UN System-Wide Action Plan on Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (SWAP)

In 2006, the UN System Chief Executives Board for Coordination (CEB) endorsed the UN System-Wide Policy on Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women, as a means of furthering the goal of gender equality and women’s empowerment within the policies and programmes of the UN system, and implementing the ECOSOC agreed conclusions 1997/2. 

To operationalize the Board’s policy, a United Nations system-wide Action Plan on Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (SWAP) was developed to promote a common understanding, enhance system-wide coherence, and advance a progressive approach to gender mainstreaming. It was prepared on the basis of an extensive inter-agency consultation process under the leadership of the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women). 

At its  first regular session 2012, CEB endorsed the action plan paving the way for its implementation throughout the United Nations system. The action plan, which includes a set of 15 common system-wide performance indicators, constitutes a comprehensive framework for reporting and accountability that is expected to markedly advance gender equality and the empowerment of women by systematically mainstreaming a gender perspective into the policies and programmes of the United Nations system. 
  
Upon expiry of the initial UN-SWAP duration (2012 to 2017), a second generation of the UN-SWAP was developed with widespread consultation across UN system entities and launched in 2018. It updated and expanded UN-SWAP 1.0, building in refinements and lessons learned, as well as aligning it with the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, with its focus on results. 

Additional information can be found on the Gender Equality topic page.