Effective government policies for advancing equality for women and girls: international evidence review

Gender focused budgeting and procurement

“Budgets are about more than money. They are a statement of a nation’s priorities.”

OECD Spending Better Framework, 2023

Some countries have established overarching legislative and budgetary frameworks that recognise how decisions on spending may impact gender equality, with 60% of member countries of the OECD developing or having developed approaches to gender budgeting. Benefits include:

• an improved evidence base, to inform decisions around resource allocation
• greater transparency on the impact of the budget on different groups of society
• improved effectiveness of the budget in closing gender gaps

According to the Women’s Budget Group (WBG) in A gendered approach to the cost of living crisis? International lessons Neitzert (2024) evidence shows that lower-income households, of which the majority are led by women, intersecting with specific populations, including black and minoritised ethnicities and disabled people, have borne the brunt of the cost-of-living crisis. Structural labour market inequalities and disproportionate unpaid caring duties mean women have less income and savings. Lone parent households, led mainly by women, have been particularly vulnerable.

The WBG report identified some general lessons to be taken from the approaches they set out. These included that:

• where there is impending or actual inflation, a standard response is one that implements national monetary policy, specifically in the form of raised interest rates. However, where rising costs are caused by “external price shocks”, such as spiralling fuel costs, monetary policy may not be the most effective tool for curbing inflation and other measures need to be applied
• close and appropriate indexation of minimum wage, pension and benefit levels is vital to preserve the purchasing power those on low incomes in high inflation environments (rising prices with falling purchasing power, eroding savings and increased borrowing costs etc.)
• “a robust gender architecture”, meaning clearly articulated policy backed up by transparency and mechanisms to promote accountability, leads to the most positive outcomes for women

The WBG report observes that not all policy responses to the cost-of-living crisis have included, or at least articulated, any gender-specific analysis despite, as noted above, that these responses when effective are going to have the most impact on women. This raises some questions as to why not?

The WBG highlights developments in both Australia and Spain as of note. In Australia, the 2022 budget included a range of measures designed to halt inflation, with its gender specific impact (actual or projected). They included financial measures relating to childcare, cost of medicines, shared parental leave, housing and minimum wages. Although gender analysis of the fiscal responses carried out by the WBG highlights that there is little or no reference to women or gender in publications, it is clear that there is likely to have been a significant positive distributional impact on women with, for example, the focus on supporting single parents, 91% of whom are women.

Spain's experience suggests that a combination of monetary and fiscal measures may be more effective than conventional monetary policy in addressing inflation. Women are more likely to be in low-paid or insecure work, have more unpaid care responsibilities, are more likely to use public transport, more likely to be impacted by higher food prices, and more likely to rely on social security benefits. The WBG suggests that the following policies in Spain are likely to have benefited women in particular:

• increases in social security payments
• indexing minimum wage, pensions and benefits to inflation measures
• rent controls and protections against evictions
• reductions in VAT on food items
• public transport fare cuts

The Spanish fiscal response is interesting, not only in terms of how extensive it is, but because there is explicit recognition of gender. While there is no gender impact assessment to draw on, the WBG expects to see a reduction in AROPE rates^[5] for women because of income-boosting measures around benefits, pensions and the minimum wage. They also anticipate that women are likely to benefit disproportionately from the price controls (relating to housing, energy and food), including because lone parent households spend a larger proportion of their income on such costs. The Spanish Labour Minister, Yolanda Diaz, accompanied the 2023 increase in the minimum wage with the following statement:

“The best, most feminist tool to improve women's social rights is… the minimum wage.”

Spanish Labour Minister, Yolanda Diaz, 2023

Gender-focused budgeting

Scottish context

Since 2009, The Scottish Government has published an Equality and Fairer Scotland Budget Statement (EFSBS) alongside the Budget. The EFSBS assesses what the Scottish Government is proposing to spend public money on, how this is changing, if these decisions are likely to affect some people more than others, and how it might help reduce inequality between different groups of people.

To deepen its understanding of how gender budgeting can address gender inequalities, the Scottish Government sought technical assistance from the OECD. The OECD Gender Budgeting Pilots: Evaluation Report, Scottish Government (2024) presents the OECD's assessment of Scotland's potential for gender budgeting.

It reports that the Scottish Government “has a strong political commitment to addressing inequalities” and has established institutional elements to help facilitate this (a Minister for Equalities, a Senior Leadership Group on Equality and Human Rights and an Equality and Human Rights Budget Advisory Group etc.). It also notes that Public Bodies in Scotland have legal obligations to actively consider how their decisions can reduce inequalities caused by socio-economic disadvantage (as a result of the 2018 Fairer Scotland Duty) and that Equality Impact Assessments (EQIAs) are required for all policies and practices as part of the UK-wide Public Sector Equality Duty.

However, the report also notes stakeholder concerns that initiatives such as equality and human rights budgeting may not drive real change across government and that gender equality gets crowded out as a priority through being one of a number of characteristics which falls under the equality banner.

To help bring gender to the fore, and strengthen the overall approach to equality and human rights budgeting, the OECD identified the following priorities:

1. Identifying clear gender equality strategy goals for Scotland.

2. Improving the quality of EQIAs and gender analysis within them.

3. Establishing the Scottish Exchequer as the clear lead for gender budgeting.

4. Increasing the use of information from EQIAs in budget decisions.

5. Improving the EFSBS.

The examples of policy and approaches in other countries could suggest ways in which the Scottish Government and its partners could further strengthen their approach to equality and human rights budgeting, with a particular focus on gender.

Broader context

Approaches to gender-focused budgeting are the focus of the OECD Best Practices for Gender Budgeting (2023) and the Tackling Inequality Through Gender Budgeting - Evidence and Models (2019) (O’Hagan et al., Wales Centre for Public Policy) reports.

The OECD review of best practice lists seven overarching best practice principles. These are that gender budgeting:

• strengthens the link between budgeting and key gender equality objectives
• is sustainable beyond political cycles
• is incorporated into the overarching budget framework
• tools are used at all stages of the budget cycle
• is underpinned by strong data and analysis
• implementation is supported through capacity building
• reinforces government transparency and accountability

Woven throughout these principles is emphasis on integrated approaches, data design, evaluation and demonstrable impact. This is illustrated through the choice of case-studies including, for example, Iceland for its transparency, and Canada for its commitment to, and investment in, data design and processes.

Four examples from these reports have been selected to highlight a range of approaches and methods of application with specific areas of interest.

• Example 1 (Canada) highlights that data design and engineering are crucial areas for gender equality and inclusion. Without data that can be disaggregated, contextualised, and that answers the appropriate questions, it is close to impossible to identify baselines, monitor progress, or evaluate impact.
• Example 2, from Iceland, offers transparency over decades of work around gender equality strategies, described as “a very public learning process”. Iceland is listed as one of the most (currently leading) gender-equitable nations in the world, according to the World Economic Forum.
• Example 3, from Sweden, sets out a clear and robust approach to gender-budgeting.
• Example 4, from Andalusia, offers an example of good policy, but one that requires a greater regulatory underpinning and means of auditing impact and progress.

The final example in this section of the report (Example 5), is a gender-focused approach to procurement. This example, that includes an example from the Basque Country as well as the city of Vienna, has been selected for several reasons, including evidence of impact and clear guidance for practical application in other regional contexts.

Example 1: Strong data and analysis underpinning gender budgeting in Canada

The example is based primarily on information obtained from the following source:

• OECD Best Practices in Gender Budgeting (2023)

Canada has been cited in multiple sources reviewed for this report, for a range of reasons, but specifically in this case as a best practice example in terms of its approach to data engineering and management.

A key challenge for equality progress is the availability of disaggregated data. In response, the Canadian government increased funding for Statistics Canada in their 2018 and 2021 Budgets. Canada’s Gender Budgeting Act (December 2018) requires the Minister of Finance to table a report on impacts, in terms of gender and diversity, of all new budget measures described in the annual federal budget. The government’s 2018 investment was targeted towards a Gender and Diversity Hub, enabling data users to access disaggregated and intersectional data, analytical products, and insights. The 2021 budget funded major investments to implement a 5-year Disaggregated Data Action Plan to:

• support more representative data collection
• enhance statistics on diverse populations
• support the government and society’s efforts to address systemic discrimination
• bring fairness and inclusion considerations into decision-making processes

The aim of the Disaggregated Data Action Plan is summarised as “to provide Canadians with detailed statistical data that highlights the experiences of women, Indigenous peoples, LGBTQ2 people^[6], visible minorities, and Canadians with disabilities, ensuring that fairness and inclusion are a key part of evidence-based policy- and decision-making.”

The OECD Best Practices report set out that, within the first year of the Plan, key results included improving and expanding data collection through the Labour Force Survey, the Canadian Community Health Survey, the General Social Survey and the Uniform Crime Reporting Survey, allowing for greater disaggregation across statistics programmes for health, society, the economy, and the environment.

Impacts of the Plan can also be seen in Canada’s Budget 2022’s Statement and Impacts Report on Gender, Diversity, and Quality of Life which includes a summary of Gender-Based Analysis Plus (GBA Plus) undertaken for additional measures announced in the budget. These are clearly presented against the evaluated impacts of pre-existing policies as responses to suboptimal or even unexpectedly negative outcomes.

The Budget Statement includes both aggregate and disaggregated analysis of the gender and diversity impacts of the budget, showing the share of the budget targeting different sub-groups of the population and the share of the budget with expected benefits for gender equality. It highlights that increased availability of disaggregated statistics helps make analysis conducted as part of gender budgeting, using GBA Plus, more robust.

“… Canada’s GRF (Gender Results Framework) is a whole-of-government articulation of Canada’s gender equality priorities and goals with matching indicators to track developments... also used to present statistics on diverse groups of people, including Indigenous peoples, people with disabilities, racialized Canadians, and LGBTQ2 people”

Source: Statement and Impacts Report on Gender, Diversity, and Quality of Life

Example 2: A gender and human rights budgeting approach in Iceland

The example is based primarily on information obtained from the following sources:

• Tackling Inequality Through Gender Budgeting – Evidence and Models, Wales Centre for Public Policy (2019)
• OECD Best Practices for Gender Budgeting (2023)
• Fiscal policy statement 2022-2026, Government of Iceland (2021)

According to the World Economic Forum, in 2025 Iceland was leading the world in terms of gender parity for the 16^th year in a row. The OECD (2023) cited Iceland’s Gender Budgeting approach, with their commitment to gender budgeting being in place since the Public Finances Act 2016, as an example of best practice. The commitment includes a requirement for governmental annual Gender Baseline reporting across policy areas, and the setting of performance objectives measured against Iceland’s gender equality goals. Iceland was also cited (in Tackling Inequality Through Gender Budgeting – Evidence and Models) as an exemplar of transparency. Iceland’s openness to share and learn has resulted in the Icelandic experience being “a very public learning process” from which other countries can gain.

Despite having clear objectives and a positive political narrative, some resistance to change has been reported, especially among finance departments and some public authorities (Steinþórsdóttir et al., 2018). However, the COVID pandemic, with its financial impacts, led to a restated commitment to the Icelandic Government’s gender equality goals. Acknowledging that, despite global recognition for its gender parity work, there are still gaps, the Icelandic Government announced a renewed focus on financial and economic development in this area.

For example, from 2021 a Sovereign Sustainable Financing Framework has been used to enable the financing of its activities for climate, environment and social issues, including projects that promote gender equality. The open and collegiate approach by gender-equity advocates and influencers within government, academia, and the activist population, has resulted in “the Icelandic experience being a very public learning”.

“[Iceland] has become a reference point for other emerging efforts to implement gender budgeting and draw on lessons from neighbours and international networks.”

Tackling Inequality Through Gender Budgeting – Evidence and Models

Wales Centre for Public Policy 2019 p.22

Example 3: National Gender Equality Policy Goals in Sweden

The example is based primarily on information obtained from the following sources:

• OECD Best Practices in Gender Budgeting (2023)
• Gender Equality Policy in Sweden, Government Offices of Sweden (2020, updated 2023)

Under the OECD’s seven principles of best practice, Sweden is given as an exemplar of Principle 1 – that gender budgeting strengthens the link between budgeting and key gender equality objectives. According to the OECD, Sweden’s long-term commitment to gender equality as a distinct policy area has led to the development of gender budgeting as a means to reaching Sweden’s key equality objectives. This has also been underpinned by Sweden’s commitment to gender mainstreaming, which has been described by the European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE) as: “a strategy towards realising gender equality. It involves the integration of a gender perspective into the preparation, design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of policies, regulatory measures and spending programmes” (EIGE website).

The Swedish approach benefits from an overall policy objective, in place from 2006, that has broad political support and has underpinned gender equality policy through the lifetimes of several different governments. The objective is that “that women and men shall have the same power to shape society and their own lives” (OECD 2023).

With this as its starting point, the Swedish Government is working towards the following six subgoals:

• equal distribution of power and influence
• economic gender equality
• gender equality in education
• an equal distribution of unpaid housework and provision of care work
• gender equality in health, care and social services
• men’s violence against women must stop (Gender Equality Policy in Sweden, 2023)

The Budget Bill of 2019 introduced a formalised requirement for all ministries to include gender-equality impact assessments as part of their budget proposals, with governmental support and capacity building measures for the improvement of gender impact assessment practice.

Example 4: Sub-national/devolved gender budgeting in Andalusia, Spain

The example is based primarily on information obtained from the following sources:

• Tackling Inequality Through Gender Budgeting – Evidence and Models, Wales Centre for Public Policy (2019)
• Gender Impact Report of the 2021 Budget of the autonomous region of Andalusia. Executive Summary, (2020)
• External control of gender budget implementation: Experience of the Audit Office of Andalusia Antonio Manuel López-Hernández et al., (2023)

Cited as “one of the most enduring gender budgeting strategies in Europe”, in Tackling Inequality Through Gender Budgeting – Evidence and Models, Andalusia also provides an example from a devolved region within an European nation, with additional data presented from 2020 and 2023.

In its Gender Budgeting Audit Plan for 2018 (p.6), the Andalusian government describes gender budgeting audits as ‘the result of a process designed to ensure that public spending plays an active role in encouraging gender equality’. By 2017, 24 spending programmes and seven government agencies had been audited for progress on gender equality outcomes. In turn, the Gender Impact Assessment Report for the 2019 Budget presents a gender analysis of spending across 13 departments, analysis of spending and distribution of personnel across government, and an analysis of spending and results across 11 ministries.

The impact assessment approach is a mixture of programme and account-based budgeting, policy-based budgeting and an assessment of staffing expenditure, reflecting the three-way expenditure analysis proposed by Sharp (2003). According to the officials currently engaged in managing gender budgeting ‘It is an example of how the public budget can be used as a valid and efficient tool to ensure that gender is integrated in budgetary policy.’

The Andalusian experience is one of the most enduring gender budgeting strategies in Europe. Its early imperative was rooted in the drive to change the social and economic status of women in the region and was an integral component of plans reforming the region and boosting economic growth and capacity. According to Puig-Barrachina et al. (2017), part of the success in sustaining the gender budgeting strategy in Andalusia has been that it stuck to its original conceptual and political project of empowering women and promoting women’s economic status in the face of austerity imposed by central government and external pressures from the EU, European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund.

A 2023 study - External control of gender budget implementation: Experience of the Audit Office of Andalusia - noted that implementation of gender budgeting in Andalusia would be more successful if a “more extensive regulatory framework were to be established, supporting the obligations of the different agents involved. In addition, more monitoring is needed by control bodies – audits – both internal and external, to cover all phases of the budget cycle: preparation, implementation and evaluation”.

“The case of Andalusia highlights the imperative of having clear gender equality objectives, political purpose and commitment, supported by robust processes outlined in the G+ methodology including gender impact evaluations and gender budget audits.”

Tackling Inequality Through Gender Budgeting – Evidence and Models p.26

Wales Centre for Public Policy (2019)

Gender-focused budgeting – Craigforth’s observations

Gender focused budgeting is already an area seen as having considerable potential in Scotland, as signified by the Scottish Government seeking technical assistance from the OECD to consider how the approach could be best taken forward. The examples set out above could potentially help inform how some of the OECD’s recommendations could be addressed.

In relation to the OECD ‘Identifying clear gender equality strategy goals for Scotland’ recommendation, the Swedish example (Example 3) highlights the potential benefits of having clear policy goals in place. Andalusia (Example 4) points to the potential of a sub-national approach that is also seeking to deliver clear policy objectives and speaks to embedding for the longer-term. It also highlights the importance of the overall approach being underpinned by a robust regulatory framework.

Taken together, the Canadian and Icelandic examples (Examples 1 and 2 respectively), highlight the importance of investing in data collection and analysis, being transparent and open about what the data is telling us, and then using that analysis to make informed choices that drive positive change. In terms of the OECD’s recommendation around ‘Improving the quality of EQIAs and gender analysis within them’ and ‘Increasing the use of information from EQIAs in budget decisions’ the work going on in Canada and Iceland may offer some useful insights for Scotland.

Gender-focus in regional procurement policies

Scottish context

In Scotland, public sector procurement is governed by the Procurement Reform (Scotland) Act 2014, which outlines the responsibilities and accountabilities of public bodies.

The Public Procurement Strategy for Scotland (2023-2028) provides a high-level vision, roadmap and strategic objectives against which public bodies can align. It aims to aims to enhance procurement practices, promoting transparency and social benefits.

There are a range of ways through which the Scottish Government is seeking to achieve wider social benefits from public procurement, for example through:

• the sustainable procurement duty and associated tools
• the promotion of fair work practices, including the real Living Wage
• promoting the use of community benefit requirements in public contracts

The sustainable procurement duty requires that, before a contracting authority buys anything, it must think about how it can improve the social, environmental and economic wellbeing of the area in which it operates, with a particular focus on reducing inequality.

Example 5: Gender responsive public procurement in the Basque Country

The example is based primarily on information obtained from the following sources:

• What gender has to do with procurement? on EU/URBACT website
• Gender Equal Cities 2022 (2022) Dellenbaugh-Losse and Dreyer, EU/URBACT

While national policies on gender budgeting may herald an overarching intent to work towards gender equality and, in some cases, do indeed create impactful processes towards that aim, the following example illustrates a regional approach to creating gender-focused progress in the area of local authority procurement that is clearly defined, evidenced and backed up by free-to-access resources for training. This example from the Basque Country in Spain, illustrates a potentially important and accessible area for Scotland.

In 1999, gender equality was first incorporated into regional law in the Basque Country. Since then, Emakunde, the Basque Institute for Women, has worked alongside the Association of Basque Municipalities to incorporate gender considerations into public policies and procedures, including into procurement. This collaborative approach has created enabling conditions, built capacity, and supported local level actions. As a result, according to the latest available data, in 2020, in the Basque Country, 87% of public procurement included at least one gender equality clause.

URBACT has launched four training modules to help European towns and cities implement Gender Responsive Public Procurement (GRPP) at local level. Developed in collaboration with the EIGE, whose practical Toolkit was launched earlier this year, the course is made up of six easy-to-understand videos, including two case studies from the Basque Country (Spain) and Vienna (Austria).

Example from Artziniega, a small Basque town: When they contracted daycare services for elderly people in 2021, the town included specific criteria in the tender related to equal opportunities. Additional points could be awarded for tenderers that committed to establishing measures to promote work life balance, to develop gender equality training for staff, and to organise at least two activities a year with service users to promote gender equality and prevent sexist behaviour.

“Local government everywhere can do a lot to achieve their equality objectives through GRPP. They can promote collaboration between gender equality bodies and procurement officers, implement awareness raising activities, and develop guidelines….”

Ander Bergara Sauta of Emakunde

Taken from What gender has to do with procurement?

Further example, Vienna. Discussions on using economic power through budgetary planning as a tool to push gender equality forward in the private sector began in Vienna in 2004-2005. Aiming at promoting equal pay, working against gender stereotypes and helping women to get into leading positions, GRPP is implemented in three ways:

1. implementation of measures for the promotion of women is a mandatory social condition for contract performance

2. women’s promotion and gender issues are formulated as concrete, qualitative award criteria

3. consideration of women’s promotion and gender issues in demand assessment, procurement planning, and specification of services

GRPP is applied in Vienna across a range of product or service sectors such as urban planning, cleaning, training, IT services, bus services for disabled persons and research studies.

“…wholehearted political support and support by the senior management has been crucial.”

Ursula Bauer, Head of Gender Mainstreaming Section, Chief Executive’s Office, Vienna

Taken from: What gender has to do with procurement?

Gender-focus in regional procurement policies – Craigforth’s observations

In line with the more general focus on gender focused budgeting, the Basque Country’s approach to gender responsive public procurement, and the approach taken in Vienna, may offer insight in terms of how this broader policy objective could be taken forward at a local level. It appears very much in line with Scotland’s ongoing work around achieving wider social benefits from public procurement but may offer insight into how this can be translated into a sub-national or locally driven or controlled approach.