Promises we made to women and girls

The year 2025 represents a critical moment in time for women and girls worldwide. It marks the thirtieth anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, the twenty-fifth anniversary of United Nations Security Council resolution 1325 on women, peace and security, and the eightieth anniversary of the United Nations. The “Gender snapshot 2025” exhibits the distressing truth: if current trends continue, the world will reach 2030 with 351 million women and girls still living in extreme poverty.

Produced annually by UN Women and UN DESA, the “Gender snapshot” is the world’s leading source of data on gender equality and the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda.

Let us zoom in on the current status of each goal from the report.

Globally, 9.2 per cent of women and girls live in extreme poverty (376 million), compared to 8.6 per cent of men and boys (355 million). At the current pace of progress, 351 million (8.2%) women could still live on less than $2.15 a day by 2030, 61 million of which will reside in Central and South Asia.

Food insecurity is a gendered issue. Globally, 822.3 million women (26.1 per cent) experience moderate or severe food insecurity compared to 758.8 million men (24.2 per cent), a gender gap that increased to 1.9 percentage points in 2024 compared to 1.3 in 2023.

While the world has made significant strides on women’s right to health, women still spend more years in poor health than men (10.9 compared to 8.0 in 2021). In addition, women comprise 67 per cent of the global health workforce but face a 24 per cent gender pay gap.

Globally, girls have surpassed boys in school enrolment and completion rates. However, gender gaps in completing secondary schooling remain in some parts of the world, including South Asia. Inequalities extend to adult learning as well as leadership in educational institutions, with women being more likely to be secondary school teachers than principals in 65 out of 70 countries.

Despite progress on goal 5, the goal dedicated to gender equality, achieving gender equality remains off track. No indicator or sub indicator has reached “target met or almost met” and only 1 is “close to target”. Substantial challenges remain globally related to legal reform, gender-based violence, child marriage, gendered division of unpaid domestic and care work, women’s political participation, and sexual and reproductive health and rights. In addition, data scarcity remains an issue to track progress, particularly on intersecting forms of vulnerability and discrimination.

Gaps in water, sanitation and hygiene services disproportionately impact the most vulnerable women and girls, such as those from Indigenous communities. Globally, 26 per cent of women and girls lack access to safe drinking water and 42 per cent lack access to safely managed sanitation.

Women remain an underutilized force in the energy sector, both as consumers as well as entrepreneurs, skilled workers and decision makers. They account for just 32 per cent of those employed in renewable energy and 5 per cent of utility board members.

After remaining stagnant for more than two decades, labour participation among women aged 25–54 has increased globally from 62.8 per cent in 2015 to 64.5 per cent in 2024. In addition, the gender gap narrowed from 29.9 to 27.8 percentage points. However, significant barriers to women’s equality in the labour market remain, including pay gaps, limited opportunities for leadership, occupational segregation and unequal caregiving responsibilities.

While digital technology is rapidly transforming economies and societies, persistent barriers limit women and girls’ prospects to gain from emerging technologies. Globally, 70 per cent of men use the internet compared to 65 per cent of women. However, investing in access to technology and digital skills is a smart move, as closing the gender digital divide could contribute some $1.5 trillion to the global economy by 2030.

Progress across the SDGs is uneven, with certain groups facing multiple and intersecting forms of discrimination. Women and girls experience a double burden, confronting both gender- and disability-based discrimination. For example, women with disabilities are less than half as likely to use the internet than women overall (26 per cent and 65 per cent, respectively). In addition, their participation in local deliberative bodies is not prioritized, with merely 1 per cent of countries having quotas for women with disabilities in local government.

An estimated 70 per cent of the world’s population will live in urban areas by 2050. This increases the need to ensure equitable and safe access to the city for all residents. However, only 38.2 per cent of the urban population in Central and South Asia currently has convenient access to open public spaces. This disproportionately affects women who generally shoulder greater responsibility for child and elder care and thus spend more time in local neighbourhoods.

Of the 61.8 million people employed in the primary fisheries and aquaculture sector in 2022, 24 per cent were women, rising to about 62 per cent of those employed in the processing subsector. Despite this significant share, women constitute disproportionate shares of those in informal work, with the lowest pay and least stability, and in jobs requiring fewer skills. In addition, only 14 per cent of aquaculture and fisheries production managers are women.

There are more active conflicts in the world than at any point in recent history, and around 676 million women lived within 50 kilometres of a deadly conflict in 2024. Among females killed, 7 in 10 lost their lives in Gaza alone. Conflicts exacerbate gender-based violence, particularly for women and girls. Sexual violence in conflict zones rose by 25 per cent in 2024 compared to the precious year, with women and girls making up 92 per cent of victims.

Gender data and statistics are critical in shaping accelerated action to achieve gender equality. However, recent funding cuts are putting the quality and availability of data at risk. A survey of national statistics offices confirmed that close to 7 in 10 have seen reduced international or domestic funding for statistics since January 2025 (68.3 per cent).

The Beijing+30 Action Agenda is a bold, forward-looking framework and sets out six priority actions to accelerate progress on both the Platform and the SDGs:  A digital revolution; Freedom from poverty; Zero violence; Full and equal decision-making power: Peace and security and Climate justice.

The future is not fixed, but it is being written. And what leaders choose to do now will define what gender equality looks like, not only in 2030, but for generations to come. Last week 106 governments including Bangladesh have stepped forward with 191 priority actions, identifying where they will invest, what barriers they will dismantle, and how they will accelerate progress between now and 2030. This act of showing up, affirms a powerful truth: gender equality remains a unifying force. And multilateralism is still delivering.

In a moment shaped by both resistance and resolve, this year’s Gender Snapshot affirms a simple truth: gender equality is foundational to peace, justice, development, and human rights.

* Gitanjali Singh is the UN Women Representative in Bangladesh.