The PARIS21 Partner Report on Support to Statistics 2022

Executive summary

Funding to data and statistics has declined by a record amount

Funding for data and statistics fell by nearly 16% in 2020, a record-breaking decline in the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) era. The COVID-19 pandemic has constrained operations of the international community, particularly development partners. But this decrease cannot be fully accounted for by pandemic-induced funding and policy shifts. Rather, it could reflect the decades-old challenges to mainstreaming data activity as well as the limited pool of donors and the low strategic priority of statistics.

The unprecedented decline in funding for data and statistics threatens the success of the SDGs

Even prior to the pandemic, funding for data and statistics amounted to just half of the funding required to produce sufficient data to meet the SDGs. Today, at the halfway point of the 2030 Agenda, fewer than half of low and lower middle-income countries are able to produce data on even a third of the SDG indicators. The further decline of data funding in 2020 will widen the funding gap and make it all the more difficult for countries to catch up, with negative consequences for evidence-based policy making at the country level. Support for SDG data cannot wait until crises are over.

Funding for gender data has decreased even more sharply, putting women and girls at particular risk of being left behind without high-quality data

Though overall funding for gender equality increased in 2020, funding for gender data dropped by more than 50% from 2019. This is inconsistent with global ambitions to support gender equality.

This worrying trend is consistent with the broader trend in gender equality, where progress has not only stalled but reversed in some cases. Without a gendered approach to data production and use, there will be a lack of insights needed to evaluate how various policies affect women and girls and then take appropriate steps to achieve gender equality.