EXECUTIVE SUMMARY men and women. However, the place of women in economic and social life is still minimal, even though women have made increasing inroads over the past few years and parity in education has already been achieved. The proportion of girls in higher education is 57.5 per cent. Despite the progress in education, women are still marginalised in the higher echelons of employment (except in the magistrates‟ corps) and also in political representation. 3.58 The Family Code, which dates back to 1984, is constantly being revised to incorporate certain realities of the 21st century and reflect the country‟s openness to the outside world. Its modification by Ordinance 05-02 of 27 February 2005 has enhanced the personal status of women. Women‟s associations and public opinion are very vocal in this area, especially since the ratification of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) in 1996. 3.59 There is increasing stakeholder participation at every level of development, despite the poor involvement of the population in the process of socioeconomic development. The APR Panel would suggest that the authorities should examine ways of further promoting a policy of democratisation and ownership of socio-economic development by the citizenry. Rather than simply holding consultations to legitimise decisions taken from above, the focus should be on institutionalising mechanisms that will ensure popular participation, essentially through village committees, which are the structures for dialogue between the authorities and the other stakeholders in society. 3.60 Based on its analyses and findings, the APR Panel recommends principally that: (i) all reservations on the ratification of the Copenhagen Convention on all forms of discrimination against women be lifted; (ii) the crucial issues of the nature and model of economic growth to be followed, the choice of core or growth sectors and the relationship between them be examined and finalised within the context of revising national strategy on sustainable development so that it supports, or ultimately replaces, the oil and gas sector. The main sectors identified are agriculture, petrochemicals, tourism and services. The Panel also recommends that: (iii) particular care be taken to ensure that growth is “propoor”, with an emphasis on job creation in appropriate areas; (iv) some degree of shared responsibility should be promoted among other socio-economic development partners and players in business and civil society; (v) there should be a clear articulation of a shared vision of the social construction project around which consensus must be built; (vi) the policy of transition from a socialist to a liberal model of socio-economic development should be clearly defined, with implementation milestones and modalities to speed up the process and help overcome entrenched habits. 3.61 The CRM observed a good number of exemplary and best practices in the area of socio-economic development. These include, among other things, the education of young girls; the policy of welfare housing and employment assistance for the youth; elimination of sexually transmitted diseases, which has vastly improved life expectancy and raised it to the same level as in 19