Ginny Chen attended the conference on Taiwan. (submitted photo/Ginny Chen)

By Derek Cornet

overseas trip

Piwapan outreach workers return from Taiwan women’s shelters conference

Dec 2, 2019 | 11:33 AM

La Ronge was represented at the World Conference of Women’s Shelters last month in Taiwan.

Community Outreach Workers Ginny Chen and Jami McLeod from the Piwapan Women’s Centre were among the more than 1,500 people from nearly 150 countries who attended the event. It was held Nov. 5 to 8 and included a number of professionals such as United Nations staff, researchers, scientists and professors.

“It was very broad and the theme was Impact and Solidarity, but I found they talked a little bit about everything,” Chen said. “Shelter management was another big topic. We talked a lot about what other shelters are doing around the world and what challenges they are facing. Usually, for these kind of conferences, a very big focus is usually gender-based violence.”

Chen stated one topic she was particularly interested in is the potential link between brain trauma and domestic violence. It’s believed there could be a link between the two, but she noted there’s not enough awareness about it yet, particularly in the health field. For herself, Chen mentioned knowing the information will change the way she interacts with clients.

The conference also attracted many attendees associated with Women’s Shelters Canada, which Chen stated was beneficial because they were able to meet and connect with one another. They were able to talk about what other shelters in the country were doing and what they can do to help one another.

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Chen mentioned, however, much of the information discussed wasn’t applicable to Canada because of the progress already by different levels of government.

“Canada is quite developed already when compared to other countries, so the barriers they are facing might not be what we are facing,” she said. “I find a lot of the things might not be applicable working in Canada, because we have stronger and more reliable law enforcement compared to some people who can’t even report to police in their own countries.”

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derek.cornet@jpbg.ca

Twitter: @saskjourno