Region:Asia Pacific
Current UN Women Plan Period Afghanisthan:2018-2022
World Bank Income Classification:Low Income
The 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:Yes
Since 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:0.575
GII 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:0.723
GDI measures gender inequalities in achievement in three basic dimensions of human development: health, education, and command over economic resources.
Population:209,497,025
Source of population data: United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division (2022). World Population Prospects: The 2022 Revision
Male:19,976,265 (9.5%)
Female:189,520,760 (90.5%)
outcome XM-DAC-41146-KGZ_D_1.1
Key national institutions are implementing international obligations and national commitments on gender equality and women’s empowerment in policy and budgeting processes, and are accountable for results, including through the coordination mandate of the country office.
2021 has marked a year of intensive reforms followed by radical changes in governance system – the shift from a parliamentary to a presidential republic, massive administrative reform-restructuring of ministries and agencies, reduction in the number of civil servants, reshuffles in civil service and municipal administration. Nonetheless, several accomplishments were made in this turbulent environment, which are important for progressing towards achieving the outcome. High level government officials have gained new knowledge and skills and expressed their buy-in and political support for application of innovative tools in managing development processes and leading the transformative change in the Government by promoting the following approaches: 29 government officials – the members of the Inter-ministerial Working Group (IMWG) at the level of deputy ministers and heads of departments – tested new approaches on creating a space for dialogues between high level state officials and women and men from the local communities to design and engage for the elaboration of the Batken Development Program. This was organized in response to the armed conflict on the Kygryz-Tajik borders in April 2021. The Government fully owned the process, and went ahead with testing an approach that was totally new for the Government to ensure full engagement of the communities through the voices of women and men, elderly and youth from Batken province in order to learn about their concerns and solutions. UN Women facilitated the work of the IMWG in planning the roadmap for the program development by applying a comprehensive set of approaches based on social innovation, the Human Rights based approach (HRBA), multi-sectorial inclusive cooperation and user-centered principles. A particular emphasis was placed on integrating the voices, and experiences and solutions of women and searching for local solutions to the development of the region. 27 members of the IMWG on development of Gender Equality Strategy (GES) and its National Action Plan (NAP) gained knowledge on new innovative approaches in developing strategic documents using the Oxford Scenario Planning Approach with the facilitation of the lead authors of this approach. 15 members of the IMWG of National Action Plan of the Security Council Resolution 1325 NAP 1325 learned about Adaptive Leadership and Design Thinking which was geared towards strengthening the human-centric and gender-sensitive approaches to planning and implementing of national commitments on NAP 1325. 42 policymakers have improved their understanding on how to use gender-sensitive data in policy and decision-making in their respective areas. The National Statistical Committee (NSC) with the support from UN Women conducted the first round of training for data users by testing the training package on gender data literacy for policymakers and to strengthen national-level monitoring on the Sustainable Development Goals and knowledge sharing. Based on the successful launch of this initiative, the training on improving gender data literacy will be continued on a systematic basis. Representatives of 18 media outlets enhanced their knowledge on the concept of gender and the role of media in forming public mindsets in a way that contributes to equal, fair, harmonious and effective societal development. The chairman of a government agency and three private sector representatives jointly explored the possibilities of collaborating to promote Gender Equality and Women Empowerment Principles in economic and social, spheres. In partnership with the Kyrgyz Stock Exchange and the International Finance Corporation (IFC), UN Women conducted the national ‘Ring the Bell for Gender Equality’ event which resulted in the expression of interest of several private companies to become signatories to the Women Empowerment Principles and dozens increased their understanding on the importance of gender equality for the capital market development. 8 advisors of the Central Election Commission (CEC), strategically supported by the Chairwoman, worked on promoting women leaders’ participation in elections by strict observation of the implementation of the gender quota as a legal provision in the laws on elections. UN Women continued providing support to CEC in searching for the pathways to accelerate the results towards the SDGs. UN Women has made contribution to these results by introducing innovative approaches on Design Thinking, human-centric and survivor-centric planning and by enabling partners to adapt to rapidly changing contexts.
outcome XM-DAC-41146-KGZ_D_3.1
Women and men, especially youth, value social norms supporting gender equality and women’s empowerment at individual and community levels
The focus to date was on identifying existing positive and negative social norms which determine community attitude and behavior towards Gender Equality and Women Empowerment (GEWE), including through: a) ethnographic review to define behavior, attitude and social norms on ending violence against women and girls (EVAWG) in 12 pilot communities of the Spotlight Initiative program; b) defining social norms on the issues of women leadership and participation in decision- making at local and national levels, peacebuilding processes and women participation in elections; c) identifying positive deviants who practice positive homegrown solutions to address the challenges of violence against women and girls (VAWG), low status of women in communities, and increased burden of unpaid care work as a consequences of COVID-19 crisis. The findings were used for strategizing the work on prevention of VAWG, reducing the burden of household chores and ways to empower women to run for elections and participate in the decision making at all levels. One of the highlights was the transformation of the community members that have undergone the Gender Action Learning System (GALS) training (author Linda Mayoux). 60 of these so-called champions reported to feel more motivated and open to behavioral changes. Many champions spoke out about the importance of testing and living these changes at the individual level. According to them, only when these behavioral changes are consistently practiced, then people start believing in the attitude changes and the impact can be spread further by sharing with and training more community members. These cascading efforts by champions covered a total of 2,817 people by end of December 2021. Participants were equipped with GALS tools such as the “Happy Family Diamond” where they reflected on the relationships between family members by discussing family relationships that they "really like", "like" and relationships that they "less like" and "very dislike". Champions learned to distinguish the different types of violence and know that women haves the option to contact the police, local institutions responsible for domestic violence prevention, or a psychologist. Most champions reported that significant changes are taking place in their families. For example, men began actively contributing to housework by baking bread, preparing meals, cleaning alongside other family members. Men no longer considered these contributions as shameful but understood that all family members feel happy when everyone is involved in family life. For additional information, see the video material broadcasted in Naryn Province TV: https://youtu.be/pA5NeqcxbC8. Another highlight was the 42 families of positive deviants (PDs) from 6 target villages that took a lead in facilitating redistribution of family responsibilities in order to boost rural women’s economic empowerment. In all 6 target villages, PD families conducted a series of advocacy campaigns among members of the community about unpaid care work and the importance of equality and mutual respect in defining household roles and responsibilities. This campaign covered 550 villagers. Thus, PDs served as role models for other members of the communities to self-reflect on their attitude towards equal division of household responsibilities and chores between women and men. Positive deviance approach was introduced by UN Women to partners in late 2021 and was further replicated by local and implementation partners. Additionally, UN Women made significant contributions to these results by upscaling and replicating the GALS methodology that was successfully tested in previous UN Women projects.
outcome XM-DAC-41146-KGZ_D_3.2
Service providers are better able to prevent VAWG and deliver essential services to victims and survivors of violence
In the first quarter of 2021, UN Women focused on strategizing its work on prevention of violence against women and girls (VAWG) and supporting the delivery of essential services to survivors of violence by achieving the following results: 299 partners acquired knowledge and use innovative tools for strategizing their work on providing services to VAWG survivors. Partners co-created and adapted the methodology on Design Thinking to create a platform for service providers and survivors to jointly use tools to strengthen the mapping of existing essential services from the perspective of the survivors. The complexity of applying a survivor centric approach is very much subject to the lack of clarity in the legislation related to sexual and gender-based violence issues, which is still under consideration due to legal inventory process going on in the country. UN Women provided a platform and expert support for the conceptualization and adaptation of Design Thinking from a business tool to a tool that can be used for ending violence against women and girls (EVAWG) by making it survivor centric and responding to their real needs. This tool allows to consider the different perspectives of women and other actors, including those displaying multiple and intersectional forms of discrimination. It also enables the engagement of a wide range of civil society actors, who can offer innovative solutions from multiple angles. Draft mechanisms of dealing with sexual violence against girls were developed based on concrete actual cases of violence following the survivors- centric approach. UN Women worked in close collaboration with other UN organizations within the Spotlight Initiative program (supported by the European Union) and facilitated the process of conceptualization and adoption of survivor centric approach by applying the Design Thinking methodologies.Showing 1 - 3 of 3
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References to Kosovo shall be understood to be in the context of United Nations Security Council resolution 1244 (1999).
References to Kosovo shall be understood to be in the context of United Nations Security Council resolution 1244 (1999).