The World Survey on the Role of Women in Development is presented every five years to the Economic and Financial Committee of the United Nations General Assembly. It provides a unique opportunity to put gender equality issues on the economic policy agenda and bring together perspectives on human rights and sustainable development. This ninth edition takes stock of progress, gaps and challenges in building comprehensive, gender-responsive social protection systems. It provides examples and recommendations on how these systems can better protect women and girls from poverty and deprivation, strengthen their resilience to shocks, and transform social norms, structures and institutions that keep them from realizing their full potential. To produce the report, UN-Women brought together researchers, policymakers, civil society actors and United Nations system partners. The report draws on their collective expertise to provide guidance to policymakers and support advocacy for a new generation of gender-responsive social protection systems equipped to uphold rights and advance sustainable development.

Ensuring women’s economic empowerment and access to and control over resources requires an integrated approach to growth and development, focused on gender-responsive employment promotion and informed by the interdependency between economic and social development. Social objectives need to be incorporated into economic policies. Economic growth strategies should give attention to the real economy and focus on creating a gender-sensitive macroeconomic environment, full employment and decent work, access to land, property and other productive resources as well as financial services, and full coverage of social protection measures. The Survey outlines a number of concrete recommendations in these critical areas, which if adopted, will facilitate women’s equitable access to and control over economic and financial resources.

A gender perspective is essential to understanding both the causes and consequences of international migration. Female migrants are increasingly part of worker flows, moving on their own to become the principal wage earners for their families. Most women move voluntarily, but women and girls are also part of the flows of forced migrants who have fled conflict, persecution, environmental degradation, natural disasters and other situations that affect their habitat, livelihood and security. The trafficking of people for prostitution and forced labour also, is an area of increasing concern to the international community. This Survey sets out recommendations that, if adopted, will improve the situation of migrant, refugee and trafficked women.