Hey, ladies!

This Friday is the United Nation's annual International Women's Day. The aim of the day is to highlight women's rights. But in Poland, the day has traditionally been celebrated by men giving women a flower. The habit evolved under communism when factory directors would make a show of giving a flower to each female worker, while sons would be considered remiss not to give their mother a bloom. However, it appears that the tide is slowly turning in Poland. For the third year in a row, the informal women's group, "Women's Aliens," made up of representatives from various non-governmental organizations in Poland, academics and the general public, has organized a march for this Friday in Warsaw. Starting at 3 p.m. at the Copernicus monument on ulica Krakowskie Przedmieście and finishing at the Royal Castle, the theme of this year's march is "Reproductive Rights" and will focus on changing Poland's strict anti-abortion laws, the right to contraception and also sex education in schools.

"We think this tradition of giving flowers is connected with the old communist past," said Women's Alien's spokeswoman, Agnieszka Grzybek. "We would like to break with this tradition and redefine International Women's Day. We would like to talk about women's discrimination, human rights and women's political and social rights in Poland. It's not enough to give a flower to a woman one day a year." The United Nations, the day's patron, hasn't organized anything to mark the day in Poland. However, the U.N. Development Program's gender focal point, Beata Balińska, agrees that changes are afoot in Poland, evidenced by the growing level of grassroots activity among organizations such as Women's Aliens, and Polish non-governmental organizations such as the National Women's Information Center (Ośka), the Federation for Women and Family Planning (Federacja na rzecz Kobiet i Planowania Rodziny) and the Women's Foundation (Fundacja Kobieca). "This type of demonstration (organized by Women's Aliens) is one type of possibility to create some sort of understanding about women's issues," Balińska said. "I think the specific problem in Poland is that many young women don't want to receive flowers on International Women's Day. They would like to do something worthwhile on this occasion."

The government has picked up on this seed of change too, establishing the Office for the Equal Status of Men and Women in November last year. Headed by Secretary of State Izabela Jaruga-Nowacka, the office will hold a press conference on women's issues following Tuesday's scheduled Ministry Council meeting. But nothing is planned by this office to mark Friday. One good piece of news to emerge on the issue of gender equality in Poland has come from a new European Business Survey conducted by Grant Thornton, an accounting firm. It looked at the number of women executives in management in European small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and found that Poland ranked fourth in terms of the number of women in management behind Ireland (first), the U.K. and Spain. Some 63% of Polish SMEs have at least one woman in management. Ewa Rożecka is one of those women. She is the managing director of the accounting systems company, Spectrum Accounting Systems. "I had to work twice as hard going up the ladder, but once I got there and I could say, 'I'm director and I do this,' then it's not so bad," said Rożecka, who has headed the company for 10 years.

She says she still doesn't see many Polish women at the top management level but in the middle layer she works with many women "and they are extremely good." As for discrimination, Rożecka says she doesn't see it much in the workplace but at the same time, she said, "I believe that there might be a slight problem in actually getting new customers if the decisions makers are men and they have their own club and their own school tie or whatever it is in Poland. But I never met with discrimination as such, once the job was in progress." And what will she be doing to mark International Women's Day? "I'll be going to work," she said.