UN Women, the IFC and the UN Global Compact have taken action to support companies and women in the Arab States during COVID-19, recognizing that eliminating barriers to women’s economic participation and empowerment drives the growth of businesses and economies and improves the lives of families and communities.

This brief provides evidence of the different ways in which women’s rights organizations have been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, highlighting the predicament that many of them face of increased relevance and demand at the same time as civic closure, restrictive work conditions, and diminishing funding.

In 2019, regional UN agencies and international non-governmental organizations including UNICEF, UN Women, ESCWA, FAO, UNFPA, UNDP, UNESCO, WFP, WHO, Plan International and Terre des Hommes Foundation came together to work on the Regional Situational Analysis (SitAn) of Women and Girls in the MENA and Arab States Region.

UN Women conducted its first rapid assessment of the impact. of the COVID-19 pandemic on UN Women Oasis Centre beneficiaries in March 2020, when the first cases of COVID-19 were confirmed in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. Fourteen months into the COVID-19 pandemic...

UN Women is at the forefront of the global drive to remove gender barriers because we believe in a world of justice and human rights for everyone. Towards that end, and as the only United Nations entity dedicated to gender equality, we marshal the world’s best gender expertise and the considerable resources of the United Nations. We connect people in many realms, the national and international, the public and private, activists and officials. Together, our efforts are more than any of us could pursue alone.

This publication is produced by Musawah with support from UN Women within the framework of the ‘Men and Women for Gender Equality’ regional programme funded by Sweden. The policy brief outlines outlines how divorce provisions in many Muslim family laws are unfair and can be damaging to women and their children—but we can reform those laws.

The policy paper provides an overview of the police response to Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) in the Arab States region including in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. The paper then presents UN Women and UNODC’s initiative on Gender Sensitive Policing, for further engagement of the police on the issue of VAWG in the region.

The aim of this report is to present evidence on the impact of UN Women’s interventions and provide in-depth analysis around resilience and factors critical for strengthening resilience. This will allow UN Women to expand its evidence based on resilience and help better design programmes, ensuring that they are mainly based on needs and vulnerabilities of the population of concern.

These policy papers are developed within the framework of the Beijing+25 Review and the Generation Equality Forum. Given the pluralistic nature of the Arab region, and in view of UN Women’s commitment to participation and inclusivity, a series of policy papers on four gender thematic areas were prepared by the Arab States CSOs and Feminists Network to amplify the voice of civil society and feminist organizations and push forward the gender equality agenda.

As COVID-19 continues to spread across the globe and throughout the Arab States. The coronavirus pandemic is challenging hard-earned progress on gender equality and women’s empowerment, and further exposing the detrimental effect gender inequality has on individuals, society, and the economy.

Gender equality cannot be achieved in Lebanon without dismantling the kafala system and creating legal protections for domestic workers. Women make up an estimated 76 per cent of all migrant workers and 99 per cent of migrant domestic workers who come to Lebanon for employment.

Ce Policy Brief met l’accent sur les différentes formes d’impact de la COVID-19 sur la santé des femmes en Tunisie. Durant la première période de l’épidémie, de nombreuses prestations sanitaires ont été reportées tandis que le personnel hospitalier se consacrait à la préparation des services de santé pour s’attaquer à la COVID-19.

Le rapport a pour objet une veille normative sur les différentes mesures prises en Tunisie pour faire face à la crise de la Covid-19 durant la première vague (mars - août 2020) sous l’aune de l’approche genre.

The results detailed in this country brief overwhelming speak to increased concerns for safety, both inside and outside the home (as a result of the pandemic), increased secondary trauma, specifically, the witnessing of violence against women, and online harassment. Most respondents believed tackling gender-based violence to be a priority in the COVID-19 response and voiced a willingness to report violations.

This brief presents emerging evidence on the impact of the global COVID-19 pandemic on the care economy. Complementing a separate UN Women brief on COVID-19 and economic recovery, this brief highlights key measures needed to address the increase in unpaid care work as a result of the pandemic, ensure adequate compensation and decent working conditions for paid care workers, and enable the participation of paid and unpaid caregivers in the policy decisions that affect them.

This brief shines a light on the critical role of women’s leadership in responding to COVID-19 and preparing for a more equitable recovery. Across the globe, women are at the helm of institutions carrying out effective and inclusive COVID-19 responses, from the highest levels of decision-making to frontline service delivery.

This brief presents emerging evidence of the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact on women’s economic empowerment. Complementing a separate UN Women policy brief on “COVID-19 and the care economy”, it considers the immediate gendered economic impacts, including widening socioeconomic divides and shifting national and international priorities for the allocation of resources, as well as the long-term implications for women’s employment and livelihoods.

This report, based on answers to a questionnaire circulated amongst CSOs networks in the region, presents emerging evidence of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on gender equality and VAWG in the Arab States. Developed through the perspective of women CSOs, the report documents major threats to women survivors of violence, associated with COVID-19, and the repercussions of the pandemic on vulnerable groups such as refugee and migrant women, and women with disabilities.

The document aims to highlight available services during the pandemic and to provide women survivors of violence with necessary details of service providers in various region of Tunisia.

Women and girls admitted to COVID-19 community isolation centers are particularly vulnerable to be subjected to harassment, violence, exploitation and abuse due to specific gendered protection risks, including being confined to an isolated space, the gendered staffing of centers, the economic vulnerability of women and girls, and avenues to seek help being limited or hard to reach. WHO and UN Women are co-leading interventions within the isolation facilities to protection the needs of women and girls, through protection monitoring, ensuring complaint and feedback mechansisms, community messaging, and training and capacity building.