As recent figures indicate, inequality and poverty in Colombia have increased in recent years, especially after the Covid-19 pandemic. The deterioration of these indicators places Colombia among the most unequal countries in the world. The Multidimensional Diagnostic on Inequalities in Colombia also demonstrates that gender gaps are particularly prevalent in the country. Indeed, employment rates are lower for women than for men at all levels of education. For example, in 2020, while the employment rate of women without any level of education reached 31%, for men it was 65%. 

In this context, the Colombian government is committed to reduce the gaps between population groups and between territories and has identified closing gender gaps as one of its priorities. Given this situation, it is critical to delve into the understanding of the causes and solutions to inequality, and identify ways through which inequality can be reduced through public policies, social spending and fiscal policy. 

In order to support the Colombian government in the development of public policies aimed at reducing inequalities, the Extension of the EU-AFD Research Facility on Inequalities, in close collaboration with local research centres and local authorities, has already:

1. Elaborated the Multidimensional Diagnostic on inequalities and generated statistics on inequalities with the National Administrative Department of Statistics (DANE). The diagnostic is a statistical overview of inequalities from multiple angles that seeks to support public policy decisions by providing key information for the reduction of the most important gaps in the country.
2. Implemented a fiscal incidence analysis through the methodology of the Commitment to Equity (CEQ), and, in close collaboration with the Ministry of Finances, elaborated a tool, which enables to assess the impact on inequalities of the latest tax reform in the country, through micro-simulations. 

These two studies opened the door to new possibilities of analysis that provide data, information and relevant knowledge for the Colombian Government as an input to strengthen the design, implementation and monitoring of policy instruments that can reduce the inequality and gaps between population groups, especially those of fiscal policy and social spending.

This research project will use innovative methodologies to take advantage of the information derived from the merging of surveys, databases and administrative records to strengthen the understanding of the impacts of the fiscal and spending measures of the Colombian government on closing gender gaps, and more generally, to strengthen the analysis of income inequality measures in Colombia.

This study also aims to generate an in-house capacity allowing the Government of Colombia to continue reporting and analysing new inequality metrics that inform the design of more equitable public policies in the country.

The research project will:

• Develop a methodology for the analysis of the impacts of fiscal and government spending measures on closing gender gaps and income inequality in Colombia, based on the CEQ tool;
• Determine the necessary methodological and operational components that will be updated on a recurring basis by different actors involved in public policy decision-making;
• Estimate a battery of indicators of the impact of fiscal, tax and social spending policy on gender gaps.

The analysis will use surveys, databases of supply and demand of social programs, as well as administrative records and tax information of natural persons, integrating them into a CEQ model. These data will serve as a basis for the inclusion of the gender approach and for the analyses that will be carried out as part of this research.

Throughout the research, working groups will be organised with the National Planning Department, the National Administrative Department of Statistics, the National Tax and Customs Directorate and other stakeholders who can contribute to the conceptual and methodological development of the research, the analysis of the results and the application of the tool to policy processes.

You will find below the different research papers related to this project:

In progress

In Colombia, the oil and coal mining industry is an important source of fiscal revenues, including royalties. The Sistema General de Participaciones (or General Participation System, GPS) has therefore been set up to organise the transfer of these royalties – that come from the exploitation of non-renewable natural resources – from the Ministry of Finance and Public Credit to territorial entities. These resources finance the provision of services in the sectors of education, health, drinking water and basic sanitation, general purpose and special allocations, in the different regions of Colombia. This mechanism aims at ensuring a fair distribution of income, which is essential since spatial inequalities in terms of access to services are still significant in Colombia – as shown by the multidimensional diagnosis of inequalities carried out with the support of AFD. For example, while in urban areas, the secondary education coverage rate is close to 100%, it is 50% in rural areas.

The Strategy for monitoring, follow-up and control of the resources of the GPS is a public policy tool led by the Ministry of Finance and Public Credit to carry out control over the management of the resources transferred. This strategy, in implementation for almost 15 years, identifies alerts and cases of non-compliance with the goal of assuring continuity, coverage and quality in the provision of public services. This seeks to prevent and mitigate risks in the provision of social services throughout Colombia, which is essential for the construction of equity across the country, as well as to prevent territorial gaps from widening with regards to the institutional capacities of local governments and to the provision of social services for all populations, regardless of their location. 

This work is also part of AFD's dialogue with the Colombian authorities on tax reform and the reduction of spatial inequalities.

This research project seeks to generate recommendations with the purpose of analysing and strengthening the role of the GPS tool – “the Strategy” – as a mechanism for closing territorial gaps in institutional capacities to provide social services.

Two research objectives have been identified, one in the field of diagnosis, and another in the field of recommendations:

1. Identify the achievements, limitations, and challenges of the implementation of the Strategy in closing territorial gaps in the institutional capacities of territorial entities and in the provision of essential social services.
2. Provide recommendations to strengthen the Strategy in its role of institutional assistance for the closing of territorial gaps.

The project will focus on sectors that receive more resources from the GPS, present more risks in their provision and are the most relevant as essential social services: education, health, drinking water and basic sanitation, and indigenous reservations.

The research methodology will be mixed methods and will include:

• A document review at the level of the Ministry of Finance and Public Credit and the territorial entities selected as a case study;
• A secondary data analysis;
• In-depth interviews with a subsample of the selected territorial entities.

You will find below the research paper related to this project:

Assessing the Impact of the Monitoring, Follow-Up, and Control Strategy on Territorial Inequalities in Colombia (November 2025)

Download the research paper

The care economy is a field in which commons-based approaches are essential to tackling inequalities in access, which disproportionately affect women. Public-Community Care Partnerships (PCCPs) can be understood as a model of social commons for addressing this issue. PCCPs involve collaboration between public actors and community-led care initiatives, such as community care centers. They focus on the complementarity of action between public and community actors, with the aim of delivering public action focused on care services that are accessible and collectively managed.

This project was selected as part of AFD’s “Commons and Citizen Participation” call for research projects. This call was aimed at research projects examining the contribution of commons to democratic practices and citizen participation; the interactions between commons actors and public actors; and the capacity of the commons to shape public action. It is part of AFD’s research program on commons.

The project studies Public-Community Care Partnerships in Colombia:

• By analyzing the extent to which they constitute a model for promoting access to care;
• By developing, testing, and evaluating public policy instruments to implement PCCPs, including a PCCP model contract.

This project is an action-research initiative that combines research activities with public policy dialogue in the city of Bogotá. The research is organized through learning communities, which bring together civil society actors from community care centers, project researchers, and public actors.

Through experimentation and learning by doing, the project will help answer the following research questions:

1. What are the conditions for the emergence of PCCPs? 
2. To what extent do they constitute public policy tools?
3. What governance, deliberation, compensation, and evaluation mechanisms underpin these PCCPs?
4. How do PCCPs reflect a complementarity between public services and commons in terms of access to care?

This participatory research, based on “learning communities,” involves public actors from both the Municipality of Bogotá and the national government from the outset of the project. The project will unfold in five stages:

1. Study of the ecosystem of actors and their interrelationships in the field of care within the context under study; 
2. Selection of four community care centers (two as pilot partnership sites and two as counterfactuals) and conducting a diagnostic of these centers’ internal and external practices and processes (legal, accounting, logistics, communication);
3. Establishment of “learning communities” in the two pilot centers conceived as spaces for dialogue and co-creation of the PCCP prototype, as well as legal and financial information and monitoring tools for the two partnerships. The pilots will run for 12 months;
4. Evaluation of the pilots through in-depth interviews and surveys of stakeholders (before/after; and between community centers);
5. Co-design and production of communication and dissemination materials.

The project will produce deliverables at each stage:

• A survey report (stage 1);
• A baseline report on the analysis of the community care centers, the collaborative digital platform for knowledge management and information-sharing within the learning communities (stage 2);
• A prototype PCCP contract (stage 3);
• A report on the challenges and opportunities of learning communities around PCCPs (stage 4);
• Dissemination of the project's findings and lessons learned (stage 5).

The teams are also involved in a collective effort led by Coop des Communs, the Casa Comum platform, and AFD. The goal: to build a transnational learning community by exchanging on the work carried out, drawing on each other’s experience, and generating knowledge on the links between commons, citizen participation, and the transformation of public action. This network brings together complementary profiles — researchers, civil society, and public decision-makers involved in these experiments — coming notably from Brazil, Colombia, and Europe. Supported by meetings held in Brazil and Italy, this effort will lead to a collective volume, currently being drafted, that will compare and put into perspective the various research projects underway.