Daejeon, (Republic of Korea) Virtual, 11 June 2021 - In collaboration with its sister Centre, the UNODC-INEGI Centre of Excellence, the CoEs conducted the Crime-Data-Policy Week; an online advocacy campaign to emphasize the importance of data prioritization for monitoring crime patterns and trends and developing, monitoring and evaluating evidence-based policies. The 7-11 June campaign, disseminated videos and images to global networks through social media channels (Twitter, Facebook) and email.
Producing, collecting, analysing and disseminating crime data at national, regional, and international levels is crucial for understanding crime and responding with effective evidence-based policies. Without timely high-quality data, it is difficult to understand crime patterns and trends to prevent violence, corruption, trafficking in persons, organized crime, and the factors impacting access to justice and rule of law.
Yet, only when based on high-quality data, can policies be developed, monitored and evaluated. However, the quality and quantity of crime statistics in Asia and the Pacific requires significant improvement. According to the ESCAP, Asia and the Pacific SDG Progress Report 2021, Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 16, ‘peace, justice and strong institutions’, is one of the three goals that has the poorest data availability and two-thirds of the SDG 16 indicators cannot be measured because of low data availability.
The campaign advocated the need to raise the prioritization of data quality and quantity for evidence-based policymaking, among those working in relevant fields, including national policymakers and technical staff, academia, Civil Society and Non-governmental Organisations. The engaging content focused on the impacts of crime on communities and how data can be used to benefit those communities. Subsequently, the campaign presented the slogan, “Solid Data - Strong Policy - Safe Community”, across five advocacy materials disseminated daily, and are found at the following links:
· Monday 7 June: Were Policies Effective? (Video);
· Tuesday 8 June: Understanding Corruption for Evidence-based Policies (GIF);
· Wednesday 9 June: Data for Protecting the Vulnerable: Trafficking in persons (Video);
· Thursday 10 June: Evidence-based Policymaking for Violence Against Women (Poster);
· Friday 11 June: Data for Access to Justice: Evaluating criminal justice systems (Video).
The materials from the Crime-Data-Policy Week resulted in over 6,000 Twitter Impressions to address the important issues related to the thematic programmes of United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime to promote crime data prioritization and increase the visibility of the CoEs as regional crime statistics innovation hubs.
The released advocacy materials can be found at CoE Twitter @CoE_UNODC and Facebook @UNODC.KOSTAT.CoE.
