Turkish public officials trained on gender responsive budgeting

Over the course of 2022, UN Women organized a series of technical and in-depth trainings on gender-responsive budgeting for public officials in various parts of Türkiye.

With the goal of increasing knowledge on gender mainstreaming and budgeting, the expert-level technical trainings targeted public officials working in central-level institutions. These trainings took place in Ankara and Istanbul, with 12 sessions attended by 332 public officials from 17 ministries and 18 central-level public institutions.

Meanwhile, the in-depth trainings included five sessions aimed at enhancing knowledge on gender-responsive budgeting and related analysis for 124 public officials from 11 ministries and 13 public institutions who had attended the previous expert-level technical trainings.  

Participants gained a deeper understanding of gender mainstreaming and gender-responsive budgeting concepts, practices and tools to apply within public budget systems across Türkiye. The technical and in-depth trainings also created a vital space for dialogue between experts from different ministries to discuss and make recommendations on gender-responsive budgeting programmes, policies and indicators for different sectors.

According to the preliminary results of tests applied before the trainings, 84 per cent of participants had never participated in any gender-responsive budgeting training before.

Emphasizing the effectiveness and importance of technical and in-depth trainings, UN Women Project Manager Mustafa Çadır said: “Our trainings were attended by a high number of public officials with strong work experience and technical knowledge who greatly benefited. These officials represent a wide range of organizations in Türkiye covering a rich number of sectors and topics. Based on their positive feedback, there is a very high possibility for gender-responsive budgeting approaches to be integrated into their budgeting practices and this is what we aimed to achieve.”

As one example, gender-responsive budgeting was integrated in the Local Authorities’ Budget Preparation Guidelines prepared by the Ministry of Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change of Türkiye, for the very first time in July 2022 after relevant public officials attended the trainings.

The training series was organized under the “Implementing Gender-Responsive Planning and Budgeting in Türkiye” project, which supports the creation of a gender-equal society where women, men, girls and boys enjoy equal rights, services and opportunities. The approach seeks to ensure that budgeting and planning processes incorporate a gender perspective at all levels and to meet the different needs and priorities of everyone in Türkiye.

These efforts are co-financed by the European Union and UN Women and implemented by UN Women in collaboration with the Ministry of Family and Social Services and the Presidency of the Republic of Türkiye’s Presidency of Strategy and Budget.