Integrating a Gender Perspective into Statistics

Abstract

Gender equality has been increasingly recognized as being essential to the process of sustainable development and the formulation of effective national development policies and programmes. The demand for gender statistics has increased over the years owing to international conventions and gender mainstreaming in policies. However, while many national statistical offices have attempted to establish and succeeded in establishing sound gender statistics programmes, additional guidance is needed to improve the availability of data and to ensure a proper mainstreaming of gender issues in all areas of official statistics. These concerns have been reflected in the statistical work of the United Nations. The United Nations Statistics Division has led many of the technical developments in the field of gender statistics since the early 1980s. Over the years, the Division has actively supported gender statistics programmes around the world, providing leadership particularly in the production of technical materials and the compilation of statistics. In an effort to revamp gender statistics programmes around the world, the Division, in collaboration with the United Nations Population Fund and the World Bank, established the Inter‐agency and Expert Group on Gender Statistics (IAEG‐GS) in 2006 and has subsequently convened various editions of the Global Forum on Gender Statistics to help to chart the path for further work in this field. The present manual was prepared following the recommendation of IAEG‐GS in 2009 and the request made by the United Nations Statistical Commission at its forty‐second session in 2011(see E/2011/24‐E/CN.3/2011/37). Recognizing that the systematic integration of gender in regular statistical programmes is still missing in many countries, the present manual aims to foster a gender perspective in national statistics. It provides information needed to accomplish three main goals: (a) to achieve a comprehensive coverage of gender issues in data production activities; (b) to incorporate a gender perspective into the design of surveys or censuses, by taking into account gender issues and avoiding gender biases in measurement; and (c) to improve data analysis and data presentation and to deliver gender statistics in a format that is easy to use by policymakers and planners. The manual is targeted primarily at statisticians working in less developed national statistical systems. It can also be used as a resource manual for training in gender statistics. The present manual supplements and brings up‐to‐date the extensive work on gender statistics carried out by the United Nations and its specialized agencies, other international organizations and national statistical offices. The manual acknowledges important milestones in the development of training materials on gender statistics, including the following comprehensive manuals: Engendering Statistics: A Tool for Change (Hedman, Perucci and Sundström, 1996); Handbook for Producing National Statistical Reports on Women and Men (United Nations, 1997); and “Developing gender statistics: a practical tool” (United Nations, Economic Commission for Europe, and World Bank Institute, 2010). The present manual was produced on the basis of collaborative efforts. IAEG‐GS initiated the process of developing the manual and provided guidance on its structure and content. The Statistics Division, with the assistance of Ms. Ionica Berevoescu as consultant to the Division’s secretariat, prepared the manual. Additional feedback was provided during two regional training workshops, which used materials from the draft manual, held in Kampala in 2012 and in Chiba, Japan, in 2013. The present manual is also available online, in the form of a wiki platform (http://unstats.un- .org/unsd/genderstatmanual). The dedicated wiki platform has been developed in such a way as to ensure a wide reach and distribution to potential users in national statistical offices as well as in other national and international agencies. The flexible design of the platform allows for frequent updates and enhancement of the content to reflect the most recent developments in gender statistics.