African officials root for data-driven approaches to achieve gender equality

NAIROBI, Feb. 26 (Xinhua) -- Achieving gender parity in Africa requires enacting policies and legislation informed by sound research and data, senior officials said Wednesday at a forum in Nairobi, the Kenyan capital.

Prudence Ngwenya, director of the Women, Gender, and Youth Directorate at the African Union Commission, said that quality data is key to advancing gender parity on the continent and achieving Africa's growth and transformation agenda.

"These data-driven interventions will guide policymakers in mainstreaming gender perspectives to education, health, employment, and promotion of climate resilience for both men and women," Ngwenya said.

Senior policymakers, lawmakers, researchers, and campaigners attended the two-day regional validation workshop on gender data generation, translation, and use in Africa. Convened by the African Union (AU), The United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women, and the Nairobi-based African Institute for Development Policy (AFIDEP), the workshop focuses on the role of data in accelerating gender parity across the continent.

Despite Africa's commitment to global and continental gender equality frameworks, progress has been uneven, the participants said, noting that Women remain disproportionately excluded from basic services such as education, clean drinking water, sanitation, and housing.

According to the AU, only 16 of the 54 African countries have closed at least 70 percent of their gender gap, and at the current pace, it could take 102 years to achieve full gender parity on the continent.

Ngwenya stressed that data will be pivotal in shaping targeted policies, legislation, and investments to eliminate barriers that prevent women and girls from realizing their full potential.

Anne Wang'ombe, principal secretary in the Ministry of Gender, Culture, the Arts, and Heritage of Kenya, urged African countries to leverage updated data to improve literacy levels, healthcare access, education and skills development for women and girls.

Wang'ombe stressed that quality data would also support grassroots advocacy efforts to eliminate harmful practices such as child marriages and female genital mutilation, which have hindered progress toward gender equality.

Eliya Zulu, executive director of AFIDEP, called on African governments to invest in research and data collection to address emerging threats to gender equality, including climate change, rising public debt, conflicts, and inflationary pressures.

Zulu emphasized that reforming macroeconomic policies, access to finance, skills upgrading, and progressive leadership would be pivotal to placing women and girls at the center of national development programs. ■