In the UN/ESCAP region, there will be a comprehensive regional paper. The regional paper will be based on the reports emerging from the questionnaire and other sources. At the Asia-Pacific High Level Intergovernmental Meeting on 6-9 September 2004, governments will assess the implementation but may also discuss emerging issues. The outputs from this regional government meeting will input to the Extended Meeting of the UN Commission on the Status of Women for the Review and Appraisal of Implementation of the BPFA and the Outcome Document, to be held in March 2005.

There are reservations about the UN holding a meeting to review the progress in implementing the Beijing Platform for Action, and the Beijing + 5 Outcome Document. The obvious danger is that the language of these documents will be renegotiated and there will be back tracking. However, the women NGOs from Asia and the Pacific cannot ignore the upcoming UNESCAP intergovernmental meeting, which is part of the global process for Beijing + 10.

Recent informal meetings of NGOs held in Manila and in Bangkok clearly supported the holding of an Asia-Pacific NGO Forum. In November 2003, the Steering Committee members of the Asia-Pacific Women Watch (APWW) met and gave its overwhelming support. Organized by NGOs to sustain advocacy and monitoring of the Beijing Platform for Action, APWW initiated the preparatory process for the 2004 Asia-Pacific NGO Forum.

Some of the other organizations involved are the Center for Asia Pacific Women in Politics (CAPWIP), Isis International - Manila, Asia Pacific Women, Law and Development (APWLD), DAWN-SEA, Coalition Against Trafficking in Women (CATW), South Asia Watch, East Asia Forum, Central Asian Women's NGOs, and Southeast Asia Watch (SEAWATCH).

They agreed that women's organizations should not let go of the role that they have played so well over the past decades in advocating women's interests and in shaping mainstream development perspective. The women's movement needs to keep their presence felt, their information heard and their views considered as governments in Asia-Pacific and worldwide assess their progress in implementing the BPFA and the Beijing + 5 Outcome Document.

On February 13-14, 2004, representatives of twenty four regional, sub-regional and national networks of women's organizations met and organized themselves into the Conveners' Group for the Asia-Pacific NGO Forum on Beijing + 10.

The UNESCAP Gender and Development Section of the Emerging Social Issues Division, supports NGO participation in the official regional review process. A major partner of this initiative is the UNIFEM Regional Office for East Asia and Southeast Asia.

The Asia-Pacific region has been organizing and monitoring around the Beijing process for at least 10 years. In 1993 Manila hosted the first regional NGO Preparatory Meeting, which was led by Thanpuying Sumalee Chartikavanij, International President of Pan Pacific and South East Asia Women's Association (PPSEAWA) and Noeleen Heyzer who was then Director of the Gender and Development Program of The Asian and Pacific Development Centre (APDC) and is now the Executive Director of UNIFEM.

In preparations for the five year review of the implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action (Beijing + 5), key regional groups (PPSEAWA, Asia Caucus, Asia Pacific Watch, Isis International, APDC, and SEAWatch to name a few) came together to prepare for the review process. It was this group that organized and hosted the NGO Symposium, Asia-Pacific Women 2000: Gender Equality, Development and Peace for the Twenty First Century that took place on 31 August to 4 September 1999 in Thailand. It was an exceptionally successful meeting, attended by over 385 women from 28 countries in the Region. A report emerged out of this Symposium, which contained the Declaration by the women of Asia-Pacific, their summary evaluation of the implementation of the BPFA and their analysis of progress along its twelve critical areas of concern. The report came to be known as "The Big Blue Book."

At the UN Special Session in New York 2000, governments admitted that barriers remain and that more needs to be done to achieve the goals set in Beijing. Amidst intense lobbying from various blocs, the governments also reaffirmed and strengthened the language of the BPFA. The women's organizations and other civil society groups helped prevent any backsliding. They also succeeded in having their inputs recognized and integrated in the Outcome Document.

APWW is an expansion of the management committee for this Asia Pacific Regional NGO Symposium and formalized as a regional monitoring group at the Symposium itself.