Giving Compass' Take:

• United Nations Foundation discusses the importance of gender data collection in order to inform better policies around the world.

• Are we elevating the impact stories around this effort? In what ways can we do better?

• For more on data collection and gender equity, check out this webinar.

In a speech on September 21 at “We The Future: Accelerating Sustainable Development Solutions,” an event organized by the Skoll Foundation, TED, and the United Nations Foundation as part of Global Goals Week, Her Majesty Queen Rania of Jordan spoke directly to women and girls around the world. “You are not invisible. You are not just a number on a spreadsheet,” she said.

How do we celebrate the promise of data when it fails to capture the experience of each person? How can we improve data so that the full lives of all people are reflected, even when we are speaking about hundreds, thousands, or millions of people?

The answer is that gender data is key for making women’s stories actionable for policymakers. The availability of accurate, timely, and disaggregated data ensures that policymakers have the information they need to design policies and programs to improve people’s lives.

Read the full article about gender data guiding policy to improve lives by Emily Courey Pryor on United Nations Foundation.