Joint report: Cooperation activity on gender-disaggregated data under the Canada-Chile 2024-2025 Trade and Gender workplan and the Memorandum of Understanding to advance gender equality

On November 27, 2024, Canada and Chile held a knowledge-exchange session on the collection and use of sex and gender disaggregated data for the development of gender inclusive policies and programs. This served to advance the cooperation under the Trade and Gender Chapter in the modernized Canada-Chile Free Trade Agreement (CCFTA), specifically its 2024-2025 work plan as well as the commitments under the Canada and Chile Memorandum of Understanding to advance gender equality. This session held via videoconference included participants from Canada, namely Women and Gender Equality Canada, Statistics Canada and Global Affairs Canada and from Chile's National Institute of Statistics, Ministry of Women and Gender Equity and Undersecretariat for International Economic Relations.

Presentations by Canada

Statistics Canada offered an overview of the Gender-based Analysis Plus (GBA Plus) framework and its intersectional approach, which has been instrumental in mitigating barriers and ensuring that public programs benefit diverse populations. Since the establishment in 2011 of the mandate for federal agencies to promote GBA Plus, Canada has advanced its efforts to disaggregate data on sex and gender, particularly through the launch of the Data Disaggregation Action Plan (DDAP). The DDAP supports the modernization of data practices and aims to capture a broader range of gender-related experiences. The Center for Gender, Diversity, and Inclusion Statistics hub, a concrete outcome of the DDAP, exemplifies Canada’s commitment to data-driven gender equality initiatives. Statistics Canada also outlined the importance of ensuring data accessibility and readability to better empower gender-disaggregated data users through mitigation strategies such as creating and improving data visualization tools as well as developing tailored training.

Global Affairs Canada's Chief Economist’s Office explored the use of data on women business owners, workers and consumers to inform inclusive trade policies and strengthen the role of women in international trade. The presentation highlighted the mechanisms supporting this objective, such as the analysis of trade trends through data from Statistics Canada and using the computable general equilibrium (CGE) model for ex-ante analysis of FTAs. As an example, the application of these mechanisms on the Canada-US-Mexico FTA (CUSMA) revealed that women in the sales sector and men in the machinery sector were shielded from some of the trade impacts of CUSMA.

Presentations by Chile

Chile’s first presentation by the Gender Statistics Commission (available in Spanish only) focused on the country’s efforts to develop gender-disaggregated data to inform public policy, especially in the context of preventing gender-based violence. The Commission, founded in 2014, brings together 28 national member institutions and aims to technically guide, systematize and promote the production, analysis of gender statistics for public policies design. The Commission monitors the progress, barriers and gaps in achieving gender equality through the collection of administrative data and data from surveys as well as the development and analysis of 83 indicators such as income, unpaid work, labor market participation, and social inclusion.

Chile's Undersecretariat of International Economic Relations presented its initiative" Radiography of women exporters," aimed at producing annual reports that highlight the realities of women in export businesses using data. Launched in 2017, this report is carried out in collaboration with organizations such as ProChile, Customs, and the Internal Revenue Service. The goal is to gather information on the number of women exporters, the types of products they export, their target markets, and the number of domestic jobs created by these exports. This initiative’s expansion from three to ten strategic alliances allowed Chile to achieve nearly complete coverage of exporting companies and provide valuable insights into the role of women in international trade. Additional positive outcomes of the initiative include increased visibility of gender gaps, enhanced methodologies for collecting gender-disaggregated data, and improved collaboration among Chilean government agencies.

Conclusion

The session concluded with a Q&A segment and emphasized the critical role of gender-disaggregated data in shaping evidence-based effective and inclusive policies. The exchange between Canada and Chile demonstrated the like-mindedness and commitment for both countries to continue to leverage data to achieve gender equality.