Gender bonds are increasingly recognized as an innovative instrument that can be used to tap into capital markets to finance gender equality. Credit: Stella Paul/IPS

By Vanina Vincensini and Jemimah Njuki
NEW YORK, Aug 6 2024 (IPS)

Iceland’s gender bond last month caused great excitement in the capital markets community. While gender bonds have been increasing in popularity within the private sector, Iceland is the first country to issue a sovereign gender bond. Many in the development community are however asking, are gender bonds the solution to financing for gender equality?

So, what are gender bonds? Gender bonds are bonds that integrate gender equality objectives or the empowerment of women. Gender bonds follow the Social Bond Principles established by the International Capital Market Association and contribute to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 5 (SDG 5), and are verified by independent entities, known as second-party opinions.

In 2021, ICMA, IFC, and UN Women published the first gender bond guide. The guide offers practical guidance on how to use gender bonds to finance gender projects and strategies and includes examples of gender-based targets for issuers and the types of projects that can be financed by private and public sector issuers.

With declining ODA going to gender inequality, the ability to mobilize resources from multiple sources including both public and private to advance gender equality objectives is increasingly becoming critical

The focus on gender bonds, or debt securities to finance gender equality is driven my many factors, one being that the share of development finance for gender equality decreased after a decade of progress—from 45% in 2019-20 to 43% in 2021-22.

With declining ODA going to gender inequality, the ability to mobilize resources from multiple sources including both public and private to advance gender equality objectives is increasingly becoming critical. But important questions remain on how we can mobilize and hold capital markets accountable to address structural gender inequalities.

Potential of capital markets

Global capital markets are vast and diverse, encompassing various instruments including stocks, bonds, and other financial assets. and institutions that facilitate the flow of capital. As of 2023, the global bond market was valued at approximately $100 trillion, similar in size to global GDP according to the OECD.

This market includes government bonds, corporate bonds, municipal bonds, and other debt instruments issued by various entities. Despite the significant size of the bond market, the allocation of funds specifically targeted towards gender equality remains relatively modest. Gender bonds are still in their nascent stages, but their growth is promising.

At the end of 2023, the global capital invested in gender bonds had reached approximately $14.5 billion. While this is a small fraction of the overall bond market, it reflects a growing recognition of the importance of gender-focused investments.

Gender bonds are increasingly recognized as an innovative instrument that can be used to tap into capital markets to finance gender equality. For example, last year Latin America and the Caribbean saw 26 gender bonds amounting to $2.25bn, led by issuances in Mexico, Chile and Colombia. In Africa gender bonds have been issued in Morocco, Tanzania, Rwanda and South Africa.

Despite this, the potential of gender bonds is yet to fully be realized, and challenges remain on how to ensure they lead to impact on gender equality, and that they address structural gender inequalities. There is risk of “pink washing” with bonds being labelled as gender but not having gender equality objectives or not having impact on gender equality.

For gender bonds to be truly impactful, we believe three key things are needed.

First is to expand the use of proceeds to address structural causes of gender inequality. Most of the gender bonds issues so far have gone to financing women owned businesses.

The National Microfinance Bank Tanzania’s Jasiri Gender Bond launched in 2023 provides capital and resources to 3000 women-led small and medium enterprises.

The most recent issuance, by Bolivia’s BancoSol $30mn bond, announced on June 20, is intended to provide finance for up to 4,500 micro and small enterprises led by women in the country and aims to contribute to closing the country’s gender financing gap, where half of all businesses in Bolivia are women-led, yet only 24 per cent of economically active women have access to credit.

But bonds can go beyond closing financing gaps. Eligible projects for the Iceland gender bond, as per their bond framework developed with technical support from UN Women and aligned with the gender bond principles, include the provision of decent living standards for women and gender minorities, increasing the supply of affordable housing that benefits low-income women, as well as efforts to increase maximum payments during parental leave which create incentives for both parents to make use of their equal right to paid parental leave.

Second, set up broad-based accountability mechanisms to ensure gender bonds lead to sustainable and transformative impact on gender equality. Investors need assurance that their funds are making a real difference. And these instruments can only make a difference in women’s and girls’ lives if we know that gender-specific outcomes are achieved.

This is why bond issuers are encouraged to align with the voluntary guidelines developed by the ICMA, IFC and UN Women, which include recommendations on clear bond frameworks, second party opinions and verifications, and annual reporting on the use of funds.

Impact reports that include sex-disaggregated quantitative data and qualitative insights can then build investor confidence, gender bonds credibility, ultimately encouraging more investments in projects that have direct and positive impact on gender equality.

In Argentina, the first gender bonds issued in the country created new jobs for women-entrepreneurs and their employees. In South Africa, procurement from black women–owned suppliers of a corporate bond issuer increased from 13.8% to 16.26% in the first year.

Third, more sovereign bonds could significantly impact gender equality due to their scale and reach, if they are backed up by sound policies, action plans, and debt management strategies.

Unlike other financial instruments, sovereign bonds can mobilize large sums of capital, which can be directed towards national programmes and policies aimed at reducing gender gaps.

Additionally, the credibility and stability associated with government-issued bonds make them attractive to a broad range of investors. But a precondition to issuing more sovereign gender bonds is political will, sound debt management strategies, and robust gender equality investment and action plans.

Governments must demonstrate a strong commitment to gender equality by integrating gender analysis into their financial and policy frameworks.

They also need to ensure that public expenditures are aligned with gender equality goals. In the case of Iceland, the country’s action plans to close persisting gender gaps, its long-standing practice of gender-responsive budgeting, strong financial standing and fiscal discipline provided a conducive environment for successful gender bond issuance.

More countries could follow Iceland’s example in the context of the 2025 international financing agenda which will mark the 30th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action (considered the most progressive blueprint ever for advancing women’s rights) and the fourth International Conference on Financing for Development, to be held in 2025 from 30 June to 3 July in Spain.

And while gender bonds have great potential, they are not a panacea for addressing the glaring gaps in financing for gender equality. Public financing is needed to bring about meaningful and transformative gender equality and gender bonds are just but a miniscule of a larger effort to plug the $360B annual funding gap for gender equality.

Vanina Vincensini is a global expert in sustainable and inclusive finance. She advised Iceland on its pioneering sovereign gender bonds proposition, setting a precedent for innovative gender-focused financial solutions worldwide.

Jemimah Njuki is the Chief, Economic Empowerment at UN Women and a New Voices Fellow. She writes widely on issues of gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls.

Women are still woefully underrepresented in leadership positions, even in industries where women constitute the majority of workers. Credit: Patricia Grogg/IPS

By Jemimah Njuki and Jocelyn Chu
NEW YORK, Aug 4 2023 (IPS)

Last week, there was uproar in Kenya when a report about one of the largest banks, Equity Bank, revealed a 52 percent gender pay gap between their female and male employees working in similar positions. This difference is neither okay nor acceptable. However, documenting the gap is laudable because that is the first step in trying to fix it.

Of course, the gender pay gap is not unique to Kenya nor to the banking sector. Worldwide, on average, women only make 80 cents for every dollar earned by men. No country has successfully closed the gender pay gap. As a result of this gap, there’s a lifetime of income inequality between men and women. This has many consequences, including that more women are retiring into poverty than men.

Worldwide, on average, women only make 80 cents for every dollar earned by men. No country has successfully closed the gender pay gap. As a result of this gap, there's a lifetime of income inequality between men and women. This has many consequences, including that more women are retiring into poverty than men

The gender pay gap is even worse for some demographics of women, such as women of color and women raising children. In the United States Black women are paid only 69.5% of white men’s wages while Hispanic women are paid only 64.1% of white men’s wages. In sub–Saharan Africa, women with children are paid 37% less than men, and in South Asia, they are paid 35% less.

Women’s educational gains have not ended the gap. For example, in the U.S., despite gains in educational attainment, women still face a significant wage gap. While women are more likely to graduate from college than men, at every education level, they are paid less than men.

The wage gap actually widens with higher levels of educational attainment. Among workers who have only a high school diploma, women are paid 78.6% of what men are paid. Among workers who have a college degree, the share is 70.2%, and among workers who have an advanced degree, it is 69.8%. The gender pay gap also increases with age.

Many reasons have been advanced for the gender pay gap – some of them structural including occupational and sectoral segregation, devaluation of “women’s work”, societal norms, and discrimination, all of which took root well before women entered the labor market.

Within all sectors and both formal and informal economies, there is striking occupational segregation, with women typically occupying the lowest occupational categories, earning less, and having fewer entitlements to social security and pensions.

Women are overrepresented in sectors that are underpaid and undervalued, such as in social work and health care. They are still woefully underrepresented in leadership positions, even in industries where women constitute the majority of workers.

If women take time off due to unpaid care work responsibilities and then go back to a job market where pay histories are used to determine job entry bands, their pay ends up lower than their male counterparts. Discrimination and gender stereotypes also give rise to biased judgments and decisions, impeding women’s advancement and pay.

Pay audits and pay transparency measures can help expose pay differences between men and women and identify the underlying causes. This is because addressing the gender pay gap requires knowing that it exists and what is causing it, which is why the Equity Bank sustainability report, while heavily criticized, is important.

A study in Finland found that 73% of human resource representatives found equal pay audits, in line with national legislation on pay transparency, to be useful in promoting workplace equality.

In fact, about 55% of enterprises surveyed reviewed job descriptions and/or altered wages, continued examining their gender pay gap or reformed their remuneration framework, because of information discovered from audits.

Pay transparency can also provide women, unions and other employees with the information and evidence they require to negotiate pay rates and provide as well as provide them with the means to challenge potential pay discrimination.

Other actions that can help close the pay gap are laws that require reporting of pay by gender, race, and ethnicity, and that prohibit employers from asking about pay history. Requiring employers to post pay bands when hiring has also been shown to have impact.

While this is positive, further action is required from governments and employers to address the gender pay gap. The Equal Pay International Coalition, convened by UN Women, the International Labour Organization and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development is a mechanism to bring together stakeholders to commit to pay transparency and to closing the gender pay gap. But while many countries have adopted pay transparency legislation, more time is needed to assess the impact and effectiveness of the measures adopted.

There is also need for policies that lift wages for most workers while also reducing gender and racial/ethnic pay gaps. Minimum wages and strengthening workers’ rights to bargain collectively for higher wages and benefits is critical for closing the gender pay gap.

Women, who tend to occupy lower-paying jobs, have been shown to benefit the most from increases in minimum wages. An analysis of the increase of minimum wages in Poland between 2008-2009 concluded that higher minimum wages contributed to a lower gender wage gap among young workers.

Deeper changes in societal and cultural norms, especially those on care for children and interventions that seek the equal sharing of responsibilities in caregiving and domestic work by men and boys are needed.

The inequalities between women and men in the world of work will persist unless we act. And we need to act together.

For Equity Bank, this transparency is the first step in taking action to close this gender pay gap. A lot, however, depends on what they do next.

Jemimah Njuki is the Chief, Economic Empowerment at UN Women, and an Aspen New Voices Fellow

Jocelyn Chu is a Programme Specialist at UN Women

The rate of female entrepreneurship is higher in Africa than in any other region of the world. Credit: Mantoe Phakathi/IPS

By Jemimah Njuki
NAIROBI, Sep 13 2022 (IPS)

Agnes Opus sells cereals in Busia, the border town between Kenya and Uganda. This is her lifeline through which she caters for her immediate family’s needs from school fees to housing and medical care and support to her extended family. While she dedicates all her energy and time to this work which she loves, she struggles to meet all her needs. She faces many non-tariff barriers including harassment by officials and unclear and ever-changing information on trade requirements.

Agnes’ challenges are not unique to her. They represent the plight of millions of women across the continent engaged in cross-border trade. They have expectations that the Women and Youth in Trade Conference and the adoption of a Women and Youth protocol by the African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA), will make it easy for women to trade.

The continent has the highest rate of female entrepreneurs globally with approximately 26% of female adults involved in entrepreneurial activity contributing between US$250 and US$300 billion to African economic growth in 2016, equivalent to about 13% of the continent’s GDP

The AfCFTA holds great potential by creating the largest free trade area in the world by number of countries -55 – it connects, bringing together 1.3 billion people and a combined gross domestic product (GDP) valued at US$3.4 trillion. The Women and Youth in Trade conference, hosted by H.E Samia Suluhu, the President of Tanzania, and the AfCTA secretariat aims at helping the AfCFTA work better for women and youth.

The conference is expected to come up with practical solutions and legislation that governments and other stakeholders must take to implement the protocol, but more importantly, to ensure women can benefit from the AfCTA. This is mission critical. The continent has the highest rate of female entrepreneurs globally with approximately 26% of female adults involved in entrepreneurial activity contributing between US$250 and US$300 billion to African economic growth in 2016, equivalent to about 13% of the continent’s GDP.

Despite this potential, women earn on average 34% lower profits than men. Structural barriers like the ones faced by Agnes hamper the growth of women-led or owned businesses. These barriers include discriminatory legal and customary frameworks and practices, gendered stereotypes, norms and biases, and an unequal distribution of unpaid care and domestic work. Together, they prevent the full and equal realization of women’s rights and their full, equal and meaningful participation and leadership in the economy.

To see real progress, the protocal should focus on ending these barriers through four strategies.

First, move beyond the mere signing of a protocol to implementable frameworks in each country. As an example, governments should pass legislations on preferential procurement that mandates the selection of services, goods or public works from women-led or owned enterprises and businesses that have gender-just policies and practices for employees and supply chains.

This would be a game changer. Today, only 1% of current public procurement spending of US$286.3 billion (15% of GDP ) in Sub-Saharan Africa goes to women-owned businesses. Evidence shows that if the amount of public procurement spending to women entrepreneurs were doubled, that would be US$5.7 billion while gender parity in public procurement would have women entrepreneurs in Sub-Saharan Africa receive over US$143 billion in contracts from governments.

Second, governments need to facilitate trade not only in sectors where women are the majority, but to also support women to enter sectors where they are underrepresented. Sectors such as manufacturing, construction, and IT technology are some of the fastest growing sub sectors in the continent, yet women remain underrepresented.

In Kenya, where the construction sector is fast-growing, only 15.4% of registered contractors are women. Removing the barriers that face women in these sectors, including social acceptance, sexual discrimination, sexual harassment, and labor conditions including unequal pay would be a game changer.

Third, governments need to address the Non-Tariff Barriers (NTBs). NTBs are considered neutral measures with gendered impacts. Women face specific constraints that undermine their economic activities, access to technical information and finances, and are often subject to harassment and extortion at borders.

They have less access to key trader networks and information about relevant procedures. Additionally, time-consuming trade measures and documentary requirements impinge more heavily on women. Addressing these should be part of a broader process for gender responsive trade policies.

And finally, there needs to be evidence-driven accountability mechanisms to track progress of the implementation of the new Women in Trade Protocols. Sex disaggregated data of trade volumes, gender indicators that track women’s engagement in Africa as well as a score card that shows how countries are doing is needed.

The CCADP indicator framework and score card that tracks country implementation of the Malabo Commitments is an example of how data can be used to bring accountability to continental commitments while integrating key gender indicators.

The conference is going to be a test of how committed governments are in making trade work for women like Agnes.

Jemimah Njuki is an Aspen New Voices Fellow and writes on issues of gender equality and women’s economic empowerment

We believe the Food Systems Summit could provide a forum for a reset that seeks to find common ground for the increasingly fractious debate over food production in Africa, the authors say. Credit: Miriam Gahtigah/IPS

By Jemimah Njuki and Elizabeth Nsimadala
NAIROBI, Sep 2 2021 (IPS)

In a few weeks, the United Nations will host the first international Food Systems Summit. The goal is to create a global movement committed to solving the many dietary, economic and environmental problems linked to the way food is produced, sold and consumed today.

Africa, a continent with high rates of poverty and malnutrition that are strongly connected to poorly performing farms—and home to vast tracts of uncultivated but farmable land—will be a stress test for the summit’s aspirations.

Both of us grew up in farming households in Kenya and Uganda and have devoted our professional careers to exploring the wide assortment of challenges and opportunities connected to food production in Africa. We have a deep understanding of the fact that being a farmer in Africa today can be either a blessing or a burden.

Overall, it feels like today there is a perverse logic in which we are being told that African farmers must be penalized for problems originating largely in wealthy countries. So no commercial seeds, even if our farmers want them. No fertilizers, even if they are desperately needed and can be responsibly used—African farmers currently apply less than 20 kilos per hectare, compared to a global average of 136 kilos

Most Africans—including up to 90% of people living in rural communities—still rely on small-scale or “smallholder” crop and livestock production to generate the income they need to support their families.

Their farms—if productive and with good access to markets—can be the blessing that pays for school fees, health care and also food to round out their family’s nutritional needs. Farming is especially important for providing economic opportunities for African women.

But farming is often a burden for many Africans because they lack what they need to succeed—so their farms don’t provide sufficient incomes or even enough food. This burden grows heavier every day as the stresses of climate change and, more recently, the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic add new obstacles.

Too many African farmers will head to their fields tomorrow with the same set of limited options they have been saddled with for decades—such as seeds for crop varieties that have become susceptible to a proliferation of plant pests and diseases, meager amounts of inputs and technical support to help them restore dangerously depleted soils, and no mechanization to work their lands or process their crops.

Increasingly, Africa’s agriculture burdens are outnumbering its agriculture blessings.

From our extensive work with African farmers, it’s clear that the Food Systems Summit’s admirable vision will not be achieved on our continent as long as our farmers lack the basic choices available to farmers elsewhere in the world. The same can be said for efforts to recover from the pandemic and adapt to climate change.

But here’s where the situation becomes especially complicated.

Many organizations are advocating for single solutions, restricting the options available for African farmers to choose from, when they should be doing just the opposite. And while we recognize that it is important to protect African farmers and African ecosystems from exploitation, we also must recognize the sovereignty of African farmers and their agency to choose what works best for their farms and their families and for protecting the ecosystems that they depend on.

For example, today, many African farmers save seeds from maize, beans or other crops cultivated in one season for planting in the next. They also may trade seeds with one another through informal markets. But too many of these varieties do not translate into good harvests. They have become susceptible to crop pests and diseases or changing climate conditions.  According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the amount of maize and other cereal crops harvested per acre or hectare in Africa is less than half the global average.

Therefore, there has been a growing effort by a number of African countries to work with their farmers to develop new, improved varieties that—while they are not a cure-all—can better respond to farmer needs and preferences. Yet some still view even commercial seeds—especially if they must be purchased fresh every year—with deep suspicion.

The answer is to help farmers understand the trade-offs and let them choose. But why vilify those who seek to offer the choice?

Overall, it feels like today there is a perverse logic in which we are being told that African farmers must be penalized for problems originating largely in wealthy countries. So no commercial seeds, even if our farmers want them. No fertilizers, even if they are desperately needed and can be responsibly used—African farmers currently apply less than 20 kilos per hectare, compared to a global average of 136 kilos. And no mechanization, even though many African farmers still plough with their cows and hand hoes.

We believe the Food Systems Summit could provide a forum for a reset that seeks to find common ground for the increasingly fractious debate over food production in Africa.

First, we can start with an agreement that we all want the same thing: environmentally sustainable, economically successful farms that deliver better opportunities for rural farming families across the continent and affordable, nutritious diets for all Africans. And we can agree that it’s incredibly important to develop public sector policies that encourage responsible use of agricultural inputs and safeguard farmers from potentially exploitive practices.

But the worst thing we can do right now for African farmers and Africa’s vulnerable food systems and ecosystems is to greatly narrow the menu of solutions available. Instead, let’s look for consensus instead of conflict and consider that there can be many paths to achieving our shared goals.

Dr. Jemimah Njuki is director for Africa at the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and an Aspen New Voices Fellow

Elizabeth Nsimadala is president of the Pan Africa farmers Organization (PAFO) and of the Eastern Africa Farmers Federation (EAFF). 

Women farmers clearing farmland in Northern Bangladesh. Credit: Naimul Haq/IPS

By Jemimah Njuki
NAIROBI, Dec 22 2020 (IPS)

In countries where women are most marginalized, discriminated under the law and where gendered norms prevent women from owning property and resources, people are also the hungriest. This is because gender equality and food systems are intertwined.

However, too often, we only focus on the roles that women play in production, processing, trading of food and in making decisions about consumption and purchase of food at household level.

A just and equitable food system will require the recognition of women as farmers, with rights to the land they cultivate, technologies that reduce the drudgery of agriculture and policies that ensure women can make a living wage from agriculture
And while this is important, we must also focus on whether the food system as organized is just and equitable and whether it promotes the empowerment and livelihoods and health of women and girls.

The UN Food Systems Summit, to be convened by the UN Secretary General 2021, provides the world with a unique opportunity to reframe the global conversation on gender and food and ask the hard questions of how the food system can be structured in a just and equitable way.

Reframing gender and food systems

While there is recognition that food systems transformation is a political, economic and environmental issue, we must also recognize it as a gender justice issue; stark gender inequalities are both a cause and an outcome of unsustainable food systems, unjust food access, consumption and production.

Tackling gender injustice and truly empowering women is not only a fundamental prerequisite for food systems transformation but also a goal.

So, what should a gender just and equitable food system look like?

A gender just and equitable food system is one which guarantees a world without hunger, where women, men, girls and boys have equal access to nutritious, healthy food, safe food, and access to the means to produce, sell and purchase food.

It is a food system where the roles, responsibilities, opportunities and choices available to women and men – including unpaid caregiving and food provision – are not predetermined at birth but are developed in line with individual capacities and aspirations.

It is a food system where countries, communities and households and individual men and women are equipped to produce enough food for their own populations through environmentally sound processes, while also being able to participate in gender-equitable local, global and regional food trading systems.

So as food systems transform, the goal should be to ensure that they transform in ways that are equitable, that ensure meaningful engagement and benefits to all, women, boys, girls, men, indigenous groups amongst others.

Towards a just and equitable food system

A just and equitable food system requires a rethinking of the role of women as producers and consumers and a move from “what are women’s contributions in agriculture” toward “how can food and agricultural systems transform in ways that are equitable and that empower women”.

Achieving this will require systemic innovations in the food system and the use of a feminist lens.

First, at agricultural production level, a just and equitable food system will require the recognition of women as farmers, with rights to the land they cultivate, technologies that reduce the drudgery of agriculture and policies that ensure women can make a living wage from agriculture.

Women in many different contexts continue to have their rights to independent control of land denied, and access to agricultural inputs, credit, and other essential resources due to cultural norms, assumptions by governments and programs that farmers are male, because ‘men are the providers’.

A global movement like the “Me Too” movement that raises the consciousness and triggers action towards women’s rights to resources and to a living wage in agriculture is needed.

Second, it will require trade, market and finance policies and processes that do not discriminate against women, and that explicitly engage women in formulation and implementation.

For example, the African Continental Free Trade Agreement – AfCFTA – framework agreement includes an objective of gender equality that recognizes the full, equal and meaningful participation of women in an integrated continental market. Monitoring of this

Third, it will require gender standards that include workplace dignity for women and equal pay with monitoring and accountability mechanisms for the food industry, whether large farms, food factories or the service industry. In the US, women food processing workers made 74 cents to the dollar men earned in 2019.

And in 2018, ILO put a spotlight on sexual violence, harassment and poor workplace conditions of women workers in commercial agriculture. Such standards are being discussed in some industries such as the garment industry.

For example, the Gender Working Group at ISEAL aims to improve the working conditions of women in textile and apparel supply chains by promoting tailored, evidence-based strategies, tools and systems, with lessons that will be more broadly applicable to other standard organizations.

And finally, it will require strengthening and amplifying the voices of women in all levels of the food system. This will require funding women smallholder farmers organizations, women business networks, women workers unions, women’s consumer organizations to engage at different levels and in different conversations to influence food systems.

And for the industry, it will require adoption of a set of principles or a women and food systems manifesto for women’s representation and inclusion in food system, similar in nature to the Chef’s manifesto.

Our food systems need to change to nourish all in a sustainable way that protects our planet. Equally important is that they must be just and equitable and guarantee the needs and priorities of those that depend on them, including women.

Dr. Jemimah Njuki is the Custodian for Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment for the UN Food Systems Summit 2021 and a Food Systems Champion. She is an Aspen New Voices Fellow and writes on issues of gender equality in food systems. Follow her on @jemimah_njuki

Credit: Kristin Palitza/IPS

By Jemimah Njuki
NAIROBI, Oct 9 2020 (IPS)

“We need to build back better.”  This has been the rallying call on the COVID-19 response by UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres to leaders and communities around the world. It has been echoed in conference rooms and in the numerous Zoom meetings organized to discuss the pandemic. It will be especially important to apply the idea to women working in the agriculture and food sector. 

Women farmers often have lower access to productive resources than men—so in times of crisis, like COVID-19, their farm productivity and food security will likely be hit harder. The pandemic is affecting input availability and use. In a survey by Precision Agriculture for Development in Kenya, 8 in 10 agri-dealers reported a decrease in farmer footfall, and 76% reported lower sales compared to a month earlier.  

Women play a critical role in entrepreneurship in the food sector, from small scale processing to high growth companies that employ thousands of workers. In Sub-Saharan Africa, female entrepreneurs are more prevalent than male entrepreneurs, although their businesses are typically smaller and with less capital and many are in the informal sector.

The current recovery efforts, and support to the agriculture sector have remained gender blind, and when they have focused on women, they have tended to make assumptions about women’s roles in the food system

The Future of Business survey found that female led businesses were 7 percentage points more likely to be closed compared to male-led small businesses. They are also likely to take longer to recover from the impacts of the pandemic due to their lower access to formal credit and reliance on the family network for investment finance. 

A report by UN Women and the UNDP found that a total of 247 million women and girls will be living on less than $1.90 a day in 2021. And of this number, 132 million are in sub-Saharan Africa. 

And while there has been extensive discussion of gendered impacts of Covid-19, particularly the care burdens on women, and on building back better after the pandemic, what that looks like for many women engaged in stallholder agriculture is not clear to many. 

The current recovery efforts, and support to the agriculture sector have remained gender blind, and when they have focused on women, they have tended to make assumptions about women’s roles in the food system.  For example, women farmers have been targeted with interventions focused on home gardens and homestead food production and while this is important, it is not enough.

Evidence shows that women play a pivotal role in all three key components of food security: food availability (production), food access (distribution), and food utilization as well as in activities that support agricultural development. 

Leaving them out in the short and long-term recovery process is not an option and any efforts to build back better must focus on and include women.

So, how do we “build back better” for women in the food sectors? Initiatives must include two broad strategies to succeed; increased access to social protection, appropriate seeds, markets and finance; and enhanced and amplified leadership of women. This is how it can be achieved. 

First, governments can increase access to markets for women smallholder farmers by providing short term access to markets through procuring Covid19 food relief and school meal supplies. A study in India showed that public procurement institutions helped the state government implement a timely and sound procurement process during the lockdown, preventing widespread losses in crop income.

In the longer term, developing improved local markets with infrastructure that supports women such as child care facilities, encouraging shorter value chains and crop diversification has been shown to enable women access markets. 

Second, allocation of inputs must target women who are the majority smallholder farmers in the continent. Most governments are allocating funds for inputs, through digital voucher systems. For example, Kenya is spending a 500 million USD loan from the World Bank on inputs through a voucher system that has no specific targets for women despite another program with IFAD showing that targeting women has led to increases in their production. These voucher systems are however likely to leave women out due to their lower access to mobile phones.  

Third, target cash transfers directly to women as a social safety net. Cash transfers targeted at women have potential to help them rebuild their businesses, secure their food security and that of their households. In Nigeria, women who received cash transfers increased investment in their own business activities, were more likely to be involved in their own non-farm businesses and increased their profits.

Fourth, support women entrepreneurs, traders and processors engaged in the food business. Women have however always faced barriers to financial inclusion. Reforming the financial system so that it works for women must be a critical part of building back better.

For example in Zambia, the implementation of a self-check tool for commercial banks to ensure their financial products and services address women’s needs in the same way as those of men led to some banks adjusting their products to better meet the needs of women.

And finally, women who are in smallholder agriculture and agribusiness must be part of building back better. In the political space, countries with female leadership have been very successful in dealing with the pandemic. This leadership has however not cascaded to other sectors. The participation and influence of women is needed in the design, implementation and monitoring of policies and programs for building back better in the sector.  Building back better must be defined by those most affected by the pandemic. 

Dr Jemimah Njuki is an Aspen News Voices Fellow and a UN food systems champion. She writes on gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls.

By Jemimah Njuki
NAIROBI, Apr 10 2020 (IPS)

As of April 8, there have been 1.5 million reported cases of coronavirus and over 83,000 deaths. Most of these deaths are of men. Italy, for example, has so far had 71 percent of all case deaths attributed to men while Spain, another major global hotspot, has seen 65 percent of all deaths being men.

While the mortality rates for men are higher, women are disproportionally affected by the social and economic impacts of the pandemic. Indeed, there is evidence that pandemics affect men and women in different ways, and COVID19 is no different.

Women comprise seven out of ten health and social care workers and contribute US$ 3 trillion annually to global health, half in the form of unpaid care work. Health workers continue to be exposed to the virus due to lack of basic protective equipment

Women are facing higher risks of infection compared to men due to their large numbers in the health sector. The health and social sector, with its 234 million workers, is one of the biggest and fastest growing employers in the world, particularly of women.

Women comprise seven out of ten health and social care workers and contribute US$ 3 trillion annually to global health, half in the form of unpaid care work. Health workers continue to be exposed to the virus due to lack of basic protective equipment.

The care work burden which disproportionality falls on women has increased with the pandemic. In addition to women making up most of health-care workers, women are overwhelmingly the primary caretakers in their families.

As schools have closed, as COVID 19 measures, which require services and activities mainly done by women, such as requirement for water, women have found themselves with a bigger workload.

Gender based violence has increased as families find themselves in lockdowns with low economic security and feeling of helplessness. For example in France, domestic violence cases went up by 30% during the lockdown, while calls to the domestic violence line in Argentina went up by 25%.

New research has shown the multiple pathways between pandemics and gender based violence. Recently, UN chief António Guterres called for measures to address a “horrifying global surge in domestic violence” directed towards women and girls linked to lockdowns.

The economic impact of COVID-19 has hit women harder, as more women work in low-paying, insecure and informal jobs. Disruptions, including movement restrictions, are likely to compromise women’s ability to make a living and meet their families’ basic needs, and access much needed sexual and reproductive health and maternal health services.

In addition to understanding these kinds of gender differences at times of pandemics like COVID-19, research can play a much more long-term role.

Indeed, it can play a critical part in documenting and studying the long-term impacts of the pandemic and suggesting ways to ensure that systems protect women and girls during pandemics. This is how.

First, research can help understand, test and scale interventions that build the economic and social resilience of women and girls, as well as provide evidence on how programs can be designed to cope with and minimise the gendered impacts of future pandemics.

For example, unconditional and conditional cash transfers that aim to shift power imbalances by targeting women are likely to be important design features for reducing gender based intimate partner violence. While these have been studies out of pandemics, research during pandemics can help understand the impacts and potential adaptations of these programs.

Second, while the focus with COVID 19 has been on the negative impacts on women’s workloads  and women’s rights, pandemics can bring much desired shifts in gender roles and responsibilities.

The key question is how to sustain these changes long after the pandemic has passed.  Understanding how short-term pandemic-induced changes in gender roles and responsibilities can be sustained over a long time can generate evidence on pathways to equitable role sharing within households.

For example, the Spanish flu disproportionately affected young men, which in combination with World War I, created a labor shortage gap that was filled by women, entrenching women’s right to work.

Third, research can provide insights that inform a more gender sensitive and effective response to epidemics. While there has been a focus on the role of social sciences in understanding and managing pandemics, there has not been enough application of a gender lens to this research.

For example, understanding how men and will be affected in different ways before pandemics occur, how proposed management and response measures will affect them and can be designed to have positive outcomes, and even understanding the power dynamics and how they will affect response are all key areas of research.

And finally, research and researchers can play a role in ensuring the collection and analysis of age and sex disaggregated data both so that the needs and realities of men and boys, women and girls women’s do not fall through the cracks.

As we address the very immediate needs of different groups in the pandemic, let us also invest in long term gender research that ensures there is no disproportionate impact of pandemics, especially on women and girls and that their voices are heard.

Dr Jemimah Njuki is an Aspen News Voices Fellow and writes on gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls. Follow her @jemimah_njuki

Brazilian women have been making headway in traditionally male-dominated areas. Construction workers in Rio de Janeiro. Credit: Fabiana Frayssinet/IPS

By Jemimah Njuki
NAIROBI, Mar 13 2020 (IPS)

Two profound incidents happened the week of International Women’s Day. 

One, Senator Elizabeth Warren, the Democratic Party candidate for President of the U.S., bowed out of the election race despite what commentators said was a strong campaign with a  “plan for everything” and strong message of economic populism. Now there are no female frontrunners left.

Two, the United Nations Development Programme released a report headlined “Almost 90% of men/women globally are biased against women”. The report argues that in different spheres – employment, education, politics –  when empowerment is basic and precarious, women are overrepresented, but as power increases the gender gap widens.

Discriminatory social norms and stereotypes reinforce gendered identities and determine power relations which in turn constrain what men and women can do in ways that lead to inequality and exclusion

Three critical statistics stand out from the report – 50 percent of people say they think men make better political leaders, more than 40 percent feel that men make better business executives than women, and 30 percent believe it is okay for men to beat their spouses.

At the centre of this are harmful social norms, beliefs and stereotypes. For example, while legal barriers on women’s ability to vote and be elected have been removed in most countries, and women can participate in the economy without formal restrictions perceptions, beliefs about women’s capabilities and prejudices create an often-invisible barrier to women.

These discriminatory social norms and stereotypes reinforce gendered identities and determine power relations which in turn constrain what men and women can do in ways that lead to inequality and exclusion

And while policies such as affirmative action or equal parental leave can provide guidelines and basic principles to address inequalities, they are not sufficient to address those inequalities that are rooted in social exclusion and longstanding social norms.

We must challenge harmful gender norms, belief systems and stereotypes.

First, we can provide individuals with the information and knowledge that can cultivate different values, behaviours and belief systems. Gender norms are transferred and reinforced through communication, much of which happens informally within families and among peer groups in the wider community or through schools, religious organisations, government policies, and the media.

It follows that, communication and knowledge that provides alternative narratives can change belief systems and stereotypes.

In a recent review by the Overseas Development Institute, 71 percent of the wide range of communications programmes were effective in changing norms, attitudes and practices.

In one of the programs in Taru, India, – a radio soap opera that featured a young woman health worker – led to more supportive attitudes among listeners towards girls’ rights to education and to reduced support for sex-selective abortion.

In Zambia, a community theatre in fishing communities that showed women making decisions and owning assets led to 30 percent more women increasing their contributions to decision-making regarding fish processing and 49 percent more taking part in deciding what to do with the associated income.

Second is addressing the household power dynamics and changing unequal power relationships within households by engaging men and boys.

Even in areas such as food and nutrition, assumptions, norms and practices about women needing fewer calories, or not being allowed to eat certain food—can push women and girls into perpetual malnutrition and protein deficiency.

For example in Ghana, father-to-father support groups,  comprised of men who to discuss family-oriented issues that include infant and young child feeding, household interaction and support, and male involvement in child welfare have lead to men adopting new behaviors that contribute to the health and wellbeing of their households, especially pregnant and lactating women and children. Working with groups of men, as gender champions eliminates stigma foe men who are seen to be doing ‘women’s tasks’.

Third is removing sanctions for non-compliance to harmful norms and providing incentives for alternative more equitable norms through engaging traditional or religious leaders, duty bearers and norm ‘enforcers’.

Research shows that a social norm will be stickiest when individuals have the most to gain from complying with it and the most to lose from challenging it. Leaders have a lot of influence on the culture of a group or as they have the most control of sanctioning and can also set a strong expectation from others.

When female senior chief Theresa Kachindamoto in Malawi annulled 850 child marriages in 2016, she set expectations for all village heads firing from their jobs those that refused to ban the practice of child marriage.

And finally, for long term change, socialising boys and girls to more equitable sharing of roles and responsibilities, equal opportunities and respect for all irrespective of gender.

Society expects different attitudes and behaviors from boys and girls leading to boys and girls being socialized differently and to have different opportunities.

For example a report by UNICEF shows that girls between 5 and 14 years old spend 40 per cent more time, or 160 million more hours a day, on unpaid household chores and collecting water and firewood compared to boys their age.

But socialization also goes beyond roles to expectations and personality traits for example messaging of “boys are aggressive”, “girls are good at reading” “men are scientists”.

Parents’ gender-role modeling is critical in changing children’s perceptions and belief systems. Research for example has shown that a fathers’ childcare involvement is negatively related to children’s gender stereotyping.

And as Senator Elizabeth Warren said as she bowed out, we can not make these “pinky promises” that girls can be anything they want including president, without addressing the norms and prejudices that hold them back.

Dr Jemimah Njuki is an Aspen News Voices Fellow and writes on gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls. Follow her @jemimah_njuki

By Jemimah Njuki
NAIROBI, Feb 20 2020 (IPS)

The global gender community will meet in New York in March to review progress on gender equality and women’s empowerment in the 25 years since the Beijing declaration. The theme for this year’s Commission on the Status of Women gathering is Generation Equality, emphasizing how the current generation must close the gender gap. 

Examples of gaps include how women’s representation in national parliaments is only 23.7 per cent. In 39 countries, daughters and sons do not have equal inheritance rights. In 49 countries there are no laws protecting women from domestic violence, and globally 750 million women and girls are married before the age of 18. In the agriculture sector where I work, women are just 13 per cent of agricultural land holders globally.  

While the UN hopes these kinds of gender gaps can close in a generation, analysis by the World Economic Forum in their Global Gender Gap Report 2020 sets different expectations.  The report says it will take 99.5 years to close the gender gap if we accelerate progress, but if we continue the current pace, it could take up to 257 years. This is alarming. 

It will take 99.5 years to close the gender gap if we accelerate progress, but if we continue the current pace, it could take up to 257 years

While numerous development actors are engaged in projects around the globe that seek to achieve gender equality and empowerment of women and girls, governments and other agencies need to act fast and at scale to accelerate progress to ensure we become generation equality.

First, there needs to be political commitment by governments across the world to address gender inequality and women’s political participation. This can be in the form of women’s representation in parliament, gender responsive budgeting or advancing policies that protect the rights of women.

By February of 2019, only 12 countries — led by Rwanda with 61.3% — had over 40% representation of women in parliament. The proportion of ministerial posts held by women however remains low, at only one in five. France, Canada and Spain and more recently Scotland have all had cabinets with at least as many women as men.

Equal political participation by women and men needs to be the norm rather than the exception. Strategies that have worked include quotas for women’s representation, reforming pollical parties to be more gender equal, and ensuring a level playing field for women political aspirants. 

Second, governments need to accelerate laws that protect the rights of women and girls. Without these laws, the efforts of organizations will not be sustainable as they are not protected under the law. Evidence shows that discriminatory laws still exist in many countries.

For example, the Women, Law and Business report 2020 shows that 90 out of 190 countries still have at least one restriction on the jobs women can hold. In terms of laws to redistribute women’s care work, more than half of the economies covered mandate paid leave specifically reserved for fathers, but the median duration of that leave is just five days.

Only 43 economies have paid parental leave that can be shared by mothers and fathers. This is despite research that shows law reforms and policies that empower women are not only good for women’s empowerment, but they also boost economic growth.

For example, when women can move more freely, work outside the home and manage assets, they’re more likely to join the workforce and strengthen the economy.

Third, we must address the harmful social and cultural norms and societal perceptions of women as laws by themselves are not enough in protecting the rights of women. Evidence from Bangladesh for example shows women who routinely wore burkah/hijab, and hence are more compliant with religious and cultural norms are less likely to be engaged in outside work.

In Kenya, while equal inheritance of land and other property is entrenched in the constitution, women own less than 7 percent of the land in the country, mainly due to cultural norms that still do not recognise the rights of women and girls to inherit land.

Engaging men, boys, traditional and religious leaders can change norms and practices that are harmful to women and girls. In countries like Zambia and Malawi, traditional chiefs have been instrumental in reducing forced and early child marriage. 

And finally, we must invest in research and evidence to test what works, where we are making progress and where progress is not happening so as to inform future action. While there are indicators to track progress, the analysis of what is working in different contexts to achieve gender equality is not always that robust.

Tools like the Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index, tracks women’s empowerment in agriculture and shows the impact of different interventions on different indicators of women’s empowerment. Analysing data used to track SDG 5 on gender equality to track what is working and use the lessons for future implementation can help to accelerate progress. 

While some progress has been made in addressing gender inequality in recent years, a big push in this last decade before the expiry in 2030 of the Sustainable Development Goals is clearly needed. Now we must use different tools than those which created the problem.

Jemimah Njuki is an expert on gender equality and women’s empowerment. She is an Aspen New Voices Fellow. You can follow her @jemimah_njuki

In rural Sri Lanka women are tasked with fetching and carrying water for the entire household, sometimes walking miles with pots and bottles balanced on their heads. Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS

By Jemimah Njuki
NAIROBI, Oct 17 2019 (IPS)

Climate change has a disproportionate impact on women and girls. This is clear when it comes to water, for instance. The Global Commission on Adaptation Report launched at the United Nations General Assembly last week states that the number of people who may lack sufficient water, at least one month per year, will soar from 3.6 billion today to more than 5 billion by 2050.

In many developing countries, gender roles and expectations have made women and girls bear the brunt of looking for water. Currently, women in sub-Saharan Africa spend an average of about 200 million hours per day collecting water, and a whopping 40 billion hours per year. As the impacts of climate change worsen, the burden on women and girls who are still responsible for over 70% of the burden of collecting water in Africa.

Currently, women in sub-Saharan Africa spend an average of about 200 million hours per day collecting water, and a whopping 40 billion hours per year. As the impacts of climate change worsen, the burden on women and girls who are still responsible for over 70% of the burden of collecting water in Africa
While most analysis of climate change recognise the impact on and role of women, many reports and programs fail to recommend practical ways to support women and to address the gender barriers that they face in responding to climate change.

And even more fail to put real resources to address gender inequalities. Now, the implementation of this new Global Commission on Adaptation report is a huge opportunity for improvement and ensuring that gender equality is at the centre of all future climate adaptation investments.

There are three ways in which this report can put women, and gender equality at the core of the three revolutions that the report proposes: revolution in financing, revolution in planning and revolution in knowledge.

First, for the revolution in financing, the Global Commission on Adaptation report recommends a 1.8 trillion USD fund needed to help the world adapt but none of this is directed to specific women lead initiations.  That should be rectified. Governments and donors should make specific investments to women led, and women inclusive funds to enable women adapt to climate change.

Women are already making efforts to pool their own funds together to support each other. For example, in Uganda,  the Women’s Empowerment for Resilience and Adaptation Against Climate Change,  a community of 1,642 women-led associations, representing more than 250,000 women, have pooled together their individual savings to generate a fund of close to USD 3 Million.

Women involved in this initiative borrow from this pool of savings to invest in innovative, scalable and replicable activities that catalyze action towards a low-carbon and highly resilient future.

Over 200,000 women have access to clean water, 250,000 earn income from income generating activities including bee keeping, over 1800 use solar energy while 34,000 energy-saving stoves have been constructed in thousands of households, reducing deforestation by 8%. Investments that help replicate such successes across the globe will economically empower women while conserving the environment and reducing the impacts of climate change.

Second, for the revolution in planning, government and other implementing agencies must make gender equality central to the planning process for climate change adaptation across the key systems that are the focus of the report- food, natural environment, water, infrastructure, cities, and natural disaster management.

This will require gender analysis for all proposed interventions in the different sectors, gender budgeting to ensure resources are allocated to gender responsive and gender specific actions, and monitoring and evaluation systems that measure impacts of interventions on different groups and on gender equality.

Studies by Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN show that a gender analysis of many climate-smart agriculture practices shows that they require relatively high investments in time and/or labour (e.g. building stone bunds and terraces) which can increase women’s labour burden.

A gender analysis can therefore inform the design and implementation of climate adaptation innovations. On gender budgeting, studies show that in countries like Nepal and Bangladesh, gender budget statements for climate change have led to more targeted investments on gender and climate change.

And third, on the knowledge revolution, a coalition of global organizations working on gender and climate should develop global guidelines on integrating gender concerns in climate adaptation and build capacity and accountability mechanisms to implement and monitor their application across countries by governments, private sector, global organizations and community-based organizations working on climate adaptation.

Organizations such as the World Health Organization, the International Labour Organization and the Food and Agriculture Organization have been developing global guidelines on health, on labour standards and on agriculture. Such guidelines have been shown to have positive impacts.

An evaluation of the FAO voluntary guidelines on the responsible governance of tenure of land, fisheries and forests enacted in 2012 found that five out of six countries evaluated had included principles of responsible governance of tenure in policies, laws or activities, as a result of the guidelines.

It’s time to move beyond the analysis of women’s vulnerabilities to climate change and their roles in climate adaptation. Governments and donors must put their money where their mouths are – real investments on gender equality in the climate adaptation agenda.

Excerpt:

Most African farmers are women. Credit: IPS

By Jemimah Njuki
OTTAWA, Canada, Jan 9 2018 (IPS)

If there is one political principle that has been constant throughout the history of human civilization it is the fact that land is power. This is something that is particularly true, and often painfully so, for women who farm in Africa.

Though women in Africa are far more likely to farm than men, they are also much less likely to have secure rights to the land where they cultivate crops and they typically hold smaller plots of inferior quality.

As a researcher who studies the role of gender in agriculture, I want to do my part to address this injustice, because when women have stronger rights to land, their crop yields increase and they have higher incomes and more bargaining power within the household. Research has shown that stronger land rights leads to other benefits such as better child nutrition and improved educational attainment for girls.

But as I delve deeper in to the issue, I frequently encounter another political constant, which is the fact that information is power. And one manifestation of the chronic neglect of women in agriculture is the lack of data that would help illuminate and address their plight.

For example, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has launched the Goal Keepers Initiative, which is making a concerted effort to track progress toward achieving the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals. Examining the first ever report on the program launched just a few weeks ago, the first thing I did was scroll down to the section on Goal 5, “Achieve Gender Equality and Empower all Women and Girls.” When examining the indicators related to gender, which include tracking the percentage of women who have secure land rights, I kept encountering the phrase, “Insufficient data” in big, bold red capital letters!

Without data, it is impossible to track progress or identify policies and interventions that are achieving gender equality. In order to develop solutions—whether around land rights or the many other challenges women and girls face–we need data that highlights current problems and assesses their impact.

A good example of how sex-specific data fosters progress is in financial inclusion. Sex-specific data gives us information about who is accessing which kind of products, which channels they use and what the gaps are. Being aware of these gaps is essential to overcome them, and this is impossible without data sets for both men and women. In Rwanda, use of sex-specific data has led to the targeting of groups who are excluded from the financial system, raising the financial inclusion index rise from 20 percent in 2008 to 42 percent in 2012.

A report by Data2X, an initiative of the United Nations Foundation, indicates that although close to 80 percent of countries globally regularly produce sex-specific statistics on mortality, labor force participation, and education and training, less than one-third of countries separate statistics by sex on informal employment, entrepreneurship (ownership and management of a firm or business) and unpaid work, or collect data about violence against women. This leads to an incomplete picture of women’s and men’s lives and the gaps that persist between them, which constrains the development of policies and programs to address these gaps.

A key challenge to collecting these data sets is investment. We need financial investments to collect data on the situation of women and girls at different levels –local, national and international. A study carried out by the UN Statistics Division in collaboration with the UN regional commissions in 2012, showed that out of 126 responding countries only 13 percent had a separate budget allocated to specific gender statistics, 47 percent relied on ad-hoc or project funds and the remaining 39 percent had no funds at all.

In 2016, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation invested US $80M to improve the collection of sex specific data. In Uganda, the World Bank Living Standards Measurement Study is collaborating with the United Nations Evidence and Data for Gender Equality initiative and the Uganda Bureau of Statistics to collect and analyze asset ownership by different members of households.

It would help to know for example what assets women own so as to develop programs and policies that benefit both men and women and that close persistent gender gaps. At Canada’s International Development Research Centre, we are supporting sex-specific reporting and registration of vital and civil events—including births and deaths to help track progress on such indicators as women’s reproductive health and child mortality.

Globally, there is still no available data on how many women own customary land. One challenge is that the rules, norms, and customs which determine the distribution of land and resources are embedded in various institutions in society—family, kinship, community, markets, and states. For example, when I was visiting Mali in 2012, I attended a village’s community meeting where I witnessed the village chief grant a local women’s group a local deed so they could farm together and raise their incomes. But there was no formal document or record.

Without this data, when land is privatized or formalized, women often lose control of customary land. For example in post-independence Kenya, Uganda and Zimbabwe, during the land registration and formalization experience, lack of data and consideration of women in customary land rights led to the documentation of land in the name of the head of the household only, often a man. This gave the man authority to use, sell, and control the land, with women losing the customary access and rights that they had previously enjoyed.

International agencies and governments must commit to investing in collecting more data on women and girls. Closing this gender data gap is not only useful for tracking progress of where we are with the SDGs, but it can also point to what interventions are working, and what needs to be done to accelerate progress towards gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls.

What gets measured matters, and what matters gets measured. Women and girls matter.

Excerpt: