This report presents the results of the independent evaluation of UN Women’s ‘Strengthening the Resilience of Syrian Women and Girls and Host Communities’ (“Madad”) programme and offers lessons and recommendations for future programming on gender equality and women’s empowerment. The Synthesis report includes country specific annexes for Iraq, Jordan and Turkey.

Thanks to the support of the European Union (EU), and the Government of Japan and other donors, the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women) implemented the ‘Strengthening the Resilience of Syrian Women and Girls and Host Communities in Iraq, Jordan and Turkey’ programme. Building on the programme implementation experience, UN Women set up a no-cost collaboration with FAO to conceptualize a gender-sensitive resilience index based on FAO’s Resilience Measurement Analysis (RIMA) Model (FAO, 2016). The analysis builds upon data collected through the Madad programme monitoring and sought to provide evidence around key resilience issues.

In Iraq, the UN system is committed to supporting the government to overcome these unparalleled crises, through the 2020-2024 United Nations Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework (UNSDCF) designed to support the State and Iraqi people to achieve their National Development Plan targets, aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals. This includes supporting a diversified economy, preceded by reforms to encourage private sector investment, to make the country more resilient to oil shocks and to boost employment in highly productive sectors.

This report represents the conclusions of two sessions held in Tunis, Tunisia on 12-13 May 2016 with members of parliament, representatives of ministries / government bodies responsible for monitoring and evaluating the SDGS, women national machineries and evaluators from across the Arab States region.