Fund gender data. Use gender data. This was the parting shot from Papa Seck, Chief Statistician at UN Women during a keynote address at a recent all-Africa forum on gender data. More than 120 public policy analysts and gender data practitioners from 30 African countries had convened in Nairobi, Kenya in September 2022 for the Africa Gender Statistics Conference—the biggest gender statistics workshop ever held in Africa. Delegates met to interrogate gender statistics through two lenses; Agenda 2063—the African Union’s blueprint for transforming Africa into a global powerhouse, and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that support gender equality and women’s empowerment.

The United Nations Secretary-General appointed Victims’ Rights Advocate (VRA) Jane Connors in 2017 to lead the institution’s efforts to handle sexual exploitation and abuse committed by UN personnel. The VRA regularly visits countries with a UN presence to gain first-hand understanding of how sexual exploitation and abuse are addressed. On a recent visit to Kenya, she spoke to UN Women about her role, her visit to Kenya and the challenges confronting victims, their experiences, and putting their needs at the forefront of the UN’s fight against sexual exploitation and abuse.

Nairobi, 10 December 2021  – representatives from national governments, regional bodies, international development agencies, and civil society organizations today convened at a high-level forum on the use of gender data and statistics to address violence against women in East and Southern Africa (ESA).

Gender equality and women’s empowerment can only be realized when global instruments, laws, policies and national programmes, among other interventions, are able to effectively address the underlying factors pushing back what the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 5 on Gender Equality seeks to achieve

UN Women under the Young Women and Leadership Project (YWLP) implemented in partnership with FOWODE. From the training, she got to understand issues of gender equality and the equal roles men and women have to play towards achieving peace and development.