1 S trengthening accountability for gender equality To learn more visit

2 WHAT IS GRB? Gender responsive budgeting (GRB) is about including a gender perspective in government planning, budgeting and performance monitoring with a view to achieve gender equality and realize women’s rights GRB seeks to ensure that governments from developed or developing countries raise revenue and allocate and spend public resources in a way that addresses disadvantage, exclusion and inequalities.

3 WHY IS GRB IMPORTANT? There is a lack of implementation of gender equality commitments as laid out in policy documents at national, regional and global levels GRB acknowledges the intersection between budget policies and women’s well being and allows us to challenge the gender blindness/neutrality of macroeconomic policies (fiscal policy, aid policy, debt etc)

4 UN Women’s work on GRB Bridges the disconnect between national development strategies and priorities identified in national gender equality plans Strengthens capacity of public institutions to formulate plans and budgets with a gender lens Encourages transparent and adequate financing for gender equality Enhances leadership and influence of gender equality advocates in policy, planning and budgeting processes.

5 The approach: from policies to results, identifying entry points for GRB in the budget cycle POLICY National gender policies National budget policies Call circulars Guidelines Planning and Priority setting National planning Sector planning Programme planning PROGRAMMING AND BUDGETING Identifying interventions Setting targets Costing and budgeting EXECUTING Delivering services RESULTS MONITORING AND EVALUATION Tracking indicators Evaluating Modifying previous steps

6 WHAT ARE KEY STRATEGIES USED IN GRB? Policy advocacy Programming Capacity development Research and analysis (to build knowledge and evidence base) Partnership building and networking

7 WHO ARE THE ACTORS OF GRB WORK? Governments: Finance Ministries, sector ministries, local governments, donors Parliament Auditor general office Civil Society Academia / research institutes

8 ENTRY POINTS FOR PARLIAMENT Championing amendments to budget laws Using budget oversight role to ensure that budgets adequately reflect the priorities and needs of women and men Raising gender issues during budget discussion Monitoring budget from a gender perspective Creating spaces for dialogue with women’s groups during budget formulation and budget approval phases

9 CHALLENGES OF GRB WORK Sustainability of GRB initiatives: lack of political will, lack of coherence between aid, debt and trade policies, competing government agendas and priorities Capacity (weak capacity for analyzing and engaging with economic policies, sector policies, aid discussions, for applying GRB tools such as costing and tracking). Small scale of GRB initiatives; and bringing all actors together and not leaving it to only one actor Complexity: difficult to expand and difficult to apply to all sectors so need to focus on priority areas for women Data and evidence

10 Highlights of results of GRB work Increased capacity and commitment of Ministries of Finance to apply GRB Budget guidelines and formats revised to facilitate gender responsiveness Sector ministries increasingly incorporate a gender perspective in their plans and budgets Effective role of civil society and national women’s machineries in monitoring spending towards women’s priorities Increased resources allocations towards women’s priorities (Morocco, Ecuador, Rwanda etc) Policy influencing at global level: Busan