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Towards a care society: IDRC at the Regional Conference on Women in Mexico

From August 12-15, 2025, Mexico City will host the XVI Regional Conference on Women for Latin America and the Caribbean, with a focus on the transformations needed to address the disproportionate responsibility of care work that falls on women. IDRC is proud to bring evidence, innovation and policy recommendations to this forum to help advance the care society and gender equality.
A mother takes a picture of her little boy next to his father, in a plaza in Colombia.
IDRC/Paul Smith
A mother takes a picture of her little boy next to his father, in a plaza in Colombia.

The regional conference comes 50 years after Mexico hosted the First World Conference on Women and at a time of both opportunity and challenge. The Latin American and Caribbean region leads in recognizing care as a public good and human right, while opposing views have intensified and threaten to erode decades of feminist progress. 

Recognition of the importance of care is a pillar of democratic renewal, economic resilience and climate justice. The region’s leadership in care systems and feminist policymaking offers a powerful response to global inequalities — and a model for transformative recovery and inclusive development. 

Four IDRC-supported official side events at the regional conference reflect IDRC’s commitment to feminist research, transformative partnerships and investment in care as a strategic pathway for gender-equal sustainable development. 

IDRC is also a proud supporter of the Care Pavilion at the conference, hosted by the Global Alliance for Care. The pavilion will be a critical space to debate how to advance the agenda towards a care society, including workshops co-hosted by IDRC. 

Here are the IDRC-supported side events at the conference:

Monday, August 11, 2025  

Care in dispute: Alternatives for financing and demanding a fundamental right 

9:30 – 11:00 Central Daylight Time (CDT) | Secretaría de Relaciones Exteriores, Plaza Juárez 20, Piso 1, Sala José María Morelos y Pavón, Sección 1 

Organized by: the Gender and Trade Network; the Global Alliance for Care; IDRC; the Inter-American Conference on Social Security; La Red Latinoamericana y del Caribe por Justicia Económica, Social y Climática; Oxfam Canada; the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development (UNRISD); and the Trenzando Cuidados Regional Network, among others. 

This feminist-led event builds on IDRC-supported research and advocacy at the recent Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development held in Sevilla, Spain, where care was positioned as central to development finance. Leveraging lessons from IDRC-supported research, the event will explore alternatives to fund universal care systems and increase public demand for care services. The session will feature IDRC partners, feminist economists, researchers and government representatives offering strategies to secure care as a human right. 

The role of international cooperation in sustaining care policies in Latin America and the Caribbean 

17:00 – 18:30 CDT | Secretaría de Relaciones Exteriores, Plaza Juárez 20, Piso 1, Sala José María Morelos y Pavón, Sección 1  

Organized by: Agencia Mexicana de Cooperación para el Desarrollo, the EU-LAC Foundation, the Ibero-American General Secretariat, the Government of Uruguay, the Government of Guatemala, IDRC, Oxfam, UN Women 

This high-level dialogue will explore how international cooperation can move from fragmented initiatives to sustained strategic alliances in support of care systems. It will highlight good practices in funding models, shared governance and policy design, emphasizing care not as a cost, but as a transformative investment with long-term returns. Carolina Robino, senior program specialist at IDRC, will join key actors from regional and multilateral institutions to discuss the tools and frameworks needed to scale and sustain care policies across the region. 

From Latin America to Latin America: Feminist, collaborative and transformative care policy innovations 

17:00 – 18:30 CDT| Secretaría de Relaciones Exteriores, Plaza Juárez 20, Piso 1, Sala José María Morelos y Pavón, Sección 3 
Organized by: the Global Alliance for Care, the Government of Chile, the Grupo de Análisis para el Desarrollo, IDRC, the Ministry of Equality and Equity of Colombia, the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation, UNRISD, UN Women 

This multi-actor event will highlight findings and lessons from the Collaborative Research-Action Fund for Latin America and the Caribbean, a regional initiative supported by IDRC that promotes feminist, inclusive and intersectional care systems. The event will feature case studies from Colombia, Mexico and Uruguay, showcasing community care models and territorial care ecosystems. It will also examine public-private-popular alliances and the role of ethnic and Indigenous leadership in shaping care systems. 

Wednesday, August 13, 2025 

Toward climate justice centred on care and support in Latin America and the Caribbean 

16:30 – 18:00 CDT | Care Pavilion - Antiguo Convento de la Santa Cruz de Tlatelolco, calle Almacenes 92, Tlatelolco 

Organized by: Fundación Avina, the Global Alliance for Care, IDRC, Mexico City Human Rights Commission, Oxfam Canada, Universidad Nacional de San Martín, UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in Mexico, UNRISD, UN Women 

This intersectoral dialogue connects the climate and care crises, an area of research supported by IDRC. The panel will focus on how climate change increases the burden of unpaid care work and affects the most marginalized communities. Drawing on grassroots experiences and intersectional research, the event will feature voices of Indigenous and Afro-descendant women as well as policy leaders from Mexico, Uruguay and Brazil to advance just transitions that are centred on care.  

Enhancing the voice of local research leading up to the conference  

Throughout 2024 and early 2025, IDRC supported the preparatory process of this conference by enhancing the voices and the role of local research. IDRC partnered with the conference organizer — the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean — as well as UN Women and other key international organizations to support the Latin America and the Caribbean Academic Care Forums. The dialogues have informed the conference’s policy document to be presented in a conference session on August 13, at 10:00. 

Representatives from the academic community and IDRC partners from the region will be sharing their contributions and insights in the conference’s Stakeholder contributions session on August 13, at 12:45.  

Through research, collaboration and policy engagement, IDRC contributes to advancing support for care work as a public good, a human right and a foundation for inclusive and sustainable development. 

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