Kazakhstan Country Gender Assessment

Kathleen McLaughlin, Raushan Nauryzbayeva

• Publisher: Asian Development Bank
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9789292613075
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Gender Studies
• Index: Social Sciences

This publication develops a strategic focus for integrating gender concerns into programs and operations of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) in Kazakhstan. This assessment reviews ADB's experiences in implementing gender mainstreaming in its portfolio in recent years. The assessment method has two main components. The first is a review of the status of gender equality and women's empowerment in the country, based on a literature review, key statistics, policy documents, and key informant interviews. The second analyzes the achievements and challenges in mainstreaming gender equality in ADB's programs and operations, and recommends the way forward to improve outcomes.

Appendix 1

Summary of Recommendations

I	Micro, Small, and Medium-sized Enterprise Development
1	Establish indicators and targets in program Development Monitoring Frameworks that ensure women’s equitable access to project benefits: Setting targets for women’s participation in the program at a higher level—possibly as a proportion of their share as SME owners (42%)—would better ensure that women are gaining equitable access to this project benefit.
2	Design SME development programs to focus on the specific needs of women entrepreneurs: Setting targets for women’s participation in projects is important. To build even more momentum, programs need to support women to reach their business goals by assessing their specific needs and designing products and services accordingly.
3	Promote gender-sensitive SME policies: ADB could also support the Government of Kazakhstan to review its current SME policies and business road map with the goal of making them gender-responsive.
II	Countercyclical Support Programs
4	Develop more targeted gender-related indicators for countercyclical support programs: ADB could ensure that countercyclical program outcomes are more geared toward reducing gender gaps. ADB could assist the government by engaging with the National Committee when setting countercyclical program objectives and indicators. Such a step could ensure that gender equality outcomes are better articulated and more effectively formulated as key indicators for national programs.
5	Improve monitoring mechanisms to track gender equality targets: To ensure that women and men have equal benefits from national programs financed through countercyclical support, all indicators on number of persons benefiting from the programs should be sex-disaggregated and reported on a regular basis. Such data need to be reviewed by ADB and government periodically to track how effective programs are in reaching women and make adjustments as needed.
6	Gender Entry Points Improving sex-disaggregated data collection and reporting. Provide technical assistance on gender analysis for social protection, and job creation programs.
III	Agriculture
7	Ensure that women are actively involved in all stages of planning and implementing irrigation infrastructure: Agriculture investments need to be directed to irrigation schemes and rehabilitation works that women as well as men have identified as priorities. Involving women and men in the design and operation of systems will build ownership and sustainability of project investments.
8	Enhance women’s decision-making in cooperatives and water-user groups: Integrating women’s membership and leadership within programs to restructure and improve cooperatives, irrigation management entities, and agribusinesses are needed to enhance women’s strategic positioning in the agriculture sector.
9	Support government to conduct gender analysis of agricultural value chains to enhance agribusiness competitiveness: ADB projects in agriculture could improve women’s participation in agricultural value chains. Accounting for gender provides a more comprehensive picture of the value chain issues and results in more insightful recommendations on the best options for investing in value chain competitiveness. Such analysis can inform the gender-specific components that need to be integrated into projects to develop agricultural value chains.
10	Strengthen rural women’s access to microfinance and business development services: New ADB projects in agriculture need to undertake detailed consultation with rural women’s groups to identify their constraints to enterprise development, and support the government to design credit and business development strategies that are tailored to the specific needs of women throughout Kazakhstan.
11	Enhance quality of work in agriculture: To ensure that financing is widely distributed and reaches rural women, projects need to modernize farm and manufacturing processes, invest in technology, equipment, and skills, and promote better conditions and facilities for all workers, with special attention to the needs of women.
12	Build capacity of rural women’s civil society organizations: ADB could increase the capacity of rural CSOs to provide services to women, increasing women’s access to information on changes in the agriculture sector, and supporting women to interpret how to respond to such changes.
13	Gender Entry Points: Build knowledge for gender analysis of agriculture policies and value chain investment. Conduct workshops or other forums to engage rural women’s organizations in agriculture policy development and feedback.
IV	Transport
14	Develop measures with the Committee of Roads to increase women’s voice in public consultations: It is important to collect sex-disaggregated information on the views expressed in public consultations, as well as conduct surveys with women on their transport needs and priorities. Equally important is tracking follow-up actions in response to women’s views. ADB could work with the Committee of Roads and other government counterparts to collect more information and analysis of women’s views on transport planning and road design. Better systematization of this information could support the Committee of Roads to enhance women’s voice in transport planning.
15	Incorporate gender components into transport investments: Consultations with CSOs working with women, interviews with women business leaders, focus group discussions, key informant interviews, and transport surveys targeting women are needed to more deeply understand how transport can best contribute to women’s access to social services and increase their participation in the economy. ADB could engage with government counterparts and other development partners in transport to design gender-specific components to integrate into investments such as the CAREC corridor. Additional investments for gender-sensitive transport design might also include public and private common transport services that are more frequently used by women.
16	Promote increased employment and training opportunities for women in transport: Increasing women’s representation in transport would provide women with more employment, particularly in rural areas. More proactive approaches beyond requiring contractors to encourage women to apply for jobs are needed. Measures could include support to technical colleges to attract women into transport engineering and project management courses, and increasing incentives for contractors to hire and create conducive working conditions for women. The Ministry of Investment could be a strong partner for ADB to work with to design more targeted programs to improve women’s representation in transport projects.
17	Develop programs to enhance women’s entrepreneurial opportunities in transport: ADB could leverage its existing partnership with DAMU and its network of women’s business development service providers, workshops, and training programs to introduce women to transport business opportunities. Ensuring that information on contract opportunities in the transport sector are circulated to women could be facilitated through Association of Business Women of Kazakhstan and other such networks. This agency and other organizations could be mobilized to more proactively seek women’s participation in road construction and post-construction businesses. Women’s economic empowerment could also be promoted by creating more explicit linkages between business development programs and the economic corridor and trade facilitation being enabled through transport investment.
18	Scale up regional responses to human trafficking and irregular migration: By facilitating the legitimate movement of goods and people, highway transport projects also increase the risk of human trafficking and irregular migration and require a scale of response in keeping with the level of risk. Kazakhstan is a leader in promoting women’s participation in the economy and would be a key champion of increased representation ...

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Tables & Figures
• Acknowledgments
• Abbreviations
• Executive Summary
• I. Introduction
• II. Background and Context
• III. Cross-Cutting Gender Issues
• IV. Mainstreaming Gender in ADB Operational Priorities
• V. Conclusion
• References
• Appendix 1: Summary of Recommendations
• Appendix 2: Agencies Participating in Key Informant Interviews
• Footnotes
• Back Cover