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ESCWA, in partnership with UN Women, is currently conducting a full fledged project on estimating the cost of VAW in the Arab region. This project consists of two phases: the first one includes two studies (namely, “Status of Arab Women Report: Violence against Women: What is At Stake” and "Model for costing domestic violence against women in the Arab region"). The former, produced in partnership with UN Women and the Lebanese American University, provides a contextualized understanding of VAW and its importance, examines the existing reporting mechanisms, explores the linkages between VAW and social, economic and health factors, and reviews the relevant methodologies with a view to identify the most suitable one for the Arab region. This first study paves the way for the development of the regional economic model to estimate the cost of VAW in the region, which is addressed in the second study in partnership with UN Women. The second phase of the project focuses on building the capacity of member States on the importance of costing violence against women, as well as piloting the economic model in two Arab countries.
Since 2014 in Tunisia, UN Women, jointly with UNFPA, OHCHR and UNICEF supported the development of the first draft law on violence against women. Since the end of 2014, a close monitoring was ensured with the two consecutive governments to provide technical support and international standards’ guidance to ensure the review of the different versions. Despite the challenges facing the country, the council of ministers has adopted on 13 July 2016 a bill regarding VAW. The House of Representatives has also voted, on the 21st July, the draft of the Organic Law No. 29/2015 on the prevention and fight against human trafficking, which aims at fighting all forms of exploitations of persons, especially women. This law is considered to be in line with international standards.
In Georgia, UN Women supported the Domestic Violence Council to harmonize legislation with the Istanbul Convention and draft a governmental decree to institutionalize the gender equality mechanism within the executive branch of the government. Planned legislative amendments will enhance the Domestic Violence Law to reflect other forms of violence against women, include protective orders, criminalize stalking and female genital mutilation, and align the concept of rape with international standards.
UN Women, in collaboration with the Jordanian National commission for Women(JNCW), held a roundtable meeting on “Jordan-Morocco sharing of experience on the criminal prosecution of rapists “in May 2016 in Amman, Jordan, at which 11 Jordanian parliamentarians as well as Moroccan parliamentarians exchanged views and experience with regards to the current amendments of the Penal Code. The Moroccan parliamentarians have explained the process they went through of reviewing the penal code over two years and then abolishing article 475 (similar provisions to 308) completely after one female minor “Amina” committed suicide for being forced to marry her rapist. At the end of the session, the Jordanian parliamentarians were equipped with knowledge on how to move forward on the abolishment of article 308 of the penal code.
UNHCR is a founding member of the Gender-Based Violence Information Management System and sits on its Steering Committee along with UNFPA, IRC, IMC and UNICEF. UNHCR is working to strengthen and harmonize data collection on SGBV by implementing the GBVIMS in selected operations. In 2015, UNHCR provided technical support in data collection and analysis to 22 countries.
UNICEF contributed significantly to building the global evidence base, leading or co-leading on major research, studies and publications. In 2014, UNICEF published the largest-ever compilation of data on violence against children – “Hidden in Plain Sight: A Statistical Analysis of Violence against Children”, followed by a dedicated statistical report on violence against adolescents’ girls - “A Statistical Snapshot of Violence against Adolescent Girls”. In 2015, UNICEF released an analysis of current levels, trends and projections of child marriage in Africa. Despite persistent challenges, an increase in the quality and rigor of data around violence against children, including sexual violence was noted in 2015, with 32 data-driven studies produced globally. In addition, a “Diagnostic Review and the Study on the Structural Determinants of violence against children and women” was completed by UNICEF in 2015 by the University of Cape Town. Jointly with WHO, Center for Disease Control and other partners, a multi-sectoral package of evidence-based interventions to prevent and respond to violence against children was developed.
UNHCR field operations collect data on sexual and gender-based violence incidents in collaboration with partners, according to UNHCR and interagency guidelines and principles. UNHCR analyzes data on SGBV in order to inform planning and program design and ensure services are accessible to all survivors. UNHCR operations documented an increase in the number of reported incidents of SGBV from 18,245 in 2014 to 26,632 in 2015. While the increase in reported cases does not necessarily represent an increase in SGBV incidents, it may be due to increased awareness and use of reporting mechanisms, as well as systematized data management of incidents reported to service providers.
In 2015, UNFPA and UNDP Burkina Faso supported the creation of a universal form allowing police units and offices for the promotion of women’s rights on decentralized level to collect data on violence against women and girls. Data collection is on-going, again with the support of UNDP. Moreover, UNDP also supported the creation of a tool for data collection and analysis, allowing the monitoring of violence on a regional and national basis.
UN Women, as one of the partners of the public-private partneship Together for Girls (TfG), has contributed to global discussions around improved coordination between VAW and violence against children (VAC) data collection initiatives. UN Women has also been a key TfG partner in the development of the Every Hour Matters Campaign, a global advocacy campaign to increase awareness about the critical importance of quickly accessing post-rape care. The partnership also includes other UN agencies, such as UNICEF, UNAIDS, WHO, PAHO and UNFPA.
UN Women participates as observer in the Inter-Agency and Expert Group on SDG Indicators, and it has influenced the selection and definition of EVAW related SDG target indicators, more specifically target 5.2 indicators. It has led and worked with other UN agencies to develop the metadata for the two indicators to monitor progress of this target. UN Women also convened a meeting with other UN agencies working on VAW data and it is coordinating the development of a UN global joint programme to build sustained national capacities to implement VAW prevalence surveys in line with international standards and SDG monitoring requirements. This work is part of the Flagship Programme Initiative “Better production and use of gender statistics for evidence-based localization of the SDGs”.