Statement by H.E. Anna Johannsdottir
Permanent Representative of Iceland to the United Nations
UNICEF Executive Board, First Regular Session 
Agenda item 11: Evaluation of the UNICEF Gender Policy and Gender Action Plans, and management response
5 February 2025

 



Mr/Madam President, 

I make this statement on behalf of Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden and my own country, Iceland.

Let me begin by expressing our appreciation for UNICEF’s commitment to gender equality. We are pleased to see that UNICEF is making significant strides in gender equality driven by the third Gender Action Plan and the Gender Policy.

The Nordics strongly support UNICEF’s important work on gender issues and protecting and promoting the rights of adolescent girls, particularly in areas such as education, social protection, health and nutrition.

We commend UNICEF for being one of the leading performers within the United Nations system in implementing institutional enablers for gender equality and consistently ranking among the highest-scoring agencies in the UN-SWAP. We appreciate UNICEF’s steady progress in this area throughout the evaluation period.

The evaluation findings highlight important elements to consider in the next Gender Action Plan such as reinforcing accountability for gender across all levels of the organization, deepening programming and partnerships and enhancing expenditures for gender-related outcomes. We agree with the evaluation that alignment should be ensured between the next Gender Action Plan and all policy frameworks across Goal Areas and in the humanitarian sector. 

In this regard, we would like to encourage UNICEF to deepen its focus on adolescent girls, strengthen gender integration in humanitarian response programming, and continue to integrate gender-transformative approaches into its work. 

We note that fewer than half of UNICEF’s country offices have a contextualized Gender Action Plan, and those that exist are not always aligned with sectoral Goal Area strategies. We encourage UNICEF to strengthen this element in the upcoming work of the fourth Gender Action Plan. 

We also note that while the Gender Action Plan is designed to support the operationalization of the Gender Policy, it does not establish sufficient accountabilities and implementation procedures to ensure that it is consistently operationalized.

Can you provide us with more details on UNICEF’s initiatives to address this?

The Nordic countries welcome the increased engagement and partnership between UNICEF and women’s and girl’s organizations. We encourage UNICEF to continue to expand and strengthen these relationships in the field.

We welcome that UNICEF has become a better workplace for women, thanks to efforts addressing gender imbalances. However, we also note that the evaluation highlights that there is still room for improvement.

Can you share some thoughts on what the main challenges have been in this regard and what lessons can be drawn from them?

Lastly, we would like to emphasize that UNICEF plays an important role in progressing gender equality as one of the largest UN agencies. Moreover, a continued focus on gender equality and empowerment of girls is also essential to UNICEF’s success in working for the attainment of children’s rights, and this should be fully reflected in the next Strategic Plan.

Let me conclude by reiterating our full support to UNICEF’s important work in this field. We appreciate the level of ambition and encourage UNICEF to continue to push for progress on this front.