African Women's Report 2000: The Critical Role of Gender Disaggregated Data

Abstract

This year's report, on the status of African women, aims at showing the critical role of gender disaggregated data (GDD) in enhancing gender sensitive policies. The report argues that without gender sensitive statistics, national policies and programmes cannot comprehensively mainstream gender concerns either with regard to national development plans or in monitoring and evaluating the implementation of Dakar and Beijing Platforms for Action. Indeed, the report contends that successful African development is seriously hampered by lack of accurate and upto-date statistics, compounded by inadequate pursuit of strategies to enhance the collection of GDD. The important relationship between reliable statistics and long-term socio-economic development is well established as is the fact that effective planning and equitable resource allocation are contingent on gender sensitive statistics and analyses. To address the ramifications of lack of sex segregated statistics in developing gender responsive policies and programmes to reduce gender inequalities, the report is divided into four parts; namely: Gender Imbalances in Education; Women's Participation in Economy; and Women in Power and Decision-making and Conclusions.