Nairobi, 5 October – While there are notable improvements in the adoption of human rights instruments and policies on ending Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG), both at continental and regional levels, there is a lot to be done to effectively translate laws and policies into action and tangible benefits.

Less than 5% of African countries are able to generate and use vital statistics from their civil registration systems or routine administrative records related to Violence Against Women and Girls and Harmful Practices.

The African Union, in the framework of the Spotlight Initiative Africa Regional Programme, and in collaboration with UNDP and other partners, organized a regional validation workshop in Nairobi, Kenya on 3-5 October 2022 to discuss and validate the Harmonized and Standardized Data Collection Toolkit on Violence Against Women and Girls and Harmful Practices.

The overall objective of the workshop was to provide stakeholders with the opportunity to discuss, assess and evaluate the content and structure of the data collection toolkit, and share their regional and national experience and knowledge to improve the quality of the toolkit.

The Data Collection Toolkit is informed by extensive capacity needs assessment surveys that explored methodologies, approaches and publicly available data collection tools for capturing data on VAWG and harmful practices. The needs assessment surveys revealed the necessity of developing a harmonized and standardized data collection toolkit to guide users on indicators and methodologies for collecting data.

The toolkit is expected to strengthen the capacity of regional partners to ensure that relevant harmonized and standardized data collection tools are produced and utilized to inform policy, evidence-based decision-making and advocacy.

Prudence Ngwenya, Acting Director of the Women, Gender and Youth Directorate at the African Union Commission, reiterated, “In order to address the challenges related to collection, generation and utilization of data, it is critical to consider the following key takeaways: putting in place effective coordination mechanisms; ensuring relevant data is being generated, collected and utilized; the inclusiveness of the process by leaving no one behind; having the right human and financial resources; and ensuring collective ownership of the process related to data collection, generation and utilization of data."

Odette Kabaya, Regional Gender Advisor and Team Leader at the UNDP Regional Service Centre for Africa (RSCA), noted, “The value addition of the toolkit is to bring together relevant approaches, methodologies and indicators in a One-Stop-Centre to ease their access and utilization. It also generates comparable data on VAWG, harmful practices and Sexual and Reproductive Health and Reproductive Rights (SRH&RR) through putting in place harmonized and standardized data collection. The toolkit also comprehensively addresses a range of diverse indicators including social norms, care work, masculinity, online violence, migration and people with disabilities, among others.”

Dr. Caroline Kabiru, Senior Researcher and Representative of the African Population and Health Research Centre (APHRC) Consortium, highlighted, “This workshop, a culmination of several months of extensive work, is an opportunity to provide quality assurance to the final content of the toolkit.”

The African Union Commission’s Women, Gender and Youth Directorate is working in partnership with UNDP and a consortium of partners including the African Population and Health Research Center (APHRC), the Eastern Africa National Networks of AIDS and Health Service Organizations (EANNASO), and the Population Council Kenya. The meeting attracted more than 30 delegates from Regional Economic Communities (RECs), Member States, National Ministries of Gender and Statistics Offices, Regional and National Civil Society Organizations and UN Agencies.