How can we ensure that a State is working towards gender equality if it does not publish gender equality data? In a study published on Friday 27 March, Access Info Europe is concerned about the quantity and quality of gender equality data made available by some European states.
The research carried out for this study in Austria, Croatia, France, Germany, Hungary, Spain, France and the United Kingdom revealed that, on average, only 57% of data on gender equality is published. The United Kingdom has the highest publication rate (96%). It is particularly low in France (36%) and Croatia (29%).
Helen Darbishire, Executive Director of Access Info, is also concerned that some of the indicators established by the UN in its Gender Equality Sustainable Development Goals (SDG 5) have been classified as “irrelevant".
"The one on female genital mutilation, for example, which Eurostat has excluded from its dataset even though it is estimated that as many as 600,000 women in Europe are affected by this illegal practice" she said.
The study also notes the lack of international standards on how to report data and points out that while countries such as Germany and the United Kingdom have a wide variety of formats and sites for viewing data, other states do not even have a centralised platform.
Recommendations were made to the governments that were the subject of the research. Thus, Access Info suggests that each country publish on dedicated and easily accessible sites all data related to SDGs, in line with UN indicators.
Access Info also calls on the United Nations and the international community to "adopt guidelines on how to publish SDG data".
Consult the study: https://bit.ly/3462DHg (Original version in French by Agathe Cherki)