Asia Regional Evaluation Summit: Gender Inequalities in Asia

USAID’s Regional Development Mission for Asia (RDMA) and the United Nations Evaluation Development Group for Asia and the Pacific (UNEDAP) hosted the “Asia Regional Evaluation Summit” last week at the USAID Asia Regional Training Center in Bangkok.  Nearly 100 development professionals, representing 15 countries, from NGOs, universities, regional organizations, USAID and the UN, attended the Summit. 

The first presentation points out that Asia-Pacific has one of the world’s worst gender gaps as evidence shows very few laws prohibiting violence against women, lack of education, and paid work for women. Policy needs to advance gender equality, so that women as well as men can benefit from job creation and investments in social infrastructure.

The second presentation provides examples and lessons learnt from the recent study to measure the cost of response services for women and girls subjected to violence. The cost covers direct, indirect and pain and suffering costs. The findings suggest that three main aspects are contributed to gender based violence issues: legislative and policy, budget and implementation which are necessary to identify which services to prioritize and highlight the need for budgeting capacity-building at the national level. This can build evidence-based advocacy.