Measuring how water-related policies of the global South consider gender: Insights from trialling a new policy gender index in Nepal

This paper supports policymakers consider how well their water-related policies respond to gender roles, norms and relations. By braiding the latest philosophies on gender mainstreaming with Integrated Water Resources Management and Feminist Policy Analysis principles, we describe a Multi-Dimensional Index of Gender in Water Policy (MDI-GWP) to measure how gender is captured in water-related policy. The indexing enables the motivated policy actor to produce well-crafted and feasible recommendations to reform policies. When we trialled MDI-GWP on 16 of Nepal’s federal water-related policies and acts, the multi-dimensional index tracked gender policy developments over the past 30 years, identified areas where policymakers could further consider gender, and revealed differences in gender application between sectors. We included water resources management (WRM), agriculture, and water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) sectors. In Nepal’s case, agriculture and WASH policies are on an improving trajectory for gender equity, while WRM policy has rebounded to the gender blind. We expect that MDI-GWP is simple enough to apply in other countries, yet meaningful enough to identify opportunities to improve gender in policies and achieve better outcomes. Highlights The essential role that women play in society needs to be embedded in policy Policymakers need tools to assist them in considering gender when preparing policies We provide a simple multi-dimensional index to measure gender capture in policies The index was successfully trialled on 16 of Nepal’s federal water-related policies Nepal’s federal water policies do not reflect its commitment to gender equity