Demographic and Social Statistics

The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD), in collaboration with Statistics South Africa, is organizing the 9th United Nations Global Forum on Gender Statistics in Johannesburg, South Africa. The event will take place on 29-31 August 2023.

The Forum will bring together producers and users of gender statistics from national and international statistical offices, other government agencies, international organizations, academia, civil society, and the donor community. On this occasion, the forum will focus ways to improve data and evidence on the growing challenges and opportunities offered by the care economy and its impact on gender equality. Panelists and audience will also strategize on how to make the best out of existing data, including by mainstreaming a gender lens into existing data processes. Additionally, the Forum will provide an opportunity to take stock and learn of good practices in gender statistics and data management from the African region.

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The members of the IAEG-GS virtually convened for the 15th annual meeting on 6, 7 and 8 December 2021. The meeting was organized by the Social and Gender Statistics Section of the United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD), the Secretariat of the Group.

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The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD), in collaboration with the Swiss Confederation, is organizing the 8th Global Forum on Gender Statistics under the Global Gender Statistics Programme and the guidance of the Inter-Agency and Expert Group on Gender Statistics (IAEG-GS).

The Forum will bring together producers, users and communicators of gender statistics from national and international statistical offices, other government agencies, international organizations, academia, civil society, private sector, media and the donor community. On this occasion, the Forum is taking place as countries come to face the consequences of the COVID-19 global pandemic and assess the effectiveness of their responses to this crisis and its long-lasting effects.

The common thread during the two-day discussions will be an outlook of the aftermath of the pandemic. Beyond the impact of COVID-19, the Forum’s intention is to tease out those aspects of gender equality and the production of gender statistics that have changed -highlighting how and why.

Panelists and audience will discuss ways to improve data and evidence for gender policies, reflecting on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on all aspects of women’s and men’s lives, and what it means for keeping the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development on track.

The 8th Global Forum on Gender Statistics will be the last event on the “Road to Bern” series, taking place right before the 3rd World Data Forum (UNWDF 2021) to be held in Bern and hosted by the Government of Switzerland.

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Bringing together gender statisticians and experts from the international, regional and national institutions that are IAEG-GS members, the closed (/invitation-only) 14th IAEG-GS Meeting will: (a) review on-going national, regional and global initiatives to improve evidence for gender-relevant policies, including the development and implementation of international statistical methods in the context of COVID-19; (b) discuss and review on-going workstreams of the IAEG-GS Advisory Groups; (c) take stock of the latest assessments of progress towards gender equality at the sub-national, national, regional and global levels, as presented in The World’s Women 2020:Trends and Statistics report; and (d) cover other business, including the IAEG-GS annual work programme for 2020-2021 and the preparations for the 8th Global Forum on Gender Statistics in 2021.

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The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) is organizing an Inter-Agency and Expert Group Meeting on Gender Statistics. This closed meeting will take place in New York, from 7 to 8 November 2019.

Bringing together gender statisticians and experts from the international, regional and national institutions that are IAEG-GS members, the 13th IAEG-GS Meeting has the following objectives:

(a) take stock and provide feedback, from a gender perspective, on the methodological work being undertaken by UNSD and the Expert Group on Innovative and Effective Ways to Collect Time-Use Statistics, in line with international standards;
(b) discuss and review the on-going work of the IAEG-GS Advisory Group on Strengthening Administrative Systems to Close Gender Data Gaps;
(c) review on-going national, regional and global initiatives to improve evidence for gender-relevant policies, including the development and implementation of international methods and standards;
(d) discuss progress towards gender equality at the national, regional and global levels, in particular in the context of Beijing+25 and for the preparation of The World’s Women 2020; and
(e) cover other business, including the IAEG-GS members’ work in the field of gender statistics and the preparation of the 8th Global Forum on Gender Statistics in 2020.

#genderstat

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The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD), in collaboration with the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications of the Government of Japan, is organizing the 7th Global Forum on Gender Statistics under the Global Gender Statistics Programme and the guidance of the Inter-Agency and Expert Group on Gender Statistics (IAEG-GS).

This event will bring together producers and users of gender statistics from national and international statistical offices, other government agencies, international organizations, academia, civil society and the donor community. The Forum will be an opportunity to discuss ways to improve data and evidence for gender policies, in the context of the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda. In particular, the Forum will: (a) review methodological developments for better gender statistics in many areas, including the nexus between gender and environment; measuring asset ownership and entrepreneurship from a gender perspective; monitoring international migration; and producing data on gender identity; (b) take stock of national practices and strategies for measuring and monitoring gender concerns, in line with the global SDG indicator framework; (c) discuss how Statistical Offices can communicate more effectively to ensure policy makers, the media and the general public identify, understand, and make full use of available data; and (d) learn about the latest research/assessment of progress towards gender equality, and about the availability of disaggregated gender data, to ensure no one is left behind.

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The members of the IAEG-GS convened for the 12th annual meeting in Tokyo, Japan on 13 November 2018, preceding the 7th Global Forum on Gender Statistics, which took place on 14-16 November 2018. The meeting was organized by the Social and Gender Statistics Section, Demographic and Social Statistics Branch, of the United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD).

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The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD), in collaboration with the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC ) and the Statistics Division of the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations (FAO), organized a Regional Workshop on the measurement of Asset Ownership from a Gender Perspective. The workshop was organized under the Evidence and Data for Gender Equality (EDGE) project and brought together national statisticians from 11 countries from Latin America to discuss the concepts and methods outlined in the UN Guidelines on the Production of Statistics on Asset Ownership from a Gender Perspective through Household Surveys.

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The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD), in collaboration with the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), the Statistics Division of the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations (FAO), organized a Regional Workshop on the measurement of Asset Ownership from a Gender Perspective in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, from 24-26 July, 2018. The workshop was organized under the Evidence and Data for Gender Equality (EDGE) project and brought together national statisticians of 13 Anglophone countries in sub-Saharan Africa. The purpose of the workshop was to train NSO participants in the region on how to collect data on asset ownership at the individual level by presenting key recommendations and providing practical advice based on the UN Guidelines on the Production of Statistics on Asset Ownership from a Gender Perspective.

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The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD), in collaboration with the National Statistical Office of Georgia (GEOSTAT), Asian Development Bank (ADB) and the Statistics Division of the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations (FAO), organized a Regional Workshop on the measurement of Asset Ownership from a Gender Perspective. The workshop was organized under the Evidence and Data for Gender Equality (EDGE) project and brought together national statisticians from 12 countries from Central and Western Asia to discuss the concepts and methods outlined in the UN Guidelines on the Production of Statistics on Asset Ownership from a Gender Perspective through Household Surveys.

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The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD), in collaboration with the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and the Statistics Division of the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations (FAO) organized a Regional Workshop on the measurement of Asset Ownership from a Gender Perspective. The workshop was organized under the Evidence and Data for Gender Equality (EDGE) project and brought together national statisticians to discuss the concepts and methods outlined in the UN Guidelines on the Production of Statistics on Asset Ownership from a Gender Perspective through Household Surveys.

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This seminar will present the UN Methodological Guidelines on the Production of Statistics on Asset Ownership from a Gender Perspective, developed under the Evidence and Data for Gender Equality (EDGE) project. The guidelines provide national statistical agencies and policy makers with guidance on collecting, processing, analysing and disseminating individual-level household survey data on asset ownership. Lessons learned from the EDGE pilot countries which tested the methodology will also be shared. The meeting will also cover the methodology proposed to measure and monitor SDG indicator 5.a.1 (5.a.1 (a) Proportion of total agricultural population with ownership or secure rights over agricultural land, by sex; and (b) share of women among owners or rights-bearers of agricultural land, by type of tenure), in line with the EDGE methods.

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The meeting will bring together national and international experts to review and discuss issues related to the development of gender statistics. In particular, the meeting will: (a) review methodological developments in key areas of gender concerns in the SDG framework; (b) review the work of the IAEG-GS Advisory Group on Gender Indicators and the alignment of the Minimum Set of Gender Indicators with the Global SDG indicator framework; (c) provide an update on the work undertaken in the field of gender statistics by the IAEG-GS Members; (d) review capacity building efforts in gender statistics; and (e) discuss the preparation of the 7th Global Forum on Gender Statistics, hosted by Japan in November 2018.

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Under the EDGE project, the United Nations Statistics Division organised a Technical Meeting on the draft UN Methodological Guidelines on the Production of Statistics on Asset Ownership from a Gender Perspective. Held in New York from 5-6 May, 2017, the technical meeting provided an overview of the key components of the guidelines and solicited input on the remaining technical issues requiring resolution.

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At a side event to the 48th Session of the United Nations Statistical Commission, the EDGE project presented the key recommendations of the draft UN Methodological Guidelines on the Production of Statistics on Asset Ownership from a Gender Perspective and solicited feedback from stakeholders.

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The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) and Statistics Finland are organising the 6th Global Forum on Gender Statistics under the Global Gender Statistics Programme and guidance from the Interagency and Expert Group on Gender Statistics (IAEG-GS). The Forum will be held in Helsinki, Finland from 24 to 26 October 2016 and will focus on data and statistical methods for the follow up and review of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) indicators framework, from a gender perspective. Gender Statistics Forums have proven to be an important opportunity to take stock of progress towards the achievement of gender equality and women’s empowerment and to review data availability, data challenges and countries’ capacities to measure and monitor gender-relevant issues. Forums are also the ideal venues to share and discuss initiatives and tools related to the collection, production, dissemination and use of gender statistics.

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The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) is organizing the 10th Meeting of the Inter-Agency and Expert Group on Gender Statistics (IAEG-GS) in Helsinki, Finland on 23 October 2016. The meeting will bring together representatives from national statistical offices, international agencies, regional commissions and other experts to discuss methodological developments to measure selected indicators under SDG 5, other gender relevant SDG indicators, and to take stoke of ongoing and planned activities to fill in gender data gaps.

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In collaboration with the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the United Nations Statistics Division, under the EDGE project, facilitated a Regional Workshop for Post Field Work Discussions of the EDGE pilot surveys. The workshop was attended by participants from the three EDGE pilot countries funded by the ADB - Georgia, Mongolia and the Philippines, as well as resource persons on sampling and measuring the gender asset gap.

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UNSD organized the 9th meeting of the IAEG-GS, held in Bangkok, Thailand from 29-30 October 2015. A total of 36 participants from international agencies, regional commissions and national statistical offices attended the meeting. The meeting reviewed the preliminary SDG indicators under Goal 5 – Achieving gender equality and empower all women and girls – proposed by the 2nd meeting of the Inter-agency and Expert Group on SDG Indicators (IAEG-SDGS), held from 26 to 28 October. The review was carried out from a technical perspective, highlighting the need for rephrasing or for correcting inconsistencies. The proposed indicators were further classified into 3 tiers according to the agree tiers system. The meeting also took note of work programmes and initiatives undertaken by IAEG-GS members to strengthen gender statistics at the international, regional and national levels.

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The UN Statistics Division and the UN Women, in collaboration with the Kitakyushu Forum on Asian Women (KFAW), organized a Mid-term Review Technical Meeting of the Evidence and Data for Gender Equality (EDGE) initiative. Standing at the mid-point of the project, the meeting took stock of progress made by the EDGE initiative to date since its inception in 2013.

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The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD), in collaboration with the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (UNESCWA) and the Jordan Department of Statistics, is organizing a workshop on Integrating a Gender Perspective in the Production of statistics, in Amman, Jordan, from 1 to 4 December 2014.

The workshop aims to train national statisticians on: (1) producing gender statistics from available data sources; (2) using data from population censuses for gender analysis; and (3) ways to produce, disseminate and communicate gender statistics to properly inform policies.

The workshop will also foster exchange of national experiences among participating countries.

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The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) and the National Institute of Statistics and Geography of Mexico (INEGI) are organising the 5th Global Forum on Gender Statistics under the Global Gender Statistics Programme and the guidance of the Interagency and Expert Group on Gender Statistics (IAEG-GS).

The Forum will be held in Aguascalientes, Mexico on 3-5 November 2014 and will serve as a platform to review methods and data (including innovative approaches/initiatives) to measure and monitor gender equality and women’s empowerment in the following thematic “pillars”: women and the economy; violence against women; time use; political participation; the environment; and women in armed conflicts. The Forum will also cover recent initiatives focused on how to fill in gender data gaps.

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The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) is organizing the 8th Meeting of the Inter-Agency and Expert Group on Gender Statistics (IAEG-GS) in Aguascalientes, Mexico on 2 November 2014. The meeting will bring together representatives from national statistics offices, international agencies, Regional Commissions and other experts to discuss specific gender statistics initiatives and issues.

The meeting will cover the International Classification of Activities for Time Use Statistics (ICATUS), proposed headline indicators on violence against women, the Evidence and Data for Gender Equality (EDGE) initiative, and an update on the work of the Advisory Group on Emerging Issues.

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The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD), in collaboration with the Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC), is organizing a workshop on Gender Statistics for countries from the Pacific region. The workshop will take place in Nadi, Fiji, from 4 to 6 August 2014.

This is one of a series of workshops conducted by UNSD, under the Global Gender Statistics Programme, to provide training and assistance to strengthen the capacity of countries to produce and disseminate gender statistics and to use gender statistics for policymaking.

These workshops focus primarily on Integrating a Gender Perspective into Statistics, Time Use Statistics and Statistics on Violence against Women. The workshops aim to promote and train national statisticians on agreed international standards, share best practices and ensure collaboration and networking among gender statisticians and other relevant stakeholders, for the production, dissemination and communication of gender statistics that are policy relevant, internationally comparable and technically sound.

The workshop for the Pacific region will assist national statisticians with translating international guidelines into practice at the national level, taking into account the specific contexts of countries in the region.

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The overall objective of the UN EDGE Follow-up Meeting on Measuring Asset Ownership from a Gender Perspective is to reach a tentative agreement on the broad recommendations on the design of the methodological survey experiments on measuring individual-level asset ownership from multi-purpose household surveys, including the Living Standards Measurement Study (LSMS), with financial and technical contributions from theEvidence and Data for Gender Equality (EDGE) project.1 The goal will be to develop by the end of the day a clear agenda for this work program and next steps.

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An international seminar on gender statistics, hosted by Statistics Korea will be held from 12 to 14 November 2013 in Incheon, Republic of Korea. The seminar is organized by the UN Statistics Division (UNSD) and Statistics Korea (KOSTAT). The meeting will discuss (1) the integration of gender into national statistics, (2) women’s discontinuity at work, (3) time use statistics, and (4) measuring violence against women.

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The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) is organizing the 7th meeting of the Inter-agency and Expert Group on Gender Statistics (IAEG-GS) in New York from 12 to 13 September 2013. The meeting will bring together representatives from national statistical offices, international agencies and Regional Commissions to review global work on gender statistics. The objectives of the meeting are to review the work of the Advisory Group on Emerging Issues, discuss the Minimum Set of Gender Indicators and update the members on capacity building efforts in gender statistics through a continued dialogue on the coordination of gender statistics activities.

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Under the Evidence and Data for Gender Equality (EDGE) project, the United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) and UN Women are organizing in Bangkok, from 30 July to 2 August 2013, a technical meeting on measuring asset ownership from a gender perspective. The meeting will bring together around 30 experts, including survey statisticians and gender specialists from selected countries, partner agencies and regional commissions, to discuss how to measure asset ownership at the individual level. More precisely, participants will: (a) review and discuss the draft Technical Report on Collecting Sex-Disaggregated Asset Data presenting the proposed methodology to collect individual-level asset data through a dedicated module attached to a multi-purpose national household survey; (b) share national practices on measuring asset ownership; and (c) discuss the project implementation strategy in selected pilot countries.

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The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) and the Statistical Institute for Asia and the Pacific (SIAP) are organizing jointly a capacity building workshop on gender statistics, in cooperation with the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, Government of Japan. This regional workshop will take place in Chiba, Japan from 16 to 19 April 2013. The purpose of the workshop is to train national statisticians on the production and use of gender statistics, as well as discuss the newly developed UN manual: Manual for Integrating a Gender Perspective into Statistics.

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This meeting, organised by the United Nations Statistics Division and UN Women and attended by country representatives, agencies, and commissions, marked the beginning of the EDGE project’s methodological work on asset ownership.

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The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD), in collaboration with the Uganda Bureau of Statistics (UBOS), is organizing a capacity building workshop for sub-Saharan African countries on Integrating a Gender Perspective into Statistics. The workshop will take place in Kampala, Uganda from 4 to 7 December 2012. The purpose of the workshop is to present the newly developed Manual for Integrating a Gender Perspective into Statisticsand train national statisticians on the production and use of gender statistics.

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Following a request by the Statistical Commission at its 28th session in 1995, UNSD convened a first expert group meeting in 1997 to prepare a draft classification of activities for time-use statistics. Then, based on the experience of countries that used or adapted this classification as well as on recommendations from a second expert group meeting organized in 2000, a revised and more elaborated version was issued and published in Guide to Producing Statistics on Time Use: Measuring Paid and Unpaid Work (United Nations, 2005) as the UN Trial International Classification of Activities for Time-Use Statistics (ICATUS).

After a lapse of years while several countries adapted ICATUS for application in their data collection, tabulation and analysis, UNSD is organizing an Expert Group Meeting on the revision and finalization of ICATUS. The meeting will bring together around 20 national and international experts to discuss and agree on several topics including: (1) the updates of the current categories (2) the consistency of ICATUS with the new international standards classification; (3) the treatment of more complex aspects (categories such as “looking for work” or “waiting”); (4) the mapping (correspondence tables) between ICATUS and other existing classifications. The final agreed classification will be presented to the UN Statistical Commission for endorsement in 2013, after been reviewed by the Expert Group on International Economic and Social Classifications.

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The Forum is being organized by the UNSD and the Department of Statistics of Jordan, in collaboration with UNESCWA, UNFPA, UN-Women, and the World Bank. It is being held as part of the Global Gender Statistics Programme promoted by the IAEG-GS with the purpose of enhancing the capacity of countries to collect, disseminate and use quality gender statistics. The forum will provide an important opportunity to review and discuss new initiatives and data collection tools for the improvement of gender statistics and focus on Women’s Empowerment, including: economic empowerment, autonomy and physical empowerment, adolescent girls, and knowledge empowerment.

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The 6th Inter-agency and Expert Group (IAEG) meeting will bring together representatives of international agencies within and outside United Nations system, statisticians from National Statistical Systems, and development partners, to review progress and provide guidance on future activities geared at advancing gender statistics.

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The Kenya Seminar on Census Data Analysis is scheduled to be held from 19 to 22 March 2012 in Nairobi, Kenya. The main objective of the national seminar is to provide an opportunity for the staff member of the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics to further analyze data from the 2009 population and housing census of Kenya on selected topics. The ultimate objective is to promote greater analysis and dissemination of the data collected from the Kenya 2009 census.

The national seminar will cover the following topics: (i) population projections at sub-national and sectoral level, (ii) analysis of data on international migration, and (iii) analysis of data on gender issues.

After the seminar, participants are expected to produce thematic analytical reports, based on analyses generated during the seminar.

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The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) will conduct a Consultative Meeting to Review the Guidelines for Producing Statistics on Violence against Women, from 8 - 10 November, in ESCWA premises in Beirut, Lebanon. The draft Guidelinesprovides comprehensive methodological guidance regarding the selection of core and additional topics, sources of data, relevant statistical classifications, outputs, wording of the questions and all other pertinent issues related to conducting statistical surveys to measure violence against women. The meeting will review the text in detail and, upon incorporation of all the inputs, the final version will be submitted to the United Nations Statistical Commission for approval.

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The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) is organizing a meeting of the Inter-agency and Expert Group on Gender Statistics (IAEG-GS) in New York from 4-6 October 2011. The main objectives of the meeting are to continue the dialogue on the coordination of gender statistics activities, in light of the conclusions and recommendations made by the 42nd session of the UN Statistical Commission, and present the on-going activities of the advisory groups. The resulting recommendations and decisions coming out of the meeting will form the work plan for the IAEG-GS.

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The Workshop objective is to review methods and practices in collecting, processing and disseminating time-use statistics at the regional and international levels, with a main focus on the design and classification issues pertinent to the measurement of paid and unpaid work.

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The Global Forum on Gender Statistics is being organized by the United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) in collaboration with the National Statistical Coordination Board of the Philippines. This Forum, from 11-13 October, will be the third in a series of international meetings on gender statistics with the purpose of promoting the advancement of gender statistics among decision makers and all other user groups. The focus of the 2010 Forum will be on the gender dimensions of health statistics, including measurement of maternal mortality, causes of death and disability, and related methodological advances. National practices in the incorporation of a gender perspective in national statistical systems and in the measurement of women and men’s health will be reviewed.

The 4th meeting of the Inter-agency and expert group on gender statistics is being held following the Global Forum in Manila, Philippines on 14 October 2010. The objectives of the meeting are to further define priorities for the overall Global Gender Statistics programme, update the group on the work of the three advisory groups (gender statistics and indicators database, gender statistics training activities and curricula, and statistical legislation for gender statistics) and share agency and expert experiences in gender statistics.

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The 4th meeting of the Inter-agency and expert group on gender statistics is being held following the Global Forum in Manila, Philippines on 14 October 2010. The objectives of the meeting are to further define priorities for the overall Global Gender Statistics programme, update the group on the work of the three advisory groups (gender statistics and indicators database, gender statistics training activities and curricula, and statistical legislation for gender statistics) and share agency and expert experiences in gender statistics.

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The Malawi National Seminar on Census Data Analysis is scheduled to be held from 19 to 22 July in Malawi. The main objective of the national seminar is to provide an opportunity for the staff member of the Malawi National Statistical Office in collaboration with the University of Malawi Population Studies Centre, to further collaborate on the analysis of data from the 2008 census of Malawi on selected topics. The national seminar will cover the following topics: (i) fertility and nuptiality from a gender perspective; (ii) fertility indices based on data from the 2008 census; (iii) measures of nuptiality based on data from the 2008 census: and (iv) and use of the CensusInfo software for data presentation and dissemination. After the seminar, participants are expected to produce thematic analytical reports, based on analyses generated during the seminar.

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Egypt National Seminar on Census Data Analysis is scheduled to be held from 17 to 19 May in Cairo, Egypt. The main objective of the seminar is to provide an opportunity for the staff member of the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics (CAPMAS) in collaboration with the Cairo Demographic Center and Cairo University, to further collaborate on the analysis of data from the 2006 census Egypt on selected topics. The seminar will cover an overview of calculation of the wealth index; gender analysis; and use of the CensusInfo software for data presentation and dissemination. After the seminar, participants are expected to produce thematic analytical reports, based on analyses generated during the seminar.

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The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) and the Instituto Nacional de Estadística y Geografía of Mexico (INEGI), in its role as the chair of the Friends of the Chair of the United Nations Statistical Commission, are organizing a meeting on statistical indicators to measure violence against women. The meeting will be hosted by INEGI in Aguascalientes, Mexico. The purpose of the meeting is to: (a) continue the work on developing the indicators in line with the recommendations in the first report submitted to the United Nations Statistical Commission in February 2009; (b) conduct an in-depth technical review of the methodologies currently applied to observe violence against women; and (c) provide methodological advice for the developing of a set of Guidelines for producing Statistics on Violence Against Women, regarding the selection of core and additional topics, sources of data, relevant statistical classifications, outputs, wording of questions and all other pertinent issues.

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The UNSD, in collaboration with the Department of Statistics of the International Labour Organization and the Tanzania National Bureau of Statistics, will conduct a Workshop on the Production of Statistics on Informal Sector Employment and Informal Employment from 28 September to 2 October 2009 in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. The workshop is being organized as part of the World Bank funded project “Improving Gender Statistics on Employment”. The Workshop will provide training on methods of measuring employment in the informal sector and in informal employment; as well as on the uses, tabulation and analysis of statistics on women and men in the informal sector and in informal employment. Participants will present and discuss recent experience in producing data on informal sector employment and informal employment, with a view to promoting the development of a model set of LFS questions on the topic to improve the overall quality and comparability of the information collected in the SADC region.

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The IAEG-GS will hold its annual meeting in conjunction with the Forum to review the work of the two advisory groups on gender statistics and propose future actions for the groups.

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The 2009 Global Forum is the second of a series of international meetings on gender statistics to be held annually with the purpose of promoting the advancement of gender statistics among decision makers and all other user groups. The 2009 Forum will serve to solidify the momentum gained with the launch in December 2007 of the Global Gender Statistics Programme and the Interagency Expert Group on Gender Statistics (IAEG-GS). In addition, the 2009 Forum will review best practices in the incorporation of a gender perspective in national statistical systems and in the measurement of women’s participation in and contributions to the economy. During the Forum, national-level experiences on integrating gender into population and housing census and household survey data collection processes and analysis will also be presented. The Forum will serve to highlight the need for statistics to respond to requirements for monitoring progress towards the attainment of gender equity goals and targets, including the Millennium Development Goals, PRSPs, Beijing Platform for Action and CEDAW. Furthermore, the IAEG-GS will hold its annual meeting in conjunction with the Forum to review the work of the two advisory groups on gender statistics and propose future actions for the groups.

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The Workshop is being organized by the United Nations Statistics Division, in collaboration with the International Labour Organization (ILO), the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) and the Southern African Development Community (SADC), as part of the project Strengthening statistical capacity-building in support of progress towards the Internationally Agreed Development Goals in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region. The Workshop will train representatives from the National Statistical Offices and Ministries of Labour of the SADC region countries on the measurement of women's and men's participation in the labour force through household surveys, with a particular focus on statistics on employment in the informal sector and informal employment.

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The United Nations Statistics Division, in collaboration with The World Bank and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), is convening an Inter-Agency and Expert Group Meeting on the Development of Gender Statistics to explore ways of strengthening collaboration and promoting partnerships among stakeholders in the development of gender statistics. The meeting will review some of the key initiatives and strategies that are considered as being most successful; identify specific programmes and products that have enhanced capacities at national and regional levels in the collection, compilation and dissemination of gender statistics; and plan for launching an initiative to improve the availability, accessibility and use of reliable gender statistics for planning, monitoring and evaluation, at various levels, in particular at the national level.

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The main objective of the time use survey is to provide sound statistics on the reality of women and men in Palestine. In particular, TUS provides statistics on the following areas: 1. All activities practiced by the Palestinians. 2. The average time spent in carrying out different activities by the individuals. 3. The percentage of individuals carrying out specific activities. 4. The social environment in which the activity is practiced. 5. The time spent by women in carrying out household activities and productive activities whether paid or unpaid activities. 6. Provide data on the time spent in different activities such as watching television, attending religious ceremonies and participation in sports activities. 7. The time spent in movement. 8. Other related issues.

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A presentation on the EUROSTAT Pilot Survey on Time Use identified problems related to the specification of activities, but noted that the general survey design proved successful. The presentation on the time-use study in Italy also identified problems with the specification of activities and concluded that improvements in survey methods rather than the classification system were required to improve the amount of information specified in time-use diaries.

With respect to objectives and uses of time-use surveys, the priority uses of and interests in time-use data were discussed by each participant for their country. The most common objectives identified by both developed and developing countries, related to issues of gender and work, specifically the division of labour in the home and improvement in the measurement of women’s unpaid work. A related objective concerned the use of time-use statistics in the preparation of household satellite accounts. Another common objective concerned changes in allocation of time across broad categories of activity.

Plans to undertake national time-use studies in three developing countries -- India, the Philippines and South Africa -- were described. Among the objectives for these surveys are to quantify women’s contribution to economic activities, to measure the extent of child labour, and to understand the relationship between welfare and poverty. The participant from India also included among the objectives the need for information on livelihood strategies and on when people are free of work as a basis for planning skills formation, training and other poverty alleviation programmes.

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