23 March 2016, Kyiv: More than 70 participants of the international conference “Strengthening non-discrimination through self-regulation and social responsibility” discussed the necessity and instruments of countering gender discrimination in the media and advertising on the legislative level as well as best practices of self-regulation in these spheres. The conference was initiated by the Parliamentary Committee of freedom of expression and information policy in the framework of the Council of Europe project “Strengthening freedom of media and establishing a Public broadcasting system in Ukraine” in cooperation with partners – Friedrich Ebert Foundation in Ukraine and Industrial Gender Committee on Advertising.

Andreas von Beckerath, Ambassador of Sweden to Ukraine, in the opening remarks emphasized the importance of prevention of sexism  in the media and gender stereotyping in order to ensure gender balance: "Istanbul Convention of the Council of Europe provides recommendations for all Council of Europe member-states and encourages media to avoid sexism and gender stereotypes because the media have a key role in changing stereotypes. We worked on attitude to this issue and therefore in Sweden  there are no legally prescribed quotas".

Viktoria Syumar, Chair of the Parliamentary Committee on freedom of speech and information policy, highlighted that the main objective of the conference was the presentation of experience of legislative work on gender discrimination as media and advertising had the potential to change stereotypes  and worldview.

Svitlana Zalishchuk, Member of the Parliament of Ukraine, stated that "the adoption of the electoral code with mandatory gender quota and sanctions for its non-compliance constitutes the most important step, because the political picture can change the attitude to the problem". Oksana Romaniuk, Executive Director of CSO “Institute of Mass Information”, presented results of gender monitoring of regional and national media: “The results of the monitoring were more than shocking: there are only 1.68% of women-politicians at the national channels. It is equal to the statistical error. Business glossy magazines do not mention women experts at all. In the national online media among experts only 10% are women and 90% are men, in the print media - 23% and 77% accordingly. Comparing to 2014 the figures have been worsened”. Olexii Pogorelov, Director General of the Association of Press Publishers shared successful experience on implementation of pilot project under support of the Council of Europe project, on introducing balanced approach  to news coverage in 4 Ukrainian media editorial offices and underlined an exeptional necessity of sharing the best practices and results among Ukrainian media.

In addition, the participants had the opportunity to learn best practices of self-regulation in advertising  and recommendations on gender portrayal in advertising from international expert Dominic Lyle (Belgium), Director General of  the European Association of Communications Agencies  (EACA), as well as from Advertising Standards Canada. In particular, Dominic Lyle noted in his presentation that audiovisual commercial communications which  included any discrimination based on sex were regulated by Article 6 and 9 of the Audio-Visual Media Services Directive. Linda Nagel and Janet Feasby, President and  Vice President of the Advertising Standards Canada, shared in video-presentation best practices of Canadian self-regulation in advertising 

Moreover, the Ukrainian experience within activity of the Industrial Gender Committee on Advertising was presented.

Ana Urrutia, manager of the Council of Europe Project “Preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence in Ukraine”, financed by the Government of Sweden, provided detailed information about Istanbul Convention and its ratification process in Ukraine.

 The Council of Europe activities on gender are outlined in the Council of Europe Strategy on Gender Equality (2014-2017) and are based on a foundation of legal standards. First of all, the standards include the Istanbul Convention, which is a legally binding international instrument. The purposes of the Convention are to protect women against all forms of violence, and prevent, prosecute and eliminate violence against women and domestic violence.The Council of Europe calls on Member States to encourage media to play an important role in preventing and combating violence against women. The Convention stipulates the provision of a proper and accurate editorial treatment of topics related to various kinds of violence against women, increase in awareness of mass media on the necessity to avoid circulation of images and reports which strengthen myths . It is also worth noting Recommendation CM / Rec (2013) 1 of the Committee of Ministers to member states on gender equality and media, according to which it is recommended to authorities of the Council of Europe Member States to encourage mass media to adopt self-regulatory strategies, codes of conduct, to develop standards of media broadcasting contributing to gender equality, to promote adequate domestic policy and to create proper employment conditions for women and men.

The Council of Europe Project “Strengthening Freedom of the Media and Establishing a Public Broadcasting System in Ukraine” is aimed to enhance the role of media and the public broadcaster in particular as an instrument for consensus building in the Ukrainian society. The Project is implemented in the framework of the Council of Europe Action Plan for Ukraine 2015-2017. In 2016 the Project is financed from the budget of the Council of Europe Action Plan for Ukraine 2015-2017. The consortium of contributors to the Action Plan for Ukraine includes 16 countries: the Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, Hungary, Ireland, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Romania, Sweden, Switzerland and Turkey.