Policy Updates

On June 25, 2024, the Dutch House of Representatives passed a motion by Sarah Dobbe ( SP) and co-sponsors to enhance support and protection for women human rights defenders.

The motion, supported by 144 out of 150 votes from multiple parties, including PVV, VVD, and BBB, highlighted gaps in the Netherlands’ current human rights policy.

Outgoing Minister of Foreign Affairs Hanke Bruins Slot has typically opposed motions aligning with existing policy, but supported the motion due to the worsening global situation for women.

On June 13, 2024, the Netherlands announced the distribution of its cabinet posts, including the creation of three new ministries: Asylum and Migration, Housing and Spatial Planning, and Climate and Green Growth.

The Dutch government also renamed the Ministry of Agriculture, Nature, and Food Quality to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries, Food Security, and Nature. The Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation will become the Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Assistance. These changes are meant to mirror the new government’s priorities.

The PVV was allocated five ministers, the VVD and NSC four, and the BBB two. Designated Prime Minister Dick Schoof does not represent any party.

Ministerial appointments with relevance to development included:

• Minister of Climate and Green Growth: Sophie Hermans ( VVD);
• Minister of Finance: Eelco Heinen ( VVD);
• Minister of Economic Affairs: Dirk Beljaarts ( PVV);
• Minister of Agriculture: Femke Wiersma ( BBB);
• Minister of Education: Eppo Bruins ( NSC, CU);
• Minister of Asylum and Migration: Marjolein Faber ( PVV);
• Minister of Health: Fleur Agema ( PVV);
• Minister of Foreign Affairs: Caspar Veldkamp ( NSC); and
• Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Assistance: Reinette Klever ( PVV).

The PVV’s Ministers for Foreign Trade and Development Assistance Reinette Klever and Asylum and Migration Marjolein Faber sparked controversy due to past statements regarding omvolking, or the ‘replacement theory’. Faber and Klever distanced themselves from past use of the term but reiterated concerns about demographic change.

Candidate ministers and secretaries will present themselves in public hearings to the House of Representatives. The new cabinet is expected to be sworn in on July 2, 2024.

On June 7, 2024, Dutch national Corinne Dettmeijer-Vermeulen was re-elected to CEDAW for the 2025-2028 term.

Dettmeijer-Vermeulen served her first term as member of the CEDAW from 2021-2024. The Dutch government nominated her for re-election, which the 189 CEDAW State Parties supported in New York, US.

During her first term, Dettmeijer-Vermeulen held the roles of Vice-chair and later Chair of CEDAW Working Group on Communications. She also joined the Working Group on Working Methods and the Working Group on Gender Stereotyping.

CEDAW consists of 23 members, who are independent experts that monitor the implementation of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women. The convention has opposed the effects of discrimination, including violence, poverty, lack of legal protections, the denial of inheritance, property rights, and access to credit.

On May 3, 2024, representatives from the Netherlands attended the 30^th ICPD in New York, where Dutch Director-General for International Cooperation Pascalle Grotenhuis and Dutch SRHR Youth Ambassador Sarah Bahgat called for further action on CSE and youth involvement to continue SRHR progress.

Grotenhuis delivered a statement on behalf of the Netherlands, Belgium, and Luxembourg and highlighted priorities set out by young people. The Netherlands also supported the ICPD Program of Action and co-hosted 300+ young people at the Global Youth Dialogue to reflect on its urgent call to ensure women and girls’ right to decide over their bodies and futures.

Bahgat delivered a statement at the General Debate of the Commission on Population and Development, highlighting the need to tackle information online, deliver CSE in humanitarian settings, and showcase the outcomes of the Global Youth Dialogue.

On April 24, 2024, the UNDP announced that the Netherlands contributed EUR36 million (US$39 million) in core funding to the UNDP for 2024.

The flexible funding supports implementing the UNDP’s strategic plan for 2022-2025 to tackle multidimensional poverty, promote good governance, foster the rule of law, and champion gender equality globally.

The UNDP also highlighted positive results coming from its partnership with the Netherlands. With Dutch support, the UNDP is strengthening Ukraine’s capacity and use of advanced technology to manage mine action operations.

On April 4, 2024, the Dutch House of Representatives debated the Dutch Global Health Strategy, 18 months post-publication. Despite recent development budget cuts, Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation Geoffrey van Leeuwen and Minister for Medical Care Pia Dijkstra affirmed broad support for the strategy.

The strategy aims to strengthen global health systems, tackle health impacts of climate change, and prepare against future pandemics. CSOs and members of Parliament expressed concerns in relation to the previously announced development budget cuts of EUR3.5 billion (US$3.8 billion) over 2023-2026, as detrimental to effective implementation of the strategy.

van Leeuwen and Dijkstra reiterated their commitment to the strategy, emphasizing the strategy’s broader goals, including safeguarding the Netherlands’ own health and economic stability.

Emphasis during the debate centered on sexual health and SRHR and access to basic health care to uphold human rights and gender equality, urging sustained strategic partnerships. Focusing on access to medicines, Dijkstra agreed to re-examine the Socially Responsible Licensing toolkit to include how private companies can enhance accessibility and affordability of medicines for people in low-income countries.

Members of Parliament inquired about strategy implementation and monitoring. van Leeuwen committed to providing progress reports to the House of Representatives by year-end, along with policy coherence updates on the Dutch Global Health Strategy and ecological footprint reduction commitments by May 15, 2024.

From March 26-March 28, 2024, the Netherlands and the UN held the first International Conference of Prosecutors on Accountability for Conflict-Related Sexual Violence in the Peace Palace in The Hague.

Dutch Minister of Foreign Affairs Hanke Bruins Slot emphasized that this topic is a priority for Dutch feminist foreign policy. Bruins Slot opened the conference with UN Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict Pramila Patten. In her speech, Bruins Slot noted how sexual violence is used as a weapon of war in many conflicts, like in the Democratic Republic of Congo, the Central African Republic, Israel, Ukraine, Haiti, Nigeria, Sudan, Syria, and Iraq. Yet, ensuring accountability for such crimes remains difficult, underscoring the need for partnerships with other countries and organizations like the ICC.

Public prosecutors from more than 50 countries attended the conference to support efforts to research and prosecute conflict-related sexual violence. The conference marked the start of a 'community of practice' to further expand the collaboration.

On February 29, 2024, the Dutch NGO Cordaid published an analysis of the Dutch global health strategy, titled Gender Matters: Strengthening Pandemic Preparedness and Response Policymaking, and concluded that while the strategy includes language on vulnerabilities and gender inequalities, it lacks a plan to assess and address them.

The policy brief underscored the connection between gender and pandemic preparedness and response, as gender influences health risks, healthcare-seeking behavior, and personal treatment by health systems.

The brief found that although the strategy recognizes the importance of gender intersectional approaches, it falls short in providing actionable steps for gender-transformative policies.

The brief presented key recommendations across the areas of: access to healthcare, sexual and GBV, frontline healthcare workers, leadership and governance, economic impacts, and research.

The recommendations stressed the need for comprehensive measures across Dutch ministries to ensure equitable access to healthcare and support services globally and domestically. Additionally, the authors emphasized promoting gender equality in leadership, addressing economic disparities, and conducting gender-specific research to inform effective pandemic response strategies.

On February 27, 2024, the Netherlands was inaugurated as a member of the UNHRC for the 2024-2026 term.

Dutch Minister of Foreign Affairs Hanke Bruins Slot delivered a speech outlining the Netherlands’ priorities. Bruins Slot emphasized the global threats to human rights, citing events including activist Alexei Navalny’s 2024 death in Russia, the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, grave human rights violations in Ukraine, the plight of Yazidis under ISIS, state-led repression against the Uyghurs in China, and conflict-related sexual violence.

Bruins Slot outlined the Netherlands’ six thematic priorities as a member of the Council:

• Protecting human rights defenders and civic space;
• Calling for accountability;
• Promoting the rights of women and girls;
• Ensuring freedom of religion and belief;
• Safeguarding the rights of LGBTQI+ individuals; and
• Upholding freedom of expression.

Bruins Slot concluded her speech by committing to strengthen the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights through sustainable, predictable, and adequate funding. She also expressed the Netherlands’ readiness to collaborate in promoting and protecting human rights.

On January 18, 2024, the Netherlands Court of Audit published a report evaluating the Dutch MFA’s progress towards its WASH goals, which found that unclear priorities, measurement, and accountability have resulted in limited progress.

After the launch of the UN SDGs in 2015, the Dutch Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation committed to providing 30 million people access to clean drinking water and 50 million people to sanitation facilities between 2016 and 2030.

One of the key findings of the report is that the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation has insufficiently implemented the recommendations made by a previous report done in 2008. Additionally, the researchers noted that the Ministry has not evaluated the policy period between 2004-2015. As a result, this new report finds that mistakes were repeated, limiting the Netherlands’ overall progress towards its WASH goals.

Another key finding is that implementers of Dutch WASH funds do not always consistently measure project reach. The researchers also found that implementers may report positive results that do not actually contribute to the desired outcomes, including sustainably installed toilets and taps. As such, the report found that Dutch achievements in this area were overreported, with recipients of WASH funding at risk of only temporarily gaining access to WASH facilities.

The report’s findings that the Ministry has insufficiently heeded the findings of previous evaluations and audits echo the conclusions of another recent audit of the Ministry’s SRHR efforts, published in December 2023.