Currently, India ranks 129th out of 146 countries in the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap 2024 Index, which tracks gender parity across four key dimensions including economic participation and opportunity. To address women’s economic empowerment and gender equality in India, we worked with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) to host the first-ever “Gender Equity Evidence Conclave” in New Delhi. The event, which occurred in July, announced key findings from a comprehensive gender scoping study conducted in partnership with Oxford Policy Management.
The study assessed the landscape of women’s economic empowerment and gender equality in India, focusing on access to resources, power dynamics, and the broader enabling environment. Gender experts from government, multilateral organizations, bilateral donors, the private sector, academia, and philanthropies across India were in attendance. They actively participated in four thematic roundtables on women’s economic programs and policies and also directly accessed and engaged with reference data on visualizations and maps at the event.
“The United States is pursuing a comprehensive plan to address gender-related inequalities and promote women’s entrepreneurship and economic empowerment, in the U.S., India, and around the world,” stated U.S. Chargé d’Affaires Patricia A. Lacina at the event. “Assessing evidence on the impact of programming towards gender equality is essential to drive collective action towards shared goals.”
Study results will be published in an upcoming USAID white paper.
