Five Key Elements for a Gender Lens in Trade

The author argues that for the WTO's efforts on trade and gender to be effective, members must adopt a comprehensive 'gender lens' that distinguishes between economic empowerment and broader gender equality. The proposed framework includes identifying women's multiple economic roles, analyzing the bidirectional relationship between trade and gender, recognizing domains of inequality (capabilities, resources, and security), and applying this analysis across all stages of trade policy from negotiation to implementation.

• There is a conceptual hierarchy between trade-related goals: increasing women's participation in international trade is the narrowest objective, followed by women's economic empowerment, with the broadest goal being gender equality.
• A comprehensive gender lens must acknowledge that women occupy multiple overlapping economic roles—including workers, entrepreneurs, consumers, and carers—and that trade rules can impact each role differently, such as affecting the cost of living for consumers or public service availability for those relying on government revenues.
• The relationship between trade and gender is bidirectional: trade rules create gendered distributional outcomes, while existing gender inequalities can either create a 'competitive advantage' through cheaper female labour or act as barriers preventing women from benefiting from trade.
• Gender inequality in economic analysis should be categorized into three primary domains: capabilities (knowledge and health), access to resources and opportunities (economic assets and political decision making), and security (vulnerability to violence or conflict), all underpinned by social norms and 'women's time poverty'.
• To be effective, a gender lens analytical framework must be applied across four distinct stages of trade agreements: the negotiation process (including ex ante impact assessments), the final text, implementation and enforcement mechanisms, and complementary laws and programs.
• While 123 WTO members had joined a Ministerial Declaration on trade and gender equality by March 1, 2022, some members remain reluctant to discuss social issues at the WTO due to fears of import discrimination or a desire to prioritize existing multilateral negotiating agendas like agriculture.

APA

Dommen,, C. (2022). Five Key Elements for a Gender Lens in Trade. International Institute for Sustainable Development. https://www.iisd.org/articles/deep-dive/five-key-elements-gender-lens-trade

Chicago

Dommen,, Caroline. Five Key Elements for a Gender Lens in Trade. International Institute for Sustainable Development, 2022. https://www.iisd.org/articles/deep-dive/five-key-elements-gender-lens-trade.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Dommen, |first1=Caroline |title=Five Key Elements for a Gender Lens in Trade |publisher=International Institute for Sustainable Development |date=14 March 2022 |url=https://www.iisd.org/articles/deep-dive/five-key-elements-gender-lens-trade |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{dommen2022five, author = {Dommen,, Caroline}, title = {{Five Key Elements for a Gender Lens in Trade}}, institution = {International Institute for Sustainable Development}, year = {2022}, month = mar, url = {https://www.iisd.org/articles/deep-dive/five-key-elements-gender-lens-trade}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }