Gender and Human Mobility

Gender inequalities contribute to heightened risks of human rights violations, and reduced socio-economic outcomes, especially affecting women, girls and gender-diverse persons. Thus, addressing gender dynamics and inequalities within policymaking and planning can contribute to social and economic empowerment and promote gender equality. Overlooking such considerations can expose persons of different genders to further risks and vulnerabilities and perpetuate or exacerbate inequalities.

Learn more on gender equality from IOM here.

This spotlight offers an overview of available data and content related to gender and human mobility.

More contextual analysis will follow here soon.

This section predominantly features migration data disaggregated by sex, which contributes to the understanding of sex and gender-based dynamics of human mobility. Though this is important, disaggregating data by gender is important to understand the diverse socioeconomic realities of individuals of different genders (Hennebry et al., 2021). In this section, the terms “women”, “girls”, “females”, “men”, “boys” and “males” mainly refer to sex-disaggregated data on adult females, female children, females of all ages, adult males, male children, and males of all ages respectively. These terms are used to facilitate ease of reading and do not refer to data disaggregated by gender unless otherwise specified.

Gender and Migration

Gender in the Sustainable Development Goals

Data

Number of female migrants

Share of female immigrants

Countries with a gender-responsive migration strategy

based on MGI data from 84 countries in 2024

Female labour force participation rates

by income level of countries, 2019

Employment rates of mothers

across OECD countries, 2021

Global numbers of internally displaced women and girls

by age, end of 2022

International migrant stock

by sex and region, mid-year 2020

Cause of death among female migrants

1 Jan 2014 - 31 Dec 2023

Women trafficked

by country of exploitation, 2002-2022

Women trafficked

by country of citizenship, 2002-2022

Gender and age profile of detected victims of human trafficking

2007-2022

Thematic briefs and glossaries

Women & Girls on the Move: A Snapshot of Available Evidence

This brief is devoted to International Women’s Day and, hence, is primarily focused on the situation of women and girls on the move. It presents an overview of internationally available sex-disaggregated data – recognizing the importance of data that help understandthe gendered dimensions of human mobility. In the future, gender analysis also requires consideration of the gendered experiences and the needs and characteristics of different groups of people. Analysis is needed to better understand the forms of gender-based discrimination that people on the move face.

Read the brief

IOM SOGIESC Glossary of Terms

The language used to describe sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression and sex characteristics (SOGIESC) varies greatly across the world and is dependent on such factors as location, language, age and cultural references. However, there are some terms commonly used within the international context. These terms, as well as less common terms useful to our understanding of SOGIESC, are included here.

Read the glossary

Expert contributions