Despite recent progress in gender data availability, significant gaps persist, particularly in low and middle-income countries. Missing information on the lives of women and girls and the inaction on existing evidence calls for a change in the way gender data is designed, collected, analysed, and used.
Transforming gender data for greater impact requires improving design and production processes and linking official statistics with lived realities on the ground. Citizen data is one powerful way to harness a collaborative effort to fill critical gender data gaps, enhance participatory governance, and ensure marginalized voices are heard in policy making.
Traditionally, gender data has been the domain of national statistics offices (NSOs), while ministries and civil society have handled gender issues. However, advancing gender equality demands stronger collaboration among these stakeholders to leverage diverse expertise and maximise the impact of gender data. The Beijing Platform for Action highlighted civil society's critical role in promoting gender equality - acting as a watchdog, advocate, service provider, and mobiliser. Yet, its potential to amplify gender data and generate evidence remains underutilised. To close this gap, public institutions responsible for gender equality must deepen their engagement with and involvement of civil society across the gender data value chain.
The Gender Data Outlook reveals that top-performing countries share a common trait: regular user-producer dialogues and strong coordination between NSOs, national statistical systems, and gender equality institutions. When civil society is involved in official data processes, gender statistics become more relevant, context-aware, and actionable-ensuring they effectively support policymaking and drive progress toward gender equality. This process can potentially empower new users and amplifiers of gender data, and its empowering potential positively affects the NSOs and governments.
Participants
- Papa Seck, UN Women
- Liliana Suchodolska, PARIS21
- Jessamyn Encarnacion, UN Women
- Miosotis Rivas Pena, ONE Dominican Republic
- Uganda Civil Society Budget Advocacy Group
- Sofia Orrebrink, Sida
- Johannes Jütting, PARIS21