Distr.: LIMITED
ECA/ACGD/CWD.BM/2006/3 January 2006
ECONOMIC COMMISSION FOR AFRICA Original: ENGLISH
African Centre for Gender and Development
Meeting of the Bureau of the Committee on Women and Development
24-25 Janua ry 2006 Addis Ababa
THE AFRICAN GENDER AND DEVELOPMENT INDEX
ECA/ACGD/CWD.BM./2006/3
TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. INTRODUCTION ... 1
1.1 What is the AGDI? ... ... 1
1.2 Characteristics of the AGDI ... ... 2
1.3 Objectives of the AGDI... ... 2
2. RATIONALE FOR DEVELOPING THE AGDI FOR MEMBER STATES ... ... 3
2.1 Gender equality is a development objective... ... 3
2.2 A common African platform for assessing the performance towards gender equality is crucial... ... 3
2.3 There is a critical need to bridge the knowledge gap between stated and real achievements... ... 4
2.4 Reporting on various gender documents has to be rationalized ... ... 5
3. DEVELOPMENT PROCESS OF THE AGDI... ... 5
4. AGDI DATA COLLECTION AT THE NATIONAL LEVEL... ... 6
4.1 Setting up the National Advisory Panel... ... 6
4.2 The National Research Institution ... ... 7
4.3 Quantitative assessment of gender equality: the Gender Status Index... ... 7
4.4 Qualitative assessment of performance on women’s advancement: the African Women’s Progress Scoreboard... ... 8
5. LESSONS LEARNT... ...10
6. THE WAY FORWARD... ...10
ECA/ACGD/CWD.BM./2006/3
1. INTRODUCTION
The regional commissions of the United Nations have been mandated to facilitate the effective implementation, monitoring and evaluation of the international and regional platforms and plans of action on gender equality and women’s advancement. Within this framework, the Economic Commission for Africa/African Center for Gender and Development (ECA/ACGD) developed the African Gender and Development Index (AGDI) during 2002-2004 to provide African polic y makers and their partners with an appropriate tool for monitoring progress towards gender equality and women’s advancement.
1.1. What is the AGDI?
The AGDI is a composite index that combines both quantitative and qualitative indicators through its two parts, the Gender Status Index (GSI) and the African Women’s Progress Scoreboard (AWPS).
§ The Gender Status Index (GSI) captures quantitatively measurable issues related to gender equality. It is based on three blocs: social power ‘capabilities’ (education and health), economic power ‘opportunities’ (income, time use, employment and access to resources) and political power ‘agency’ (representation at decision-making levels in the public sector and in civil society organizations). A score of 1 for the index means the country has achieved gender equality. A score below 1 means there are gender gaps to be addressed.
§ The African Women’s Progress Scoreboard (AWPS) measures government policy performance regarding women’s advancement and empowerment. It tracks government progress in ratifying relevant conventions on gender equality and women’s rights, such as the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), the Beijing Platform for Action, African Charter on Human and People’s Rights and its Women’s Rights Protocol, International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD- Cairo) and its Programme of Action (POA) and review Plus Five, including the implementation of policies and programmes in line with such conventions.
§ The AWPS also focuses on qualitative issues and fills the gap between purely quantitative indicators, such as those contained in the GSI, and more country-specific or sector- specific indicators, or those related to decision-making and well-being at the household and individual levels. It is composed of four blocs: women’s rights, social power
‘capabilities’, economic power ‘opportunities’ and political power ‘agency’. The scoring for each indicator is done on a three -point scale: 0 for a zero performance, 1 for a poor to fair performance and 2 for a good to excellent performance.
The AGDI is specifically an African index in three respects. First, it takes into account the major African charters and documents that have a bearing on gender relations in the continent.
Second, it identifies gender gaps in the selected power blocs and facilitates the review of the underlying gender relations in Africa. And third, its findings are from the African countries, based on the statistics available nationally.
1.2 Characteristics of the AGDI
The characteristics of the AGDI as a tool are as follows:
• Evidence-based, rigorous and ‘independent’ , with fact-finding by an independent research institution, which can guarantee high standards in data analysis. This allows for documenting achievements and gaps in effective gender mainstreaming and for informing policy-making, programme formulation and resource allocation.
• Combination of a quantitative assessment of gender equality and a qualitative assessment of women’s empowerment, which allows analysis of the impact of affirmative action measures on gender equality indicators. For example, in dealing with school drop-out rates, when a country has undertaken specific measures on girls’ schooling, the impact on the school drop-out rates for girls should be visible. Further, the ‘quantification’ of qualitative indicators related to women’s empowerment through a scoring process in the African Women’s Progress Scoreboard of the AGDI facilitates comparison between countries and analysis of trends over time within each country.
• Promotion of collaboration between the women’s/gender national machinery, the line ministries, the national bureau of statistics and the research institution. This brings great prospects for enhancing policy dialogue on gender mainstreaming in sectoral policies, raising awareness about statistical gaps and linking research and policy advocacy to gender issues.
• Ownership of the process by member States given that the analysis is based on nationally collected data and the process is steered by the national advisory panel chaired by the head of the national women’s machinery.
• Combination of a national and regional process of assessment through the regional advisory panel and the national advisory panels. This facilitates the exchange of good practices between countries.
• Comprehensiveness of the tool, which covers the monitoring of all key areas, recognized in the Beijing Platform for Action and other gender documents crucial to the achievement of full human rights for women, and gender equality.
1.3 Objectives of the AGDI
• To provide African governments with data and information on the status of gender equality and the effects of their gender policies on reducing women’s marginalization;
• To provide African policy-makers and their partners with an appropriate tool to measure gender equality and women’s advancement in various spheres, namely, economic, political, social and women’s rights;
• To strengthen the capacity of member States to effectively monitor the progress made in implementing conventions that African countries have ratified, as well as other gender commitments;
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• To promote change in attitudes, structures and mechanisms at the political, legal and operational levels in order to achieve ge nder equality and women’s advancement;
• To bridge the knowledge and information gap between stated achievements by member States and the real impact of gender mainstreaming efforts;
• To democratize statistics and qualitative monitoring tools that are effective and easy to use;
and
• To stimulate inter-departmental cooperation within the Ministries in which the index will be applied.
2. RATIONALE FOR DEVELOPING THE AGDI FOR MEMBER STATES 2.1 Gender equality is a development objective
• One of the greatest challenges facing Africa over the last three decades has been gender inequality, and this has been exemplified by women’s limited access to and control over social services and, socio-economic opportunities, as well as their low representation in decision-making spheres at all levels. Women are disproportionately represented among the poor in Africa. Women’s poverty is exacerbated by such factors as gender relations, women’s limited access to education, child and maternal mortality and morbidity, the feminization of HIV/AIDS, poor nutritional status, high population growth rates and low economic productivity. Addressing the deep roots of poverty in Africa will require that gender equality and women’s empowerment are recognized as being central to development objectives. This should be complemented by mainstreaming gender equality concerns in all development policies and strategies such as national development plans and poverty reduction strategies;
• The Millennium Development Goals; and
• The NEPAD objectives.
However, effective gender mainstreaming requires baseline gender-disaggregated data and indicators of outputs, outcomes and impact on Government’s performance in achieving equality. By combining quantitative and qualitative data in all sectors – i.e. social, economic, political and women’s rights --the AGDI constitutes a complete and comprehensive tool that can guide policy makers on strategic interventions towards gender equality and women’s empowerment.
2.2 A common African platform for assessing the performance towards gender equality is crucial
At the level of the African Union (AU), the Constitutive Act of the AU emphasizes the need for gender -balanced development to enable the monitoring of gender equality in the Union’s policies and programmes. In July 2004, Heads of State issued a Solemn Declaration on gender equality, reaffirming their commitment to the gender provisions of the Constitutive Act of the African Union as well as other existing regional and international instruments. The Decla ration encompasses nine areas of agreement:
• Accelerating the implementation of gender-specific economic, social and legal measures aimed at combating the HIV/AIDS pandemic and effectively implementing both the Abuja Declaration and the Maputo Declaration on malaria, HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and other infectious diseases;
• The full and effective participation and representation of women in peace processes;
• Advocacy on the issue of child soldiers and abuse of the girl child as wives and sex slaves in violation of their rights as enshrined in the African Charter on the Rights of the Child;
• The fight against gender-based violence and trafficking in women and children;
• The expansion and promotion of the gender parity principle in all the organs of the African Union;
• The active promotion and protection of all human rights for women and girls;
• The promotion of the implementation of legislation to guarantee women’s land, property and inheritance rights;
• The adoption of specific measures to ensure the education of girls and women’s literacy, especially in rural areas, to achieve the goal of ‘Education for All’ (EFA); and
• The signing and ratification of the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’
Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa by end 2004 and ensuring its entry into force by 2005.
Within the framework of the New Economic Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD), the issue of governance is monitored through the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM), which has a gender component. The AGDI allows Governments and civil society to evaluate good practices in neighbouring countries and learn from them. For instance, in compiling its APRM report, Ghana used AGDI data to accentuate the national statistics on gender. The data and national reports from the AGDI also play a critical role in monitoring the implementation of the 12 critical areas of the BPFA and the commitments made by Governments during the Seventh African Regional Conference on Women (“Beijing + 10 in Africa”). The Beijing Platform for Action lays an emphasis on action and focuses on taking concrete measures to achieve the strategic objectives of the 12 critical areas of concern. All subsequent reviews have emphasized the need for concrete measures to accelerate the implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action, focusing on gaps, limitations and obstacles, and addressing challenges that have led to the limited delivery on the key Beijing commitments.
2.3 There is a critical need to bridge the knowledge gap between stated and real achievements
The periodic reviews of progress towards gender equality conducted during the Beijing + 5 and + 10 processes were driven by the need for member States to showcase their initiatives and achievements. While such self-evaluations are usually complemented by the reporting of NGOs, regional and subregional institutions, the lack of gender-disaggregated data and gender sensitive indicators in all spheres is a serious impediment to the accurate assessment of inequalities and violations of women’ s human rights. Moreover, impact studies of government policies and
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programmes at the continental level to assess the relevance and effectiveness of gender mainstreaming initiatives are missing. As a fact-finding tool to be used by an independent research institution for data collection and compilation, the AGDI allows relatively accurate reporting of gender relations in a given country for a specific period.
2.4 Reporting on various gender documents has to be rationalized
Addressing gender inequality requires accelerating the pace of implementation of gender commitments made in various international and regional documents, such as CEDAW and its optional protocol on women’s rights; the Beijing Platform for Action and its follow-up processes; the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD), Cairo 1994 and ICPD Platform for Action + 5; the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs); the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights and its protocol on the rights of women in Africa.
However, the overlapping gender commitments and the various reporting requirements have led to ‘reporting fatigue’ in member States. The AGDI is a valuable and comprehensive tool for streamlining reporting on all regional and international instruments on gender equality. It allows for the compilation and consistent use of qualitative and quantitative gender-disaggregated data in the social, economic and political spheres.
3. DEVELOPMENT PROCESS OF THE AGDI
Prior to the development of the AGDI, numerous other indexes had been developed to measure gender equality and women’s empowerment, the most prominent being the Gender-related Development Index (GDI) and the Gender Empowerment Measure (GEM) developed by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). These two indexes are the first global instruments to demonstrate that the level of gender equality in a country is not solely dependent upon a country’s economic performance. However, the GDI and GEM are still closely related to a country’s Gross Domestic Product (GD P). Moreover, the international database used by the UNDP is not always adequate to capture African realities. Besides, by focusing on quantitative issues, the GDI and the GEM ignore important qualitative issues such as women’s rights.
Through the development of the African Gender and Development Index (AGDI), ECA took further the steps initiated by UNDP and separated the gender status from a country’s GDP, making use of data sets that are nationally available and incorporating qualitative issues. The AGD I maps out gender gaps between men and women in all spheres and at various levels and tracks progress towards gender equality and women’s advancement in both quantitative and qualitative terms. It provides an effective monitoring mechanism that policy makers can use to assess their performance in implementing the various documents African countries have ratified.
The development of the AGDI involves various steps, including:
(a) Definition of a theoretical framework based on a review of existing indices and any global agreements and charters to which African countries are signatories;
(b) Presentation of the proposed Index for review by a working group comprised of statisticians, economists, gender experts, and sociologist/development experts for strict scrutiny;
(c) Presentation of the proposed Index to a Regional Advisory Panel comprising of panelists from the twelve countries in which the index was piloted as well as representatives from the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), the World Bank, the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) and other partners for discussion and validation;
(d) Launching of the AGDI at the Fourth African Development Forum (ADF IV) in Addis Ababa on 12 October 2004 and endorsement by ministers and experts during the Seventh African Regional Conference on Women (“Beijing + 10 in Africa”) held in October 2004 during ADF IV;
(e) During the “Beijing + 10 in Africa” Conference, African ministers and experts endorsed the AGDI as a critical tool to monitor progress in achieving gender equality and equity and recommended its extension to all African countries;
(f) Piloting the Index in twelve countries to determine its feasibility, relevance, applicability and advocacy in the development of gender-disaggregated data. The trial countries include: Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Egypt, Ethiopia, Ghana, Madagascar, Mozambique, South Africa, Tanzania, Tunisia and Uganda;
(g) The results of the field trials will be published in the African Women’s Report (AWR) to be launched in March 2006. Subsequent editions of the AWR will allow for more in-depth analysis of both individual indicators and of particular trends and salient issues. A major focus will be on best practices, in order to allow African Governments to learn from the experiences of neighbouring countries.
ECA is currently preparing to extend the AGDI to 26 additional African countries in 2006-07.
4. AGDI DATA COLLECTION AT THE NATIONAL LEVEL
4.1 Setting up the National Advisory Panel
Before the country data collection is initiated, a national advisory panel is set up in each country, comprising representatives from the following Ministries or their equivalents: national machinery for women’s affairs or gender, health, education and the national bureau of statistics. The panel also includes two independent experts with gender and development experience and statistics and an NGO representative.
The role of the National Advisory Panel is the following:
• Support the institutions in the collection of nationa l data that is accurate and of high quality;
• Assist institutions in accessing the relevant data;
• Review the institutions’ methodology for collecting data;
• Review the data collected by the national institution;
• Review the national report prepared by the national institutions, which includes the AGDI data before it is submitted to ECA.
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4.2 The National Research Institution
Selected independent institutions in each country undertake the data collection for the AGDI.
This group includes statisticians, economists and gender specialists. It is selected by means of a transparent and rigorous process to ensure fairness as well as selecting a capable institute.
The involvement of both the national institutions and advisory panels is to warrant the collection of quality data directly from national data banks, guarantee national ownership of the process and foster close collaboration between Governments and civil society. The national institutions are important in ensuring objective reviews of Governments’ performance, whilst the national advisory panels guarantee transparency and quality control.
4.3 Quantitative assessment of gender equality: the Gender Status Index
In each country, the research institution collects 42 sex-disaggregated variables distributed into three blocs:
• Social power ‘capabilities’ with two components:
o Education, measured by variables on enrolment, drop-out and literacy;
o Health, measured by variables on child health, life expectancy at birth, new HIV infection and time spent out of work.
• Economic power ‘opportunities’ with three components:
o Income measured by variables on wages in agriculture, the civil service and the formal sector, and on income from informal enterprise, small agricultural household enterprises as well as remittances and intra-household transfers;
o Time use or employment measured by variables on time spent in market economic activities and in non-market economic activities, and variables on employment;
o Access to resources measured by access to means of production and to management positions.
• Political power ‘agency’ with two component:
o Representation in key decision-making positions in the public sector,
o Representation in key decision-making positions in civil society organizations.
For each variable, the indicator of gender equality is calculated in the same way: it consists in the comparison of female achievement to male achievement. The closer the indicator is to 1, the better the performance on gender equality is in the country. The indicator is also calc ulated for each component and for each bloc. The Gender Status Index, which takes into account all 42 variables, is then compiled to give the overall gender profile of the country.
4.4 Qualitative assessment of performance on women’s advancement: the African Women’s Progress Scoreboard
In each country, the research team assesses the level of implementation of regional and international documents relating to key women’s rights and gender equality as classified within four blocs:
• Women’s rights bloc:
o CEDAW, with special attention to its Optional Protocol, article 2 on the principle of equality of men and women in national constitutions and other legislations, and to article 16 on marriage and family relations;
o The Protocol to the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights on the Rights of Women, which focuses on harmful practices.
• Social bloc:
o Beijing Platform for Action;
o Violence against women: domestic violence, rape, sexual harassment and trafficking in women;
o ICPD + 5: sexually transmitted infections, HIV/AIDS, maternal mortality and contraception;
o 2001 Abuja Declaration on HIV/AIDS and women;
o Education: policy in girls school drop-outs and education on human/women’s rights.
• Economic bloc:
o ILO conventions and policies: Convention No.100 on Equal Remuneration, Convention No.111 on Discrimination, and Convention No.183 on Maternity Protection at the workplace and policy on HIV/AIDS;
o Highlighting the gender dimension in national poverty reduction strategy papers (PRSP) and other development plans;
o Access to agricultural extension services;
o Access to technology;
o Equal access to land.
• Political bloc:
o United Nations Security Council resolution 1325 (2000) on Women, Peace and Security;
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o Beijing Platform for Action on effective and accessib le national machinery;
o Policies in the following areas: support for women’s quota and affirmative action;
decision-making positions within parliament/Ministries; gender mainstreaming in all departments.
For each indicator, the research team collects inf ormation on the following measurements:
• Ratification: was the international convention or document ratified, with or without reservation?
• Reporting: has the country met all the reporting requirements?
• Law: was a national law passed on the specific gender issue?
• Policy commitment: have policy documents specifying the particular intentions of Governments to address the specific issue and the activities to be undertaken to reach their goals been passed?
• Development of a plan/gender plan: has a plan with clear objectives and particular activities been elaborated?
• Targets: have realistic and measurable targets been set?
• Institutional mechanism: have government departments or institutions organized adequate institutional mechanisms, such as gender desks or focal points, at appropriate levels to implement the specific convention or document?
• Budget: have Governments paid attention to the “gendered” impact their budget has on the specific item by allocating sufficient resources for the implementation of the gender plan specified earlier?
• Human resources : is sufficient and qualified staff employed to implement the necessary gender-related activities?
• Research: has the Government taken sufficient care to ensure that data collection and analysis on the specific item take place?
• Involvement of civil society: how is the Government collaborating with NGOs on the particular item?
• Information and dissemination: Do Governments undertake sufficient efforts to ensure that the population is aware of the specific issue , and that the information is correctly disseminated and reaches people in a language that they understand?
• Monitoring and evaluation: is the gender policy or plan under consideration monitored and are appropriate indicators to measure progress for the particular item being used?
The performance of member States on each measurement for each convention will be gauged against a three-point scale: 0 for a zero performance, 1 for a poor to fair performance and 2 for a good to excellent performance. A detailed narrative substantiates the score attributed on each measurement.
5. LESSONS LEARNT
• The participatory development of a tool that involves various stakeholders and that is tested on the ground is a lengthy process. However, such a process is worthwhile to ensure its acceptance and facilitate the institutionalization of the tool.
• Governments are sometimes sensitive to the review of their progress. Currently, the scoring is done at the national level by the research institutions and then discussed by the national advisory panel. There is a need to set a forum for negotiating the scoring when there are contentious issues relating to the scoring of achievements.
6 . THE WAY FORWARD
In 2004, ten years after Beijing, Africa conducted its decade review of the implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action under the auspices of ECA. Following the assessment of achievements and gaps, African ministers issued a statement to renew their commitment to gender equality, equity and empowerment of women and to suggest concrete steps to address the gaps between commitment and implementation. The statement stressed the need for ‘Governments to evaluate on a regular basis the extent to which political will is translated into concrete results, so as to identify and remedy the gaps in existing gender policies and implementation and support them with the allocation of the appropriate human and material resources’. Such evaluation requires up-to-date sex-disaggregated data and gender-sensitive indicators in various sectors, at various levels in all African countries, which can be provided by national field studies using the African Gender and Development Index.
Member States have identified the AGDI as a tool for monitoring the empowerment of African women and their participation in the NEPAD process and in fulfillment of the NEPAD programme, especially the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM). What is probably even more significant is the recognition of the index by ECOSOC and the European Union as an Africa -specific initiative.
ECA/ACGD will therefore extend the AGDI to all African countries, with the support of various partners, in two phases:
• During the biennium 2006-2007, 26 countries selected to reflect the geographical and language representation will be covered as follows:
o Central Africa: Chad, Congo Brazzaville and Gabon;
o East Africa : Burundi, Djibouti, Kenya, Rwanda and the Sudan;
o North Africa: Algeria, Libya and Morocco;
o West Africa: Cape Verde, Liberia, Mali, Mauritania, Nigeria, Senegal and the Gambia;
and
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o Southern Africa : Angola, Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Namibia, Seychelles, Swaziland and Zambia.
• The rest of the African countries will be targeted during the biennium 2008-2009.
ECA will also enrich the tool with additional variables such as those related to water and sanitation and to agriculture, which are critical areas for gender equality.
The present 3-point system is too limiting. A wider system of scoring (4-5 points) would be both more accurate and would allow countries to track progress over time to capture various stages of progress.
