Gender-Responsive Budgeting in Africa

The chapter explores how African countries are striving to promote gender equality and inclusivity through their budgetary processes. It emphasises the importance of equitable access to resources and services for all genders. The study examines current initiatives and policy measures taken by African governments to integrate gender considerations into budget allocation and expenditure. It underscores the significance of addressing disparities in access to education, healthcare, and economic opportunities, particularly for women and marginalised groups. Furthermore, the chapter explores the potential future directions of gender budgeting in African economies, considering emerging challenges and opportunities. It discusses the need for sustained commitment and innovation to advance gender equality, reduce disparities, and promote inclusive economic growth. This chapter is qualitative and presents an overview of the gender budgeting response both globally and within the African continent. The sections are divided to address the issue of access to gender budgeting responses for African communities, the African government interventions and responses, and the future measures on Gender budgeting response. The chapter concludes that “gender budgeting response in African economies: access and future matter” underscores the crucial role of gender-responsive budgeting in fostering equitable development and offers insights into the evolving landscape of gender mainstreaming in African fiscal policies.

The chapter examines the budgetary responses to gender-based violence (GBV) by governments in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Global reports indicate that Sub-Saharan Africa accounts for most of the countries with high incidences of gender-based violence. Reports on the prevalence of GBV in Sub-Saharan Africa reveal high incidences of female genital mutilation in countries like Ethiopia (65.2%), Cote D’Ivoire (36.7%), intimate partner physical or sexual violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo (50.7%), Uganda (49.9%), Rwanda (41.5%), and Kenya (40.7%), and child marriage in Nigeria (43.4%), and Ethiopia (40.3%). To reduce the widening gender gap that emanates from the growing cases of gender-based violence in South Sub-Saharan Africa, the responses of the governments have focused on legislation, policies, and programmes that target the provision of healthcare, legal services, and economic empowerment of women. Although most countries in Sub-Saharan Africa have components of gender mainstreaming into their budgeting processes, the allocation to crucial areas that target victims of gender-based violence remains low, which is also observed in the high gender gap index in most countries in Sub-Saharan Africa. Hence, the chapter examines the prevalence of gender-based violence in Sub-Saharan Africa, the measures that are taken to address the problem, the budgeting responses to gender-based violence in SSA, and lessons from effective gender budgeting responses from some of the countries analysed. The chapter uses secondary data sourced from organizational databases, publications, journals, the Internet, and other secondary sources. The chapter reveals that governments’ funding of gender-based violence in most countries in SSA is low and recommends that governments at all levels in SSA should commit to funding programmes that protect the legal, social, and economic rights of women in the region.

This chapter attempts to explore the extent to which climate change vulnerabilities exacerbate gender disparities and how the application of gender-responsive budgeting tools can help mitigate such inequalities. The rationale for focusing more on these variables is based on the notion that gender analysis helps governments and organisations’ understanding of vulnerabilities and climate change implications, responses in various contexts, climate governance inequalities, and climate knowledge and social action. While studies are gradually shifting away from a linear and technocratic understanding of the nexus that exists between gender and climate change, a number of scholars in the African context are having difficulty operationalising this development. Our goal is to make a contribution to the gender-climate change conceptual debate by examining how the idea of gender-responsive budgeting, applied in the South African context, can generate additional fiscal policy lessons and insights from the ground. While the concept has been used in different ways and contexts, its potential to shrink gender-related threats emanating from climate change in the South African context has not been fully explored. Since gender-responsive budgeting encourages the provision of methods in which government or organisations’ fiscal policies and expenditures are analysed from a gender perspective, we advance the notion that it can be used to mitigate the gender-differentiated effects of climate change. In order to tackle gender disparity challenges in the area of climate change, government-led adaptation initiatives must be gendered and accompanied by sufficient financial disbursements. Using desktop research, the findings point to the fact that gender-responsive budgeting tool has great potential to mitigate the effects of climate-related vulnerabilities by responding to the priorities of men and women.

Women play important roles in the Nigerian economy. However, some of the gender development indicators have not shown significant improvement in women empowerment and gender equality. Thus, the aim of the study is to understand the political and economic factors influencing budget allocation to women-oriented programmes and projects and to investigate the impact of gender-responsive budgeting on women’s empowerment and gender equality in Nigeria. Using a descriptive and inferential statistical technique, the study examined the proportion of the total budget that is allocated to the core women-oriented agencies, analysed the trend of gender equality indicators, and examined gender-responsive budgeting and its integration into the annual national budgeting process. The findings of the study showed that gender gap is prevalent in almost every sector, and the design and implementation of GRB have not followed a pattern structure, due mainly to the lack of legal and institutional framework. The study also found that the implementation of GRB has only been done through annual budget allocation to the Ministry of Women Affairs and some selected women-oriented programmes. Thus, the absence of a comprehensive budgeting framework has limited progress in the adoption and implementation of GRB, thereby undermining the attainment of the gender equality targets in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

The rigor and physical exertion needed in the maritime sector makes the maritime job description to be compatible with the male gender. This is why, over the years, the maritime sector has been male-dominated, hence increasing the gender lacuna. However, there is a change in the demographics, as women are now engaged in various aspects of the maritime domain. Women are indefatigable. Nevertheless, inequality still persists as there is a dearth in the skillset needed for women to perform excellently and professionally in the maritime space. This gap in capacity building can be closed effectively if the budget is more responsive and aligned to capacity building for women. This research is a comparison study that examines the process and procedure of gender-responsive budgeting in selected developing African coastal nations such as South Africa and Namibia and developed European coastal nations like Finland and Lithuania. The Gender budgeting, process that is geared with a view to reduce the gender disparity in capacity building in the maritime sector is quite pivotal to building nations. This research recommends that nations that have not adopted gender-responsive budgeting should align themselves by including gender budgeting in their legislation. Furthermore, the benefit of gender-responsive budgeting can be spread over the African nations if African Union makes it mandatory like their European Union counterpart.

Gender balance in resource allocation is an important attribute that is needed for effective national planning and development. Any budget that takes into account the peculiarity of both males and females in the society and ensures equal opportunities for all in the achievement of the objectives of the budget is referred to as a gender-responsive budget. Gender-responsive budgeting is essential not only for gender equity and fairness but also for economic and financial equity in the context of national resource allocation. In Africa, especially in Nigeria, the role of women in economic development is undervalued. Women constitute about 50% agricultural workforce and offer over 70% of the contribution to food supply, yet their contributions are hardly recognized in the budget as reflected in the way the annual budgets at both state and federal levels are designed. There is no appropriate justification in the way women benefit from public sector expenditure and equality of access to national resources especially in rural areas in the budget is not accounted for. For instance, an analysis of the 2022 Nigerian Federal Government budget proposal by the National Institute for Legislative and Democratic Studies (NILDS) shows that the share of gender-specific projects examined by Ministries as a percentage of the overall Federal Government of Nigeria (FGN) total budget is just 0.11%, and percentage of gender-related capital budget in overall 2022 capital budget is 0.36%. Although the Nigerian president in his 2022 budget speech emphasized the need for the Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) to design a gender-responsive budget to facilitate the distribution of resources fairly and equitably to vulnerable people in the society, there is no adequate provision for a budget with gender impact in equal employment opportunity, specific target expenditure for men and women and gender mainstreaming of budget in 2022. This calls for critical stakeholders’ engagement such as the legislators in the budget cycle so as to ensure gender-responsive budgeting in Nigeria. The objective of this chapter is to discuss the role of legislature in ensuring a gender-responsive budget in their law making, oversight, and representation functions.

The fact that women have less retirement savings than men is rooted in a plethora of factors that need to be examined, central of which is the unequal gender pay inherent within the labor sector wherein women earn less than their male counterparts. Gender pay gap has been the focus of research on inequality in remuneration, and the adverse effects it has on economic empowerment and gender equality at large. In addition to this is the effect it has on retirement savings and the likelihood of women having pension fund to sustain them. There appears to be a relationship between gender pay gap and pension inequality between men and women. Hence, this chapter examines how gender pay gap affects women’s retirement savings in South Africa in order to understand the relationship that exists. Using a qualitative methodology and literature analysis, it argues that the pay gap between men and women permeates into retirement savings such that women are less likely to have sufficient pension fund, further consolidating the poverty of savings and widening the economic gap between men and women. It recommends that there is a need for the design of a pension fund targeted at women to enable them to make informed choices on retirement savings. It adds that for pension inequality to be addressed, gender pay gap must be mitigated to ensure income equality between men and women.

There is a large disparity in financial inclusiveness for those people living in northern Nigeria in contrast to those living in southern Nigeria. According to a 2019 report by the Central Bank of Nigeria and Enhancing Financial Innovation and Access (EFInA), Nigeria has more people living in extreme poverty than any other country in the world. Access to education and lower levels of income all contribute to the lack of financial inclusion for both men and women in the North, but particularly for women. These gender barriers have acted as an enabler for the recruitment of women into the Boko Haram insurgency. Much of the academic and grey literature on Boko Haram’s gender politics tends to focus on the lived experiences of women before, during, and after their association with the group. In response, this chapter, by means of a qualitative exploratory analysis, attempts to illustrate how Boko Haram exploits the financial exclusion of women for its benefit. Attention is given not only to the socio-economic barriers associated with northern Nigeria but also to the limitations of the deradicalization and reintegration programmes designed to counter the insurgency. Findings suggest that ensuring effective financial inclusion of women is more likely to occur if Nigeria links Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs 5 [Gender Equality] and 10 [Reduced Inequalities]) to its counterterrorism approach. To this end, recommendations are proposed, which include a series of action items for the Nigerian government and its partners. Central to this plan of action is a coordinated response which impedes Boko Haram from exploiting the ongoing financial exclusion of women in northern Nigeria.

The participation of women in peacebuilding is often low due to several reasons ranging from societal norms, gender inequality, and underreporting of women’s work. The sphere of peacebuilding does not recognize women as active participants due to the narrative that women are not actively participating in fostering peace. However, studies have been written to counter this narrative to demonstrate that women are participating just that their work is not recognized in mainstream peacebuilding. This is often a consequence of their peace activities being mainly in the informal space, which leads to non-recognition/erasure. Apart from the above factors that perpetuate the underrepresentation of women in peacebuilding, the lack of gender-responsive financing in peacebuilding is also an issue. Most women organizations that engage in peace work do not get the funding to support their work. Thus, this chapter intends to explore how gender budgeting can be used to mainstream women in peacebuilding. By asking how gender budgeting can help mainstream women in peacebuilding, this research moves away from cause to proffering solutions. Using a qualitative methodology, this chapter argues that the intersection of gender-responsive budgeting and peacebuilding will yield better results in increasing women’s participation in peacebuilding. This is to contribute to studies on women in peace and security as well as the role of gender budgeting in increasing women’s representation in different spheres.

Women perform critical roles as a catalyst of economic development globally. In Africa, they supply 60–80% of the agricultural labour force, engage in several entrepreneurial activities, and are fast emerging as the sole breadwinners. Despite their laudable contributions, several gendered norms and stereotypes impede women’s economic empowerment, financial inclusion, and the ownership of resources required for establishing and financing small- and medium-scale enterprises (SMEs). Scholars and the government have long identified microfinance banks as a significant pivot for engendering women’s economic empowerment and financial inclusion. The study interrogates women’s motivations for obtaining microcredits from microfinance banks to fund SMEs. It probes their lived experience to ascertain if microcredits foster women’s economic empowerment and financial inclusion. The study established that although microcredit banks make microcredit readily available and accessible, high interest rates often negatively impact women’s ability to repay microcredits. Also, dehumanising loan recovery strategies undermine debtors’ social and emotional well-being and militates against women’s economic empowerment and financial inclusion.

South Arica and Kenya have some of the highest levels of financial inclusion among women in Africa. While South Africa has primarily relaxed constrictions in its traditional banking system to advance financial inclusion, Kenya has leveraged novel digital channels to offer a range of financial services to the unbanked and underbanked. While literature abounds with positive accounts of financial inclusion of women, there exist peculiarities in the way that financial service providers extend their services and in the way that women experience financial services. This chapter thus moves away from the broad-brush approaches in the literature by highlighting nuances in the financial inclusion experience of women in the two countries. Zooming into the financial inclusion strategies employed in South Africa and Kenya, we make the case that their strength is also their Achilles heel. Powerful incumbent banks, popular as the “Big Four,” aided by a rigid regulatory regime beset the financial inclusion of women in South Africa. Similarly, while financial innovation undeniably narrowed the financial inclusion gender gap, “one-size-fits-all” digital products in Kenya have done little to close the gender gap as evidenced by peculiarities in the uptake and usage of the products. We argue that these drawbacks ultimately threaten the ability of digital financial inclusion in bringing financial health to women users.

The conflict in South Sudan has exacerbated women’s economic marginalization, although policies exist to support their economic empowerment. For example, due to the war in South Sudan, women may have less access to finances, goods, and training to protect themselves. Furthermore, recent research indicates that South Sudan ranks number one in corruption globally, which is likely to have a dire impact on women’s economic empowerment and gender budgeting. In addition, scholars have debated that women’s rights are far from being recognized in South Sudan despite its efforts to include women’s rights in the transitional constitution after it attained independence from Sudan in 2011. Hence, the Government of South Sudan needs to draw attention to the gendered impact of economic policies.

This chapter used an exploratory qualitative research approach to explore the implementation of gender budgeting in South Sudan regarding women’s empowerment and emancipation. The findings suggest that women’s political-economic empowerment in South Sudan has been considered through the participation of women in the peace process although with no consideration of gender budgeting specifically for women in peace processes and decision-making. However, through effective gender budgeting, economic empowerment remains weak despite the national, regional, and local policies supporting the initiative. The study recommends that the Government of South Sudan prioritize women’s economic rights through adequate data collection on the financial status of women and ensuring gender budgeting implementation. The chapter concludes that the South Sudan Government still has opportunities to advance women’s economic rights if there is political will and commitment to do so.