09/04/2024
The country holds an international seminar to learn about good practices on single registers of information from all the institutions that form part of the care and prevention route for cases of violence against women
The Ministry of Women’s Affairs of Paraguay in coordination with the National Institute of Statistics held the International Seminar on Systems for Recording Cases of Violence against Women, together with the European cooperation programme to support the implementation of the 2030 Agenda in Paraguay led by the FIIAPP.
This event is part of the process of building a unified and standardised system for the registration of violence against women in Paraguay. During the meeting, representatives from Uruguay, Paraguay, Mexico, Chile and Spain shared their experiences and knowledge on systems for recording data on women who face violence and the care they receive.
The Spanish experience in the registration of victims of gender-based violence has identified effective ways of coordinating information, management and data management, as well as the different conceptualisations of the types of violence and the need to distinguish which cases should be registered as gender-based violence. Spain ranks among the most advanced countries in gender equality, according to the European Institute for Gender Equality. In 2023, it ranked fourth, behind Sweden, the Netherlands and Denmark, thanks to its systematic approach to the implementation and monitoring of equality policies and protection of women victims of gender-based violence.
In previous meetings, Macarena Gámir Linares, Deputy Director General of Inter-institutional Coordination on Gender Violence of the Government Delegation against Gender Violence of Spain, has exchanged experiences and knowledge with the technical and management team of the National Institute of Statistics and the Ministry of Women’s Affairs of Paraguay. These meetings have laid the foundations for designing and planning an itinerary that will allow Paraguay to develop its own integrated system for registering victims of gender-based violence.
A unified registration system for victims of violence is necessary in order to:
1.To know the real magnitude and characteristics of violence against women in Paraguay and to avoid data being duplicated and/or not systematised.
2. To be able to monitor the care route for women victims of violence and to know where protection is being cut off, where it is not being sufficiently effective or what is happening with the cases reported.
3. Make public policy based on evidence.
Thanks to this, women will be more protected because it will be possible to recognise the knots in care, the institutions responsible and the response times. A unified registry also means improved inter-institutional coordination, action- and evidence-based learning, and faster response to cases of violence. Monitoring is key to the type of effective protection provided to women and their families.
In the words of Pilar del Barrio, coordinator of the European Union Cooperation Programme to Support the Implementation of the 2030 Agenda in Paraguay, “the construction of single registers of victims is a challenge in most countries in the region. Achieving interoperability between institutions and having reliable and updated data is essential to have State policies that place the care and protection of women at the centre of their actions”.
One of the challenges of the Integrated System is to achieve data interoperability in order to update the information contained in the single user files, ensuring their quality and protecting personal and/or sensitive data in order to maintain their confidentiality. These single files integrate information from the Ciudad Mujer Registration and Monitoring System (SIRM), the Ciudad Mujer Mobile Registration System and MINMUJER’s Integrated System of Users.
In addition, this system has automated processes based on web services that allow for the integration of information. In this way, it seeks to bring together sources of information from all the institutions that form part of the care route with the ultimate aim of being able to act in the prevention of cases of violence against women.
The event has encouraged the promotion, collaboration and exchange of knowledge between institutions and countries, as well as a demonstration of the commitment of Paraguay’s public institutions in the fight against violence against women.
