authentic values that have been passed down from generation to generation, while investing in them and reformulating them for new generations.”

Narek Mkrtchyan highlighted the government polices for the protection of families in his country.

“In Armenia tens of thousands families live in the nuclear family model, which is a cohesive family model in Armenia. Family is considered one of the core aspects of the society in Armenia. Two and half years ago, we started to work on the strategy for the demography of the country, and of one the pillars of our strategy is to ensure the well-being of the families. The government is addressing their challenges of demography by improving the birth rate conditions,” he said.

“In our case, we started to pay attention to the well-being of the family, ensuring active, healthy aging, also such kind of polices which will avoid emigration in order to avoid any kind of suppression of members of the family,” Mkrtchyan added.

Talking about employment policies, he said,“We consider the cohesive family as a source of happiness and successful future of the Armenian society. We initiated the strategy of the employment in Armenia, which is a long-term project. According to that strategy, the government should act as a mentor to overcome poverty and address all the challenges.”

Mkrtchyan said,“Another important challenge we face is to ensure responsibility among the members of the family. For example, in family there are some vulnerable members with disability, and we have to understand what kind of psychological support they need. We have created family and children centres across the country, where we are providing different kind of services, starting from legal advice to psychological services."

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