Region:Asia PacificCurrent UN Women Plan Period Afghanisthan:2018-2022
World Bank Income Classification:Low IncomeThe World Bank classifies economies for analytical purposes into four income groups: low, lower-middle, upper-middle, and high income. For this purpose it uses gross national income (GNI) per capita data in U.S. dollars, converted from local currency using the World Bank Atlas method, which is applied to smooth exchange rate fluctuations.Least Developed Country:YesSince 1971, the United Nations has recognized LDCs as a category of States that are deemed highly disadvantaged in their development process, for structural, historical and also geographical reasons. Three criteria are used: per capita income, human assets, and economic vulnerability.Gender Inequality Index:0.575GII is a composite metric of gender inequality using three dimensions: reproductive health, empowerment and the labour market. A low GII value indicates low inequality between women and men, and vice-versa.Gender Development Index:0.723GDI measures gender inequalities in achievement in three basic dimensions of human development: health, education, and command over economic resources.
Population:209,497,025Source of population data: United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division (2022). World Population Prospects: The 2022 RevisionMale:19,976,265 (9.5%)Female:189,520,760 (90.5%)
People’s lives in China are improved further as headway is made in ensuring access to childcare, education, healthcare services, elderly care, housing, and social assistance, and more people in China, including left-behind groups, benefit from equitable and public services and social protection systems as well as accelerated efforts to reduce gender inequality and other forms of social inequality throughout the life-course.
In 2022, some progress has been made in gender responsive governance through the collective efforts led by UN Women and its strategic partners, through joint advocacy, strengthened evidence base for policy making, provision of technical support for policy making and strengthened institutional mechanism for capacity development, and promotion of women’s leadership and participation. This progress has contributed to China’s UNSDCF Outcome 2 and the office’s draft SN Outcome 2: People’s lives in China are improved further as headway is made in ensuring access to childcare, education, healthcare services, elderly care, housing, and social assistance, and more people in China, including left-behind groups, benefit from equitable public services and social protection systems as well as accelerated efforts to reduce gender inequality and other forms of social inequality throughout the life-course.
With technical and financial support under UN Women’s China Gender Fund (CGF) initiative, Dehong Municipality Communist Party (CPC) and Dehong County Government have jointly issued a red title Order for the 2021 election, emphasizing women's political participation and leadership and stipulating that the proportion of women in three important leadership positions of two village committees should reach 30 per cent. This is the first policy in Yunnan that has stipulate the proportion of women. This will ensure women especially minority women’s political participation in rural area.
The amended Law on the Protection of Women's Rights and Interests of People’s Republic of China (the Law) was adopted in October 2022 and has come into effect on 1 January, 2023. The amended law further strengthens the legal and policy basis for Chinese women’s rights to fully participate in political, social and economic activities. Leveraging the UNGTG mechanism, UN Women led the coordination for the development of common messages and feedback from all interested UN agencies and prepared a consolidated a report of UN system’s review recommendation and inputs on the draft law, aligned to the international norms and standards. UN Women and UNICEF jointly organized closed on line meeting with the Legislative Affairs Commission (LAC) with participation of the ILO and UNFPA, and written feedback from the FAO IFAD, and WFP. The technical inputs received were well received and some recommendations were mostly incorporated into the finalization of the law amendment, including the need to pay special attention to vulnerable groups of women, including the elderly women and women living with disabilities, the roles and responsibilities of different government and social stakeholders’ role in anti-trafficking of women, and accountability of government on women’s rights violation cases, etc.
In 2022, with the support provided from UN Women’s CGF grant-making support, a dedicated UN Women Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment and CEDAW Training Center (GEWE and CEDAW) has been established in Zhejiang Women Carders School, China. The training center aims to strengthen national partners capacity especially CSOs and individuals’ capacity on application of CEDAW normative framework in policy making and programming, with a specific focus on supporting the CSO on CEDAW based policy advocacy through periodic training organized by the training center. By using the UN Women developed standard curriculum on gender equality and CEDAW, a Training of Trainers (TOT) was conducted for 31 trainers in the first round. The trainers will serve as resource persons to roll out subsequent trainings for interested organizations and persons.
A new research study Enhancing “Her” Power: A Survey of Women’s Career Development in the Artificial Intelligence Industry and Countermeasures has been finalized by Jiangsu AI Association with grant making support from UN Women’s China Gender Funds initiative. The research provides important insights to the gender gaps in policy and programming in the field of AI, and recommendations for strengthening gender responsive governance of the AI sector. Based on the study, UN women has partnered with the Institute for Interdisciplinary Information Core Technology (the same team of Tsinghua) to develop a policy brief on the issue and will organize a policy dialogue on how to mainstream gender equality in AI sector in China in 2023.
(Link to SN Output 1.3) Relative poverty and multi-dimensional poverty are reduced, and more coordinated development leads to reduction in gaps between rural and urban areas and among regions, as more people in China, including left-behind groups, benefit from sustainable, innovation-driven and shared high-quality economic development, with enhanced access to economic opportunities arising through innovation, entrepreneurship and rural revitalization, enjoying decent work, sustainable livelihoods, and the right to develop equally for both women and men.
In 2022, UN Women China has made significant progress towards the intended outcome results. More people in China, including left-behind groups, benefit from sustainable, innovation-driven and shared high-quality economic development, with enhanced access to economic opportunities arising through innovation, entrepreneurship, and rural revitalization, enjoying decent work, sustainable livelihoods, and the right to develop equally for both women and men.
UN Women has continuously promoted gender equal employment, by supporting private sector companies to promote gender responsive policies and practices based on women’s empowerment principles (WEPs), mainly through WeEmpowerAsia, a programme supported by and partnered with EU, and ‘A place called home-Wecare’, a project funded by and in partnership with IKEA China. As of December 2022, 352 companies from the Chinese mainland have committed to promoting women’s decent work by signing the WEPs. Among them, 30 have integrated gender into their corporate policies and practices under UN Women’s support on implement gender responsive policies and practices in line with Women’s Empowerment Principles (WEPs). This benefits over 100,000 employees, including at least 50,000 women. Strategic partnership is developed between UN Women and ILO, China Enterprise Confederation, ICT and Textile industry associations.
UN Women has made good efforts to benefit women owned SMEs, through capacity development, especially on digital literacy and enhancing their access to finance and market, through 'Supporting Women to recover from socio-economic impacts of COVID-19' a programme working with All-China Women’s Federation (ACWF) and WeEmpowerAsia. Over 550 women-owned SMEs and 6,000 women employees in Wuhan and Tianjin (among the COVID hardest-hit regions in China) directly benefitted from all-round model recovery support schemes including capacity development, training, dedicated business support and cash grants in 2022. A total of 53 women-owned SMEs increased their income by 70,000 CNY on average. The trainings on gender equality, WEPs, as well as on how to enhance SMEs’ access to market, have been provided to 1052 women entrepreneurs from SMEs. In 2022, UN Women and the Ant Foundation launched the Together Digital five-year partnership, with the purpose to support over 30,000 women to establish, maintain and expand their businesses in the digital era.
UN Women continues to support rural women economically with enhancing their climate resilience through programme. Partnering with IFAD, Hunan Department of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, and Hunan Women’s Federation, we are working to improve the well-being of over 320,000 rural population. A comprehensive gender-disaggregated survey of 1,500 households showed that women’s unpaid care burden, less access to information and services, and lack of opportunities to move up along value chain, hindered their economic empowerment. Informed by these findings, gender-responsive interventions are being implemented, including climate-smart irrigation to sustain agriculture and public services to prevent natural disasters. A total of 26,824 rural women are benefited from infrastructure construction and public services. In addition, the office is able to secure new programme in Qinghai focusing on advancing rural women’s access to clean energy and strengthening their actions in green rural governance with support from ClimateWorks Foundation. This will help strengthen the implementation of commitments made in Action Coalition on Feminist Action for Climate Justice by engaging with women led CSOs and cooperatives in the context of China’s rural revitalization and green transition.
UN Women China convenes partners for collective climate actions through policy dialogues and public advocacies. Aligning with CSW 66 theme 'Gender Equality Today for a Sustainable Tomorrow', UN Women and Center for China and Globalization, a leading global think tank, hosted a high-level policy dialogue on 'Biodiversity and Climate Change from a Gender Perspective ' on 8 Mar 2022. The dialogue brought over 60 representatives including 3 Chinese ministries, 3 ambassadors, and 4 UN agencies, reaching over 320,000 participants via livestreaming. The dialogue fostered a strategic partnership between UN Women and Chinese Academy of Environmental Planning (CAEP) of Ministry of Ecology and Environment, for joint research to look at China’s climate and environmental policies through gender lens. The initial findings were shared on the Gender-just Green Transitions workshop, co-organized by UN Women, UNDP and GIZ on 15 November 2022. Prof. Ge Chazhong, Chief Scientist of CAEP shared current gender gaps and suggested “incorporating gender perspectives into the ecological, environmental protection and climate change laws and policies”.
UN Women leveraged interagency mandate to substantively engage the UN system, specifically UNDP, IFAD, UNFPA and UNEP, for joint advocacy on the importance of gender just climate governance, action, and mitigation. Besides, a UN system wide International Women's Day campaign on the theme of 'With Her A Greener Future' was organized, attracting 24 million views and discussions on social media. UN Women, together with RCO, UNDP, UNICEF, WFP, FAO, IFAD, ESCAP, WHO, UNV, UNHCR, UNFPA, UNIDO, ILO, and World Bank made joint video for public advocacy, with concrete recommendations for fully reflection of women’s roles and rights in climate policies, programmes and investments. And three CSOs brought voices from the field through video too, revealing women’s great contribution and pressing needs for supports in biodiversity conservation and climate response.
(Link to SN Output 1.4 and 1.5) Relative poverty and multi-dimensional poverty are reduced, and more coordinated development leads to reduction in gaps between rural and urban areas and among regions, as more people in China, including left-behind groups, benefit from sustainable, innovation-driven and shared high-quality economic development, with enhanced access to economic opportunities arising through innovation, entrepreneurship and rural revitalization, enjoying decent work, sustainable livelihoods, and the right to develop equally for both women and men.
In 2022, UN Women China has made significant progress towards the intended outcome results. More people in China, including left-behind groups, benefit from sustainable, innovation-driven and shared high-quality economic development, with enhanced access to economic opportunities arising through innovation, entrepreneurship, and rural revitalization, enjoying decent work, sustainable livelihoods, and the right to develop equally for both women and men.
UN Women has continuously promoted gender equal employment, by supporting private sector companies to promote gender responsive policies and practices based on women’s empowerment principles (WEPs), mainly through WeEmpowerAsia, a programme supported by and partnered with EU, and ‘A place called home-Wecare’, a project funded by and in partnership with IKEA China. As of December 2022, 352 companies from the Chinese mainland have committed to promoting women’s decent work by signing the WEPs. Among them, 30 have integrated gender into their corporate policies and practices under UN Women’s support on implement gender responsive policies and practices in line with Women’s Empowerment Principles (WEPs). This benefits over 100,000 employees, including at least 50,000 women. Strategic partnership is developed between UN Women and ILO, China Enterprise Confederation, ICT and Textile industry associations.
UN Women has made good efforts to benefit women owned SMEs, through capacity development, especially on digital literacy and enhancing their access to finance and market, through 'Supporting Women to recover from socio-economic impacts of COVID-19' a programme working with All-China Women’s Federation (ACWF) and WeEmpowerAsia. Over 550 women-owned SMEs and 6,000 women employees in Wuhan and Tianjin (among the COVID hardest-hit regions in China) directly benefitted from all-round model recovery support schemes including capacity development, training, dedicated business support and cash grants in 2022. A total of 53 women-owned SMEs increased their income by 70,000 CNY on average. The trainings on gender equality, WEPs, as well as on how to enhance SMEs’ access to market, have been provided to 1052 women entrepreneurs from SMEs. In 2022, UN Women and the Ant Foundation launched the Together Digital five-year partnership, with the purpose to support over 30,000 women to establish, maintain and expand their businesses in the digital era.
UN Women continues to support rural women economically with enhancing their climate resilience through programme. Partnering with IFAD, Hunan Department of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, and Hunan Women’s Federation, we are working to improve the well-being of over 320,000 rural population. A comprehensive gender-disaggregated survey of 1,500 households showed that women’s unpaid care burden, less access to information and services, and lack of opportunities to move up along value chain, hindered their economic empowerment. Informed by these findings, gender-responsive interventions are being implemented, including climate-smart irrigation to sustain agriculture and public services to prevent natural disasters. A total of 26,824 rural women are benefited from infrastructure construction and public services. In addition, the office is able to secure new programme in Qinghai focusing on advancing rural women’s access to clean energy and strengthening their actions in green rural governance with support from ClimateWorks Foundation. This will help strengthen the implementation of commitments made in Action Coalition on Feminist Action for Climate Justice by engaging with women led CSOs and cooperatives in the context of China’s rural revitalization and green transition.
UN Women China convenes partners for collective climate actions through policy dialogues and public advocacies. Aligning with CSW 66 theme 'Gender Equality Today for a Sustainable Tomorrow', UN Women and Center for China and Globalization, a leading global think tank, hosted a high-level policy dialogue on 'Biodiversity and Climate Change from a Gender Perspective ' on 8 Mar 2022. The dialogue brought over 60 representatives including 3 Chinese ministries, 3 ambassadors, and 4 UN agencies, reaching over 320,000 participants via livestreaming. The dialogue fostered a strategic partnership between UN Women and Chinese Academy of Environmental Planning (CAEP) of Ministry of Ecology and Environment, for joint research to look at China’s climate and environmental policies through gender lens. The initial findings were shared on the Gender-just Green Transitions workshop, co-organized by UN Women, UNDP and GIZ on 15 November 2022. Prof. Ge Chazhong, Chief Scientist of CAEP shared current gender gaps and suggested “incorporating gender perspectives into the ecological, environmental protection and climate change laws and policies”.
UN Women leveraged interagency mandate to substantively engage the UN system, specifically UNDP, IFAD, UNFPA and UNEP, for joint advocacy on the importance of gender just climate governance, action, and mitigation. Besides, a UN system wide International Women's Day campaign on the theme of 'With Her A Greener Future' was organized, attracting 24 million views and discussions on social media. UN Women, together with RCO, UNDP, UNICEF, WFP, FAO, IFAD, ESCAP, WHO, UNV, UNHCR, UNFPA, UNIDO, ILO, and World Bank made joint video for public advocacy, with concrete recommendations for fully reflection of women’s roles and rights in climate policies, programmes and investments. And three CSOs brought voices from the field through video too, revealing women’s great contribution and pressing needs for supports in biodiversity conservation and climate response.
(Link to SN Output 1.1 and 1.2) Relative poverty and multi-dimensional poverty are reduced, and more coordinated development leads to reduction in gaps between rural and urban areas and among regions, as more people in China, including left-behind groups, benefit from sustainable, innovation-driven and shared high-quality economic development, with enhanced access to economic opportunities arising through innovation, entrepreneurship and rural revitalization, enjoying decent work, sustainable livelihoods, and the right to develop equally for both women and men.
In 2022, UN Women China has made significant progress towards the intended outcome results. More people in China, including left-behind groups, benefit from sustainable, innovation-driven and shared high-quality economic development, with enhanced access to economic opportunities arising through innovation, entrepreneurship, and rural revitalization, enjoying decent work, sustainable livelihoods, and the right to develop equally for both women and men.
UN Women has continuously promoted gender equal employment, by supporting private sector companies to promote gender responsive policies and practices based on women’s empowerment principles (WEPs), mainly through WeEmpowerAsia, a programme supported by and partnered with EU, and ‘A place called home-Wecare’, a project funded by and in partnership with IKEA China. As of December 2022, 352 companies from the Chinese mainland have committed to promoting women’s decent work by signing the WEPs. Among them, 30 have integrated gender into their corporate policies and practices under UN Women’s support on implement gender responsive policies and practices in line with Women’s Empowerment Principles (WEPs). This benefits over 100,000 employees, including at least 50,000 women. Strategic partnership is developed between UN Women and ILO, China Enterprise Confederation, ICT and Textile industry associations.
UN Women has made good efforts to benefit women owned SMEs, through capacity development, especially on digital literacy and enhancing their access to finance and market, through 'Supporting Women to recover from socio-economic impacts of COVID-19' a programme working with All-China Women’s Federation (ACWF) and WeEmpowerAsia. Over 550 women-owned SMEs and 6,000 women employees in Wuhan and Tianjin (among the COVID hardest-hit regions in China) directly benefitted from all-round model recovery support schemes including capacity development, training, dedicated business support and cash grants in 2022. A total of 53 women-owned SMEs increased their income by 70,000 CNY on average. The trainings on gender equality, WEPs, as well as on how to enhance SMEs’ access to market, have been provided to 1052 women entrepreneurs from SMEs. In 2022, UN Women and the Ant Foundation launched the Together Digital five-year partnership, with the purpose to support over 30,000 women to establish, maintain and expand their businesses in the digital era.
UN Women continues to support rural women economically with enhancing their climate resilience through programme. Partnering with IFAD, Hunan Department of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, and Hunan Women’s Federation, we are working to improve the well-being of over 320,000 rural population. A comprehensive gender-disaggregated survey of 1,500 households showed that women’s unpaid care burden, less access to information and services, and lack of opportunities to move up along value chain, hindered their economic empowerment. Informed by these findings, gender-responsive interventions are being implemented, including climate-smart irrigation to sustain agriculture and public services to prevent natural disasters. A total of 26,824 rural women are benefited from infrastructure construction and public services. In addition, the office is able to secure new programme in Qinghai focusing on advancing rural women’s access to clean energy and strengthening their actions in green rural governance with support from ClimateWorks Foundation. This will help strengthen the implementation of commitments made in Action Coalition on Feminist Action for Climate Justice by engaging with women led CSOs and cooperatives in the context of China’s rural revitalization and green transition.
UN Women China convenes partners for collective climate actions through policy dialogues and public advocacies. Aligning with CSW 66 theme 'Gender Equality Today for a Sustainable Tomorrow', UN Women and Center for China and Globalization, a leading global think tank, hosted a high-level policy dialogue on 'Biodiversity and Climate Change from a Gender Perspective ' on 8 Mar 2022. The dialogue brought over 60 representatives including 3 Chinese ministries, 3 ambassadors, and 4 UN agencies, reaching over 320,000 participants via livestreaming. The dialogue fostered a strategic partnership between UN Women and Chinese Academy of Environmental Planning (CAEP) of Ministry of Ecology and Environment, for joint research to look at China’s climate and environmental policies through gender lens. The initial findings were shared on the Gender-just Green Transitions workshop, co-organized by UN Women, UNDP and GIZ on 15 November 2022. Prof. Ge Chazhong, Chief Scientist of CAEP shared current gender gaps and suggested “incorporating gender perspectives into the ecological, environmental protection and climate change laws and policies”.
UN Women leveraged interagency mandate to substantively engage the UN system, specifically UNDP, IFAD, UNFPA and UNEP, for joint advocacy on the importance of gender just climate governance, action, and mitigation. Besides, a UN system wide International Women's Day campaign on the theme of 'With Her A Greener Future' was organized, attracting 24 million views and discussions on social media. UN Women, together with RCO, UNDP, UNICEF, WFP, FAO, IFAD, ESCAP, WHO, UNV, UNHCR, UNFPA, UNIDO, ILO, and World Bank made joint video for public advocacy, with concrete recommendations for fully reflection of women’s roles and rights in climate policies, programmes and investments. And three CSOs brought voices from the field through video too, revealing women’s great contribution and pressing needs for supports in biodiversity conservation and climate response.
People’s lives in China are improved further as headway is made in ensuring access to childcare, education, healthcare services, elderly care, housing, and social assistance, and more people in China, including left-behind groups, benefit from equitable and public services and social protection systems as well as accelerated efforts to reduce gender inequality and other forms of social inequality throughout the life-course.
In 2022, through the implementation of programme ‘Domestic Violence Prevention and Response in Post CoVID-19 China’ UN Women China Office contributed to the outcome and made significant progress in strengthening of ensuring essential services to women and girls subject to/at risk of gender-based violence (GBV) and increasing public awareness and understanding on healthy social norm towards ending violence against women (EVAW).
UN Women China Office achieved results in localization and implementation of Essential Services Package for Women and Girls Subject to Violence (ESP) in strengthening of both social and judicial services to women and girls experiencing GBV.
A Domestic Violence (DV) Social Service Training Manual adapted from the ESP has been developed by Beijing Dongcheng Yuanzhong Family and Community Development Service Center (Yuanzhong) with technical and financial support from UN Women. By applying the manual and the guideline in capacity development, 37 civil society organizations, including 10 women’s rights’ organizations, from diverse background (including women living with HIV, women living with disability, LGBTIQ+ and migrant women), have strengthened capacities on GBV case management, outreach and referral services to survivors, and increased awareness on community level prevention of GBV based on feedbacks of the pre- and post-assessment. 376 women and girls subject to/at risk of GBV have benefited from the services provided by these organizations. This also includes community level interventions for women living with HIV being delivered in partnership with National Women's Network Against Aids in China and Aizijia.
In the strengthening of judicial service provided to DV survivors, ten guiding cases for domestic violence court trial are under development by the China Institute of Applied Jurisprudence (CIAJ), an affiliated entity of the Supreme People’s Court of the People’s Republic of China. The guiding cases are real trial cases which have been analyzed against a set of indicators developed by UN Women to assess legislation, protection measures, and access to justice for survivors of domestic violence in China. The CIAJ will use the guiding cases to identify gaps in current domestic violence case trial practice and use as a reference point to be used by local courts and judges for future DV case trials, with the aim of strengthening people-centered approach to justice and court decision for domestic violence cases. UN Women China provided financial support and developed the indicators with support from UN Women Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific.
Three social norms change campaigns on EVAW have been organized by UN Women China, receiving a total of 120 million views, and generating 11.9 thousand positive comments on various social media platforms. A wide range of stakeholders from bilateral, private sector, women’s rights organizations and CSOs, UN agencies, media platforms and key opinion leaders (KOLs) have been mobilized by UN Women China to provide technical and pro bono support. These three campaigns are tailored-made to engaged young people, men and boys and the broader public to become action takers on ending violence against women and girls as following:
A campaign titled ‘Be the supporter, start by supporting your children who experience Gender-Based violence’ was organized on the 2022 Father’s Day (19 June 2022) to advocate male’s role in prevention of violence and supporting survivors. The link to video: https://video.weibo.com/show?fid=1034:4782026151362627.
The campaign also includes an online round table live-streaming inviting three male key opinion leaders who have in-total 5 million subscribers to discuss how to set-up male role model in respectful relation.
A campaign titled ‘Acknowledge the unsafe experience by women and respect other’s boundaries’ was launched on the International Youth Day (12 August 2022) and called for young people to become champions in respectful relationship and stop violence. The link to the video: https://video.weibo.com/show?fid=1034:4801723722825748.
The campaign also includes an online round table live-streaming inviting four young key opinion leaders who have in-total 1.2 million subscribers to discuss how to advocate their peers towards zero tolerance on violence against women and girls.
A campaign titled ’Be the light in the dark’ was launched on the 16-day campaign of activism on EVAW (25 November 2022). An immersive exhibition calls for public support on frontline service organization and WRO was launched by UN Women, engaging over fifteen young gender equality advocates, representative from WRO, bilateral, UN Agencies and six leading female artists in China and an international artwork from GBV survivors. The link to the exhibition: https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/cn0mhSgn4m9hK_SpDfKsvw.
Based on the above progress, the original strategy and Theory of Change for this outcome is still applicable. There was delay in the capacity development to the local women’s federation staff on coordination of essential services to women and girls experiencing GBV due to CoVID-19 control measures as well as the outbreak in end of 2022. UN Women China Office will need to catch up the progress in 2023.
With the further national roll-out of the Domestic Violence Social Service Training Manual and capacity development to local women’s federation staff on coordination of essential services to women and girls experiencing GBV, there will be more women and girls reached by the trained staff and benefiting from receiving quality, coordinated, and survivor-based essential services.
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