The video meeting of the Asia Pacific Standing Committee of Women in Local Governments of the United Cities and Local Governments (UCLG) was jointly held by Guangzhou and UCLG Asia Pacific (ASPAC) on Aug 20, gathering nearly 40 representatives from member cities of UCLG ASPAC.

The meeting was hosted by Bernadia Irawati Tjandradewi, secretary general of UCLG ASPAC, while Chen Yini, co-president of UCLG ASPAC and chair of the Asia Pacific Standing Committee of Women in Local Governments, delivered a work report on behalf of Guangzhou.

Chen made a systematic summary of Guangzhou's efforts in areas like women's empowerment and health in her report.

She also called on governments to establish close relationships with medical institutions, encouraged more member cities to participate in the pilot cooperation projects for remote medicine, as well as initiated the establishment of a network among governments for information and resource sharing to make contributions to the COVID-19 pandemic prevention and control efforts.

"Women are greatly affected in areas like medical health, financial economy, and social insurance due to the COVID-19 outbreak. Therefore, women's voices need to be heard more than ever to learn about their demands," said Chen.

"We should attach more importance to the exchanges and sharing among female medical workers, female teachers, and female entrepreneurs from small- and medium-sized companies as the exchanges can help them better face the challenges caused by the pandemic," said Tri Rismaharini, president of UCLG ASPAC and mayor of Surabaya, India.