Highlights and shadows of the Seville summit: "A men's conference with results primarily for men"

“We continue to underinvest in half of the world's population.” The phrase was heard frequently this week at the Seville summit. More than $420 billion (€356 billion) is needed each year to achieve gender equality in countries of the Global South alone, according to UN data . The funding crisis to close this gap is “unprecedented,” and if it is not reversed, the world will “fail” to achieve all the development goals it committed to by 2030.

“Women and girls continue to be disproportionately affected by poverty, unpaid care, gender-based violence, and exclusion from decision-making,” lamented Nyaradzayi Gumbonzvanda, Deputy Executive Director of UN Women , in Seville. “These disparities are not accidental. They reflect tax and financial systems that systematically ignore all rights,” she added.

The Seville Commitment, the final document of this summit, commits to "incorporating a gender perspective and promoting gender-sensitive solutions throughout the development financing agenda." "An achievement given the circumstances," said María Fernanda Espinosa, former president of the United Nations General Assembly and former Ecuadorian minister, currently executive director of Global Women Leaders Voices .

Women and girls continue to be disproportionately affected by poverty, unpaid care, gender-based violence, and exclusion from decision-making.

Nyaradzayi Gumbonzvanda, UN Women

"The document speaks of increasing women's participation and representation in international financial organizations. It also recognizes the feminization of poverty and mentions women in the debt restructuring chapters. It's powerful material for moving forward," she added.

The UN summit in Seville was also marked by the notable absence of the United States, and one of the issues that led Washington to withdraw from the negotiating table was gender, along with debt and climate change financing.

For Noemí Espinoza, secretary general of the Association of Caribbean States (ACS), Seville saw "a qualitative leap," but now the "implementation mechanisms" are lacking. "We need to see how we're going to translate all of this and whether there's enough money to truly transform things," she explained.

Money and power, several leaders emphasized. One example speaks volumes: of the 54 international organizations GWL Voices monitors , 19 have never been led by a woman, and 17 have been led only once. "There has never been a female UN secretary-general," the GWL Voices representatives pointed out.

"The financial world is dominated by men, in the North and the South. This was a conference for men, with results predominantly for men," said Aminata Touré, former Senegalese prime minister and member of the Club of Madrid.

Before it's too late

Gumbonzvanda recalled that when gender-responsive budgeting was called for following the previous Financing for Development Summit held in Addis Ababa in 2015, few countries comprehensively tracked spending on gender equality, and essential programs still depend on the goodwill of private donors or chronically underfunded women's ministries. "Immediate action must be taken before it is too late," she insisted.

For this reason, Spain and UN Women presented a gender-sensitive financing initiative in Seville, already supported by more than 15 governments and more than 20 international organizations and civil society partners, aiming to add billions of dollars to global GDP.

Because "commitments are not enough," stressed Antón Leis, director of the Spanish Agency for International Cooperation (AECID), calling for "an examination of power structures and a genuine democratization of development, to ensure that 50% of humanity has the opportunity to contribute to it."

The initiative is a roadmap with clear and measurable actions: governments must institutionalize gender-responsive budgeting across all ministries; the private sector must increase gender-responsive investment; international financial institutions and development banks must mainstream gender equality into all their operations; and civil society organizations must strengthen accountability mechanisms to track gender-responsive spending.

“By prioritizing funding for gender equality, we can correct historical injustices, unleash the potential of half the world's population, and accelerate progress toward the development goals. The cost of inaction is catastrophic,” Gumbonzvanda insisted.

Paid care

An estimated 10% of official development aid directly benefits women. Investing in them, beyond an act of justice, is smart and generates benefits. A clear example is caregiving. "Every dollar invested in care infrastructure creates more and better jobs, while increasing women's participation in the workforce," stressed the head of UN Women. This is especially true at a time when the volume of cooperation is set to decline due to cuts by the United States and European countries.

Arlene Tickner, Colombia's ambassador-at-large for gender issues and feminist foreign policy, recalled, for example, that her country was heavily dependent on USAID, and the dismantling of the U.S. aid agency has had repercussions for women's associations working with vulnerable communities. "Many have had to lay off people and cannot continue training women in key areas for peacebuilding in Colombia," she said.

Come to an African country and tell them that women should be paid because they take care of the family. They'll look at you like you're crazy. Society is designed this way. Why would the state invest in relieving women of this burden?

Aminata Touré, former Prime Minister of Senegal

Cristina Gallach, a Spanish journalist and former Secretary of State who has also held senior positions in the EU, NATO, and the United Nations, emphasizes that another urgent issue after Seville is climate finance. “The disproportionate impact of climate change on women is brutal. For example, 60% of climate disasters in Latin America directly affect women,” recalls Gallach, who is also part of GWL Voices.

"We need a new climate finance system that incorporates gender considerations into every decision about how and where finance is allocated, tracked, and delivered. This is the path to climate and gender justice," economist Natalia Flores Garrido urged at one of the meetings in Seville.

Another of the most debated issues in Seville was unpaid care work. A report by the NGO Oxfam estimates that three-quarters of this care work falls on women, and if these hours were paid, they would boost the economy by more than €10 billion each year.

“Come to an African country and say women should be paid for taking care of the family. They'll look at you as if you're crazy. Society is designed this way. Why would the state invest to free women from this burden?” Touré wondered. He concluded, “We're swimming against the tide. We need progressive men at our side to support these types of policies and, above all, to ensure that the benefits, if they come, accrue to women. Because you know what's most precious to a woman? Time. And professionalizing care can make a huge difference.”