The African gender and development index 2011: promoting gender in Africa

Abstract

The African Gender and Development Index (AGDI), designed to measure the gap in the status of women and men in Africa and to assess the progress made by African governments in implementing the gender policies they have developed. The AGDI is a composite index consisting of two parts, a Gender Status Index (GSI) and the African Women’s Progress scoreboard (AWPS), rather than a collection of individual statistics. As an index, it gives a clearer political message and allows for easier comparison between countries. The AGDI is a measure that focuses on the African continent. It 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. Second it identifies gender gaps in the selected power blocks and facilitates the review of the underlying gender relations in Africa. Third, its findings will be specifically from the African countries, based on nationally available statistics.