Three global trends on a collision course… with women and girls at the crossroads

UNITED NATIONS, New York – As 2024 draws to a close, the world is grappling with ever-intensifying crises. UNFPA, the United Nations sexual and reproductive health agency, has just launched a $1.4 billion humanitarian appeal to address the unique needs of women and girls trapped in, or uprooted by, this wave of emergencies. 

Yet at the same time, support for the needs of crisis-affected women and girls is under threat. Below are three global trends poised to collide in the year ahead: Without urgent and global action, the world’s most vulnerable women and girls will be caught in the crossfire of all of them.

1- Catastrophes are rising sharply, with unique impacts on women and girls.

Violent conflicts, extreme weather events, and forced displacement are reaching record levels. Across these emergency settings, women and girls face unique and often neglected challenges.

To start with, many crises are roiling in countries where women and girls already face systematic disadvantages, imperilling their mobility, agility and ability to access aid. Of the countries facing the highest levels of disaster-related internal displacement, for example, one third rank among the most gender unequal places in the world.

On top of this, in virtually all crises, women and girls face rocketing levels of gender-based violence – roughly twice the rates compared to those in non-humanitarian settings.

All of this plays a role in making crises uniquely harrowing for women and girls – who continue to have their periods, become pregnant and give birth, all while sexual and reproductive health services take a back seat in emergency responses. 

UNFPA and its partners are working to ensure these needs are met, even in the most dangerous and deprived places. In 2024, UNFPA reached 10 million people with reproductive health services across 59 crisis-affected countries, support that includes contraception, menstruation supplies, and prenatal, safe delivery and post-natal care. Protection from gender-based violence was provided to 3.6 million people.

Still, this work reached just a small portion of crisis-affected women and girls globally.

2- Global cooperation – and humanitarian funding – are under threat.

“Today, multilateralism is under attack from all sides,” United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres has warned. This trend – driven by growing mistrust and nativism – threatens the very collective action needed to address the onslaught of violence- and disaster-related catastrophes. 

One critical form of global cooperation is humanitarian funding, which has for years failed to keep pace with the proliferation of crises. And funding gaps are especially stark when it comes to the gendered needs of women and girls. Globally, the humanitarian response to gender-based violence, for example, is one of the most underfunded sectors, with just 27 per cent of the required funding for 2024 received by 24 November.

UNFPA sees this firsthand. By September 2024, UNFPA’s annual appeal for humanitarian support was only 43 per cent funded. In the 34 most underresourced crises, this funding gap stands at a staggering 75 per cent. 

Even more severe shortfalls are anticipated in the year ahead, a period when 11 million pregnant women are expected to require humanitarian aid and 92 million people are projected to require protection from, and services for, gender-based violence.

3- Support for women’s rights and reproductive rights eroding

The world faces continued pushback against women’s and girls’ rights and their sexual and reproductive health. New data released this year shows that, in 40 per cent of countries with data, women’s ability to exercise bodily autonomy is actually diminishing.

“Human reproduction is being politicized. The rights of women, girls and gender diverse people are the subject of increasing pushback,” said UNFPA Executive Director Dr. Natalia Kanem. “Yet we can, and we must, push forward.”

Despite the challenging funding environment, UNFPA is deploying thousands of midwives and medical teams to humanitarian zones. In 2024, UNFPA equipped over 3,500 health facilities to deliver life-saving care, and established more than 1,600 safe spaces for women and girls to seek refuge and empowerment programmes.

And in the year ahead, UNFPA will strengthen local and national responses – especially among women- and youth-led organizations, and to improve emergency preparedness. These measures aim to improve the resilience of at-risk communities while empowering the women and girls on the frontlines who know their needs best.

The coming year will present many challenges, but we already know how to overcome them: With solidarity. “The way forward, how we proceed and succeed, is by working together,” Dr. Kanem said.