LATRA INNOVATION LAB hereby presents ‘’The Gender Equality Plan for LATRA INNOVATION LAB’’, which was created for the purpose of serving and promoting the interests, capacity, development and human rights of everyone who is engaged full-time, part-time or on a voluntary basis for the organisation. 

 

The primary objective of the The Gender Equality Plan is to ensure that LATRA INNOVATION LAB is a safe place for everyone, -male, female and people in the entire non-binary gender spectrum-, by respecting equality, inclusion and diversity, whilst at the same time being free from any kind of discrimination and ensuring equal and equitable career progression for all.  

 

The Gender Equality Plan takes into consideration the principles and guidance in the “Strategy for the development of human resources taking into account the principles of the European Charter for Researchers and of the Code of Conduct in the process of the recruitment of researchers, 2015-2019”. 

 

Equality, inclusion and diversity are values which are promoted within the organisation, its projects, programs and activities. The organisation has a distinct social mission, and part of that mission is to ensure equitable and equal access to knowledge and skills to all people engaged in any capacity with the organisation. As part of safeguarding this process, discrimination is combated through early ‘report and response’ mechanisms.

 

The European Commission has identified the following objectives for gender equality strategies in research and innovation (2012):

• fostering equality in scientific careers;

• ensuring gender balance in decision-making processes and bodies;

• integrating the dimension of gender in the content of research and innovation, i.e., accounting for the biological characteristics and social features of women and men.

 

As laid out in the European Commission’s Communication for a Reinforced European Re- search Area (2012), the EU Member States are encouraged, inter alia, to remove legal and/ or other barriers in the recruitment, retention, and career progression of women researchers, while complying fully with EU laws on gender equality (Directive 2006/54/EC) to address gender imbalances in decision-making processes, and to ensure that at least 40% of the underrepresented sex participates in committees which are involved in recruitment/career progression and in establishing and evaluating research programmes (see EIGE 2016).

 

The Gender Equality Plan for LATRA INNOVATION LAB, is meant to serve as a ‘living document’, which is updated on an annual basis -or when deemed necessary- in order to better serve the interests of the organisation’s staff and to ensure that gender equality is a value which is integrated, advocated and promoted in every facet of the organisation whether it be its projects, programs or organisational culture.