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Eliminating harmful practices against women and girls
At least one in three women on the planet has suffered physical or sexual violence, usually at the hands of a family member or intimate partner.
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At least one in three women on the planet has suffered physical or sexual violence, usually at the hands of a family member or intimate partner. (Shutterstock/-)
T
he numbers are shocking: at least one in three women on the planet has suffered physical or sexual violence, usually at the hands of a family member or intimate partner. More than 700 million women alive today were married as children. Up to 250 million women and girls have undergone female genital mutilation.
Although violence against women and girls is widely recognized as a global pandemic, the response has ranged from indifferent to sporadic to inadequate, with weak enforcement of laws, the continued impunity of perpetrators and limited resources to address the issue.
But less than a year ago, something significant emerged: the Spotlight Initiative, an unprecedented, multi-year partnership between the European Union and the United Nations, with 500 million euros (US$ 588.44 million) in seed funding from the EU. Comprehensive in scope, targeted in focus, it is changing how we do business across the UN system and across countries and regions.
We recognize that violence against women and girls is a complex phenomenon deeply embedded in unequal power relations between men and women, and persistent social norms, practices and behaviors that discriminate against women at home, in the workplace, and in society at large. Several factors can further heighten the risk of women and girls facing violence, such as their ethnicity, religion, age, income, immigrant status, disability and sexual orientation.
