Call for Action: Int'l Women's Day 2026

No step back on equal and safe workplaces.

Across the world, progress on gender equality is under attack. Governments and employers are scaling back protections, weakening labour standards, and treating equality as optional rather than fundamental. Violence and harassment are normalised, reporting mechanisms are dismantled, and women who speak out too often face retaliation instead of justice.

In the construction, building materials, wood, and forestry industries where BWI is present, around 550 million workers keep our economies running. Yet these industries remain overwhelmingly male-dominated and structurally unequal, with gender-based violence still widespread and tolerated.
This violence is not accidental. It is rooted in workplace cultures and power structures that isolate women, exclude them from decision-making, and normalise harassment and intimidation. Although many countries have ratified ILO Convention No. 190 and adopted equality laws, violence and harassment are still rarely recognised for what they truly are: occupational safety and health hazards.

At the same time, a global backlash against gender equality is accelerating by weakening protections, silencing victims, and rolling back hard-won rights. Gains that took decades to achieve are being eroded in just a few years.

We cannot allow safety, dignity, and equality at work to be reversed.

On International Women’s Day (IWD) 2026, BWI calls on affiliates worldwide to mobilise to stop the backlash against equal and safe workplaces and to eliminate gender-based violence in male-dominated sectors. Violence and harassment are not inevitable; they are preventable.

Call for Action

In 2026, BWI calls on affiliates to take visible and concrete action under the slogans “No step back on equal and safe workplaces”, “Violence Prevention is Safety Protection”, including:

• Organise workplace assemblies, marches, and public mobilisations to promote violence prevention and safe, dignified working conditions.

• Launch campaigns demanding the formal recognition of violence and harassment as occupational safety and health hazards.

• Deliver training and awareness sessions on preventing and addressing gender-based violence and harassment.

• Engage employers and governments to strengthen laws, policies, and enforcement mechanisms that ensure safe and equal workplaces.

• Collect and share testimonies, experiences, and good practices that highlight solutions and promote workplaces free from violence and discrimination.
• Document your IWD activities using BWI visual materials and share them on social media with the hashtag #BWISafeEqual2026 to amplify our collective message.

Make workplaces safe. End violence and harassment. Ensure women’s equal participation and leadership.

Download our campaign materials.