Women in Peace Operations – Zambia

This project aims to provide training equipment and support to the Zambia Police Service (ZPS) especially its Police Women’s Network in mitigating key barriers to women’s meaningful participation identified in the Measuring Opportunities for Women in Peace Operations (MOWIP) barrier assessment. In 2020 the ZPS became the first service in the world to complete a barrier assessment using the innovative MOWIP methodology supported by Canada. As part of the bilateral partnership between Canada and Zambia under the Elsie Initiative for Women in Peace Operations this equipment enables training and complements other capacity-building under the Elsie Initiative including technical assistance from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. This project also supports the Zambian Police Women’s Network to disseminate the results of the barrier assessment advocate women’s perspectives implement mitigation strategies and disseminate new policies to increase the number of ZPS women deployed to UN peace operations.

The expected outcomes for this project include: (1) increased the number of uniformed women in the Zambia Police Services eligible for deployments to United Nations (UN) peace operations; (2) enhanced ZPS’s capacity to employ gender-responsive training and train and prepare officers for deployment to UN peace operations; and (3) improved Police Women’s Network’s capacity to advocate and disseminate gender-transformative polices.