CWU Holds Training Session on GBV Data Collection

Wang Lian speaks at the opening ceremony on November 2. [China Women's University]

A training session was held at China Women's University (CWU) in Beijing on November 1-2 to underline the methods used to collect data concerning gender-based violence (GBV).

The two-day training event was jointly sponsored by the UN Population Fund (UNFPA), UN Women and the CWU, and co-organized by the Department of Women's Studies, the UNESCO Joint Chair on Media and Gender, and the Research Center of Family-related Disciplines at the Beijing-based University.

CWU vice-president Wang Lian; Wen Hua, a researcher of the gender-related program in the UNFPA's office in China; and Yang Ruikan, a program coordinator of UN Women, attended the opening ceremony.

Speaking at the opening ceremony, Wang called on trainees to learn more about international methods in connection with GBV data and explore effective measures to conduct relevant work whilst taking China's anti-family violence law and special environment into account.

Dr. Henriette Jansen, a technical advisor of violence against women (VAW) in the UNFPA Regional Office of Asia and the Pacific, talked with attendees about the similarities and differences amongst VAW, GBV, domestic violence, and violence inflicted by intimate partners from the perspective of the UN, explained their forms when taking place in various cultural contexts, and made an introduction of the advantages and disadvantages of the collection of VAW data by police, courts and hospitals.

She stressed the importance of training in the study of different types of VAW, the positive impact brought by measuring the prevalence and frequency of different forms of violence and the collection of relevant data for women, the consideration of ethics and risks, and the utility and analysis of these figures.

Sara Duerte Valero, a statistics expert in the UN Women's Regional Office of Asia and the Pacific, spoke about how to use gender-disaggregated indicators to measure the progress of the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

She revealed that roughly one fourth of all the targets set in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development are closely related to gender equality and that the quality of collected gender-disaggregated figures is still not high.

Jiang Yongping, a researcher from the Women's Studies Institute of China, shared with participants about the history and development of GBV data in China and hoped that more concrete efforts would be taken to uncover inflictors.

Li Shenrui, an officer from UNICEF's office in China, briefed attendees about their study of violence against children.

In addition, Sun Xiaomei, director of the CWU Research Center of Family-related Disciplines, and Wang Xiangmei, a teacher from the Department of Women's Studies at the university, also delivered speeches.

Speaking at the closing ceremony, Wei Kaiqiong, director of the CWU Department of Women's Studies, noted that the collection of GBV data should take women's different difficulties and conditions into consideration.

She urged participants to pay close attention to work around GBV data, share their research results with each other, and work together to improve relevant mechanisms.

Those in attendance at the training session included over 100 professionals, researchers and grassroots workers from Peking University, Renmin University of China, Beijing Normal University, Communication University of China, China University of Political Science and Law, the Chinese Center For Disease Control And Prevention, the All-China Women's Federation, Beijing Women's Federation, Beijing Bureau of Statistics, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, the China Population and Development Research Center, the China Institute of Applied Jurisprudence, China Women's News, and social organizations.

Dr. Henriette Jansen gives a speech. [China Women's University]

Sara Duerte Valero in the training session [China Women's University]

Jiang Yongping in the training session [China Women's University]

A speaker in the training session [China Women's University]

A speaker in the training session [China Women's University]

A group photo of attendees at the training session [China Women's University]

(Source: China Women's University / Translated and edited by Women of China)