agencies to allocate a minimum of five per cent of their total annual budgets for gender programs, projects, and activities”(Department of Budget and Management (DBM), 2024). In practice, this means that every year a fixed share of national and local expenditures is channelled into programmes that benefit women, from livelihood training and maternal health services to combating gender­based violence. The Philippine example demonstrates how public resources can be systematically earmarked and reallocated towards gender equality goals, making the state budget an instrument for social transformation. By institutionalising gender budget tags and accountability mechanisms, the policy ensures that women’s needs are no longer an afterthought in fiscal decision-making but a core priority across all sectors. Pakistan’s experience with the Benazir Income Support Programme(BISP) provides a further illustration of resource redistribution that empowers women economically. Launched in 2008 as the country’s largest social safety net, BISP delivers unconditional cash transfers to millions of low-income women as a form of direct economic support. The programme is widely recognised as one of the world’s best in terms of targeting and coverage; it“provides cash assistance to 5.8 million families(ever-married women) with a quarterly stipend of PKR 5000(approximately US$35)” (Hameed et al., 2024). By design, the payments are made to female heads of households, putting disposable income into women’s hands at scale. Research on BISP finds that this influx of resources has translated into greater agency for beneficiary women. In fact,“the study observed that BISP… has brought improvement in women’s mobility and women’s participation in voting”, contributing to“socio-economic and political empowerment” for women over time(Iqbal, Padda, & Farooq, 2020, p. 57). These outcomes show how even nominal cash stipends, when delivered directly to women, can enhance their decision-making power in the household and public sphere. In essence, Pakistan’s experience illustrates how the cash transfer approach converts fiscal resources into tangible gains in women’s welfare and autonomy, illustrating feminist policy in action through social protection. Taken together, these initiatives demonstrate how feminist policymaking in the Asia-Pacific is beginning to convert abstract commitments into concrete redistributive mechanisms. Tax and land tenure reforms in Nepal explicitly aim to shift property ownership patterns in favour of women; budget mandates in the Philippines guarantee a steady fiscal injection into gender equality programmes; and social protection programmes like Pakistan’s BISP funnel monetary resources directly to women. Each intervention addresses the resources dimension of the “Three Rs” framework by redefining what counts as economic value and who benefits from public expenditure. These cases collectively signal an emergent regional consensus that economic justice and gender equality are interdependent pillars of sustainable development. 4.4 Regional Cooperation and Multilateral Feminist Pathways Regional and multilateral cooperation in the Asia-Pacific has evolved as a vital mechanism for translating domestic feminist reforms into collective policy innovation. Beyond formal institutions such as ASEAN, diverse platforms ranging from development partnerships to climate diplomacy and South-South Cooperation(SSC) are advancing feminist ideas through cross-border collaboration, technical exchange, and shared advocacy. One key arena for feminist collaboration is climate and environmental diplomacy, where Pacific Island nations have emerged as regional leaders in linking gender equality to climate resilience. Under the Framework for Resilient Development in the Pacific(FRDP), governments are encouraged to incorporate women’s leadership and local knowledge into national adaptation plans and disaster risk management(UN Women, 2016). Additionally, Fiji’s National Gender Policy on Climate Change explicitly recognises vulnerable groups, including women, as“agents of sustainable social and environmental change” rather than “climate victims”(Government of Fiji, 2022). These approaches demonstrate how feminist environmental policy can be both locally grounded and internationally influential, shaping global negotiations under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change(UNFCCC). Another frontier for regional cooperation lies in trade and labour mobility frameworks that integrate gender perspectives into cross-border economic policy. Through partnerships with the ILO and ADB, several Southeast and South Asian governments are piloting gender-responsive trade facilitation measures and social protections for migrant workers(ILO, 2024a). Malaysia’s recent expansion of social security coverage to migrant workers and Thailand’s inclusion of domestic workers in its labour code illustrate how local regulatory reforms can converge into regional norms. These developments offer models for feminist approaches to labour governance that recognise care work, migration, and economic rights as interconnected policy domains. SSC has also become a conduit for feminist knowledge exchange. The India-UN Development Partnership Fund has supported projects that advance women’s entrepreneurship and gender-sensitive governance in the Pacific. Meanwhile, through the South-South and Triangular Cooperation Framework, Indonesia has delivered training and advocacy for family planning services in over 20 countries(UNFPA, 2025b). These initiatives reflect an emerging shift in feminist internationalism, where leadership and innovation are increasingly originating from the Global South rather than being transferred from the North to the South. In an era where foreign aid from traditional donors is being cut, this shows that feminist cooperation is no longer dependent on aid agencies, but on the desire to undertake mutual learning, shared capacity building, and solidarity across countries. CH 4: Existing Best Practices and Localised Strategies- Lessons from the Asia-Pacific 45