Georgia

In 2024, public finance management (PFM) reform progressed in Georgia to incorporate Gender Responsive Budgeting driving progress towards SDG indicator 5.c.1. With direct technical and financial support from UN Women, the Ministry of Finance (MoF) developed and adopted a gender tagging methodology. This innovative tool enables State spending units to identify, classify and track budget allocations and expenditures that promote gender equality within the electronic budget system (e-budget system). By embedding a �gender tag� into the national budgeting process of Georgia, the Government can now proactively integrate gender considerations into fiscal planning and budgeting cycles, ensuring that policies aimed at eliminating gender-based violence, increasing women�s employment, and fostering gender equity are effectively funded and implemented. As a result, in the reporting period, 19 programmes and 18 subprogrammes were analysed, identified and tagged as gender relevant during the submission of the 2025 budget proposals by State spending units. A key milestone leading to this result was the Public Expenditure and Financial Accountability (PEFA) Gender Responsive Public Finance Management (GRPFM) assessment, conducted by the MoF with support from UN Women, the World Bank and the European Union, which identified critical gaps in the PFM system regarding gender-responsive budgeting (GRB). Leveraging the results of the PEFA assessment, UN Women secured political buy-in from the MoF, which expedited the implementation of GRB, including the gender tagging methodology. UN Women strengthened its partnership with the MoF by piloting the gender tagging methodology in five State institutions: the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Agriculture, the Ministry of Regional Development and Infrastructure, the Ministry of Economy and Sustainable Development, the Ministry of Education, Science and Youth, and the Ministry of Labour, Health and Social Affairs. Through this cooperation gender responsive budgeting has been embedded into national budget processes. By equipping these institutions with tools to identify, track, and prioritize gender-responsive investments, Georgia is making a transformative shift towards inclusive, accountable, and equitable PFM that directly supports women's empowerment and sustainable development. In strengthening institutional capacities at scale, UN Women empowered 230 public servants (140 women and 90 men) through a series of GRB training sessions, equipping them with the expertise to embed gender equality principles into Georgia�s PFM system, ensuring that national budgets actively drive progress toward inclusive economic policies and social equity. It is envisaged that from 2025 onward, not only these five pilot Ministries but also the whole of the Government will apply the gender tagging methodology through the e-budget system in Georgia.

In February 2023, Georgia doubled the amount of compensation for maternity, parental, newborn adoption and additional parental leave for formally employed women from GEL 1,000 (approx. USD 380) to GEL 2,000 (approx. USD 760). This increase raised the state budget allocation for this benefit from GEL 15 million (approx. USD 5.6 million) to GEL 30 million (approx. USD 11.2 million). It is estimated that about 14,000 women have benefited from this provision in 2023, and around the same number will also benefit in 2024. In Georgia, women's participation in the labour market is notably low before the age of 45, the primary reproductive age. This indicates that the challenge of balancing child-rearing responsibilities with paid employment acts as a significant obstacle to women's economic empowerment. Providing adequately paid maternity leave is a crucial step towards dismantling the structural barriers that hinder women's participation in the workforce and contributes to Sustainable Development Goals 5, 8 and 3 and UNSDCF Georgia Outcome 3. UN Women, in partnership with the Ministry of Internally Displaced Persons from the Occupied Territories, Labour, Health and Social Affairs of Georgia, has advocated for enhanced maternity, paternity and parental leave policies since 2020. This collaboration included a Regulatory Impact Assessment (RIA) of the ILO Maternity Protection Convention, 2000 (No. 183). The RIA identified two major issues: (1) Georgian labour legislation did not ensure adequate income for mothers during paid maternity leave; and (2) there was inequality in terms of maternity benefits between different workers� groups, notably between civil servants and other sectors, with civil servants being provided 100 per cent of their salary for six months, while everyone else is entitled to GEL 1,000 (USD 380) for the whole duration of leave (six months) from the State. This RIA allowed UN Women to crystalize its advocacy messages as well as its . At the end of 2022, the Labour Code was amended to remove any reference to the amount of maximum eligible compensation from the State (GEL 1,000). The compensation amount was consequently further specified as GEL 2,000 by the Decree of the Minister responsible for labour. UN Women continues to work with the Government of Georgia on this matter. In 2024, further assessment of the enhanced leave policies is planned, incorporating actuarial studies and cost analysis to further improve not only the adequacy of the maternity/parental compensation but also its coverage in terms of unemployed women and women in informal employment, as neither group is currently covered by any maternity benefit scheme