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Good practice Imported

Macao's Women's Development Goals Plan

Macao · Macao · See the Macao profile

Evidence: Descriptive / self-reported Top 59% 59/100 · Ask Evidence Copilot about this practice

Macao SAR ran a seven-year, 21-department Women's Development Goals plan (2019-2025), reporting all 278 planned actions completed, and has launched a follow-on 2026-2032 plan - even as a 2023 UN review found women still underrepresented in senior government and legislative posts.

278 actions
Actions completed under 2019-2025 plan (2019-2025)
21 public departments
Departments involved (2019-2025)
66 measures
New plan policy measures (2026-2032)
1 of 5 (~20%)
Women government secretaries (2023)
5 of 33 (~15%)
Women Legislative Assembly deputies (2023)
Macao's Women's Development Goals Plan

Details

Maturity
Established
Promoter
Women and Children Affairs Committee, Macao SAR Government
Period
2019-2032 (two phases)
Keywords
gender mainstreaming, public administration, decision-making, family policy

Context

Macao SAR's Women and Children Affairs Committee coordinated a first Women's Development Goals plan from 2019 to 2025, spanning 278 action items across 21 public departments covering health, employment, family policy and women's participation in public decision-making.

Objectives

Advance gender mainstreaming, women's representation in decision-making, health, employment and family policy outcomes through coordinated department-level action items, followed by a second, expanded plan for 2026-2032.

Activities

21 public departments implemented 278 planned actions under the 2019-2025 plan. A follow-on Women's Development Goals Plan for 2026-2032, unveiled in May 2026, sets out 66 further policy measures (43 short-term, 13 medium-term, 10 long-term) across eight priority areas, including gender mainstreaming and women's representation in decision-making.

Results

At an October 2025 'Beijing+30' review session, officials reported all 278 actions had been implemented, citing improved public awareness of gender issues and more equitable labour policies. Independent scrutiny complicates this account: the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights found in 2023 that women's representation in senior public and private positions in Macao remained 'unsatisfactory' — at the time, only one of Macao's five government secretaries (about 20%) and five of its 33 Legislative Assembly deputies (about 15%) were women.

Conclusions

Process indicators (departments involved, actions completed) are well documented, but hard outcome data on decision-making representation still shows a substantial gap, which the government aims to address with the expanded 2026-2032 plan.

Implementation
Indicative cost
High (€500k–€5M)
Time to results
Long (> 3 years)
Staffing & skills
Women and Children Affairs Committee, Macao SAR Government, 21 public departments (health, employment, family policy, decision-making)

Conditions for success

  • Cross-department coordination mechanism spanning 21 departments
  • Defined, trackable action items (278 in phase one) enabling completion reporting
  • Follow-on phase (2026-2032) with 66 measures split into short/medium/long-term horizons for continuity

Common failure modes

  • Self-reported 100% completion is not independently corroborated
  • Process completion (actions delivered) has not translated into measurable gains in women's representation in senior public/private posts per UN CESCR 2023 review

Where it fits

Governance type
SAR government, multi-department coordination
Scale
national/territory-wide

Commonly funded by

National / regional programmes

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Data sources

Where this practice's information was retrieved from, and when.

Attachments

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