The Gender, Youth and Accountability Programme in Pakistan aims to generate data to advance women’s social and economic well-being by developing and carrying out a survey focusing on violence against women in Pakistan.

The DFID-funded partnership involves UNFPA, UNICEF and UNDP, along with the National Commission on the Status of Women, the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics and the National Institute of Population Studies.

The NCSW led the development of standardized indicators of violence against women. UNFPA supported capacity building for key national actors on the collection, dissemination and use of data on violence against women, and provided technical assistance to the NCSW, to ensure that the survey meets international standards. DFID and the UN agencies will work to ensure that the indicators can be used for futures national surveys.

The project started in 2015, and a provincial-level survey was first rolled out in Punjab in late 2017, to set a baseline for generating key indicators on women’s social and economic well-being, including the impacts of violence against women and girls. The project also developed the capacity of the Punjab Commission on the Status of Women Gender Management Information System and Helpline, two key initiatives for data monitoring, protection and advocacy for women facing violence.

The project is set to eventually expand to other provinces and scale up to the national level.