The Executive Board of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has approved a “gender strategy”. Clearly, the institution wants to take gender inequalities more into account in its work, it announced in a press release published on Friday.

It is a “gender strategy aimed at mainstreaming gender issues into the Fund’s core activities”, namely monitoring, capacity building and lending. This is equivalent to “evaluating in a more systematic way the macroeconomic consequences of gender gaps (…), evaluating the differentiated impact of shocks and policies,” explained the general director of the institution, Kristalina Georgieva.

Crises weigh heavily on women

In deciding on this strategic change, the IMF started from an observation: “Crises, including the pandemic and wars, weigh heavily on the lives and livelihoods of women, aggravating the effects of climate change and the fragility of the world. “.

But “gender mainstreaming at the IMF begins with the recognition that reducing gender disparities goes hand in hand with higher economic growth, greater economic stability and resilience, and lower income inequality,” Kristalina Georgieva writes.

“Successful implementation of this strategy will help our member countries achieve more inclusive and equitable economic growth and resilience. When women do well, countries do well”, the Director General also stressed. The latter is intended, in particular, to give IMF staff access to “relevant data disaggregated by sex”.