Regional Conference on Public Sector Management in Support of the MDGs

1. Session 10a MDG3: Numbers tell HERstory: Why gender statistics is important to monitor the progress in achieving MDGs?UNESCAP, Bangkok, Thailand15-06-2012 Regional Conference on Public Sector Management in Support of the MDGs Kaushal Joshi Senior Statistician, Development Indicators and Policy Research Division, Economics and Research Department, Asian Development Bank, Manila

2. Outline MDG3 – numbers tell HERstory Recent International Initiatives Situationer: Sex Ratio in India More number on HERstory Data constraints and gender Post2015 development and gender Challenges at country level

3. Key Message “SHEcounts, countHER.”

4. Sex Ratio in India Discriminated even before she is born Persistently declining child sex ratio

5. Sex Ratio in India (2) urban sex ratio is far worse than rural but rural areas show a steep decline too … Sex Ratio: India, Census 2001 and 2011 Source: Rural-Urban Distribution of Population (Provisional Population Totals) ; Census of India, 2011

6. MDG3 – numbers tell HERstory MDG Goal 3: Promote Gender Equality and Empower Women Target 3A: Eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education, preferably by 2005 and in all levels of education no later than 2015 Three Indicators Gender parity in primary, secondary, and tertiary education; Share of women in wage employment in the non-agricultural sector; Seats held by women in national parliament, percentage.

7. MDG 3 - Progress on education Targets • Gender parity in primary and secondary has progressed well (though the 2005 target was missed) • Gender parity at tertiary level remains less gender inclusive in many countries Source. : Key Indicators for Asia and the Pacific 2012, ADB.

8. MDG3 - Data issues in education indicators • Incomplete coverage - Private schools often not covered. • Possible misreporting (over-reporting) of enrollments when budget allocation linked to enrollment performance. • Unreliable or incomplete data on age of students, and population of children. • Obtaining reliable estimates of sub-national level population - disaggregates by sex, rural–urban, etc. • Differences between national and international data. • Data availability: Primary (65% countries); Secondary (52% countries); and Tertiary (46% countries) had data for 2009 or later years respectively.

9. MDG 3 – Wage employment in nonagricultural sector Wide gaps remain in women’s access to paid work. Source. : Millennium Indicators Database Online (UNSD 2011) accessed 6 June 2012.

10. MDG3 - Women more likely in vulnerable jobs In 2009 latest years for which data are available, compared to the wage and salaried employment low quality own-account work and contributing family work is more prevalent in women than men. Average employment in vulnerable jobs per 100 wage and salaried jobs for 32 ADB member economies = 261.7 = 160.2 Source. : Key Indicators of the LabourMarket 7th edition (ILO 2012) accessed 30 May 2012.

11. MDG3 - Data issues in employment indicator Share of women in wage employment in the non-agricultural sector Data quality and gaps • Only 30 percent of the total ADB member economies have data for 2009 or later years. • Suffers from problem on comparability across countries due to variation in concepts, classification, coverage, and methods of data collection. Source: Millennium Indicators Database Online (UNSD 2011). Note: C=Country Data; E=Estimated, estimated by the international agency, when corresponding country data on a specific year or set of years is not available.

12. MDG3 - representation in the national parliament Women continue to be underrepresented as member of the national parliaments though there is a slow upward movement.

13. More numbers on HERstory… On participation in education… In 2010, female youths and adults most likely to have lower average years of schooling than their male counterparts … Source: Barroand Lee (2010), Human Development Report (UNDP 2011), ADB staff estimates.

14. More numbers on HERstory… On fields of study … Women more enrolled in fields of studies considered “feminine” such as social sciences and education. Are underrepresented in engineering, manufacturing, and construction fields. Source: UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS) accessed 12 June 2012.

15. More numbers on HERstory… On employment rate… Women still lag behind in access to employment opportunities.

16. More numbers on HERstory… On employment by sector…. More than half of women are employed in agriculture sector. Source. World Development Indicators Database accessed 24 April 2012.

17. More number needed to complete HERstory • Major Data constraints to provide evidence for public policies related to gender equality: • Violence against women; • Participation in household unpaid work, leisure, time use; • Occupations, wages, unemployment, informal employment, unpaid employment, decision making in private sector; • Entrepreneurship; • Household decision making and ownership assets.

18. Recent International Initiatives and Development • Busan - 4th High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness • Forum declaration commits countries and development partners “to collect, disseminate, harmonise and make full use of data disaggregated by sex to inform policy decisions …..” • Busan Action Plan for Statistics – adopted at Busan • Commits to fully mainstreaming gender mainstreaming into national statistical systems • Address weaknesses in sex-disaggregated data among others as a priority initiative

19. Recent International Initiatives and Development • UN Inter-Agency Expert Group on Gender Statistics; • Manual on mainstreaming gender in all official statistics under finalization; • Guidelines on statistical surveys on Violence against Women (VAW) – standard methodological guidelines on what, how, and special features of VAW surveys • Initiatives at the regional commission level

20. Recent International Initiatives and Development • Minimum set of indicators by IAEG-GS in five areas under finalization • Economic structures, participation in productive activities and access to resources • Education • Health and related services • Public life and decision-making • Human Rights of women and girl child • Framework to promote production and compilation of minimum set at the country level

21. Recent International Initiatives and Development • Evidence and Data for Gender Equality (EDGE) • initiative – a 3-year project that aims to provide • comparable gender indicators on education, • employment, and entrepreneurship and asset • ownership. • developing international database and metadata on gender indicators; • methodological development of standards and guidelines on entrepreneurship and ownership; • presentation of methodological work to UN Statistical Commission in 2015.

22. Post2015 and Gender agenda • Two parallel processes ongoing • Discussions on Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and forthcoming Rio Summit and • Post2015 development agenda • Hopefully two processes merge into a single framework • Need for specific goal on women’s role in development and their empowerment • Need for mainstreaming data collection on identified indicators at the national level.

23. Challenges at country level • Mainstreaming gender statistics program in National Strategies for Development of Statistics (NSDS) and work program; • Mandating collection of sex-disaggregated data in all official data collections and their use in results based monitoring ; • Establishing institutional mechanisms for coordination of gender statistics collection and dissemination; • Allocating dedicated financial and human resources for improving availability and use of gender statistics • Capacity building and training.

24. “SHEcounts, countHER.” Thank You • kjoshi@adb.org • www.adb.org