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The First Meeting of a New Global Framework on Ammunition

Emma Bjertén
9 July 2025

Despite civil societies’ persistent advocacy, ammunition has for decades been overlooked in international instruments regulating conventional arms. To address this gap, UN members states met in New York in late June for the first meeting of a new global framework, the “Global Framework for Through-life Conventional Ammunition Management.”

When we have conversations about armed violence or how firearms increases the risk of people being killed in intimate partner violence, it is obviously with the assumption that these firearms are used with ammunition. “Without ammunition the dogs don’t bark,” as Folade Mutota from Women’s Institute for Alternative Development recently said at a side event. She said this to illustrate how ammunition is inextricably linked with firearms. Small arms ammunition is the key component that makes firearms lethal. While small arms can circulate and be reused for decades, ammunition has a shorter shelf-life. To use a particular gun lawfully, the suitable ammunition must be available and accounted for, as well as safely and securely stored. Ammunition plays a key role in the discussion on how small arms impacts our societies. It might therefore appear as strange that ammunition, only until recently, had been overlooked in international instruments regulating conventional arms.  

What led us here? 

The Programme of Action to Prevent, Combat and Eradicate the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons in All Its Aspects (UNPoA), does not substantially address ammunition despite civil society and the majority of member states arguing for its inclusion. Since its adoption in 2001, ammunition has maybe been the most contested topic of the UNPoA. For years a small number of states blocked any recognition of ammunition in the UNPoA and during the third review conference in 2018 it was debates over ammunition that kept diplomats from going home. But the frustration with the refusal of a minority of states to allow the UNPoA process to adequately address ammunition motivated action in other fora.  

In 2021, the UN General Assembly adopted resolution 76/233 to establish an Open-ended Working Group to elaborate a set of political commitments for a new global framework and address existing gaps in through-life ammunition management. Two years later, in 2023, a new international instrument containing political commitments to prevent diversion, illicit trafficking, and misuse of ammunition was adopted. The Global Framework for Through-life Conventional Ammunition Management (GFA) lists 15 objectives and 85 measures for safe, secure, and sustainable through-life conventional ammunition management. The Global Framework covers all type of conventional ammunition from small-calibre ammunition that is used in firearms to larger conventional types. It also provides a life-cycle-based approach to managing conventional ammunition from production and acquisition through storage and transfer to use and disposal. 

Last month, on 23–27 June 2025, member states, civil society—including WILPF—and practitioners convened in New York for the 2025 Preparatory Meeting of States on the Global Framework for Through-life Conventional Ammunition Management (GFA Prep Meeting). While the agenda for this first meeting focused on procedural aspects related to preparation of the 2027 Meeting of States, it also discussed international cooperation and assistance, as well as format for the voluntary national reporting on state’s implementation of the GFA (for more information, see IANSA’s report). Gender was also a major discussion item and several states, along with civil society, emphasised the need to ensure a gender perspective in the implementation of the GFA.   

Gender perspectives at the core of the GFA  

WILPF and other civil society organisations have for decade showed how flows and proliferation of weapons, parts of weapons, and their ammunition—both legal and illegal— impact societies, undermines social justice and have differential gendered impacts that requires an intersectional analysis. In the last four decades, more than 100 states in all regions have experienced unplanned explosions at munition sites. These incidents have led to the death and injuries of civilians, environmental degradation, and displacement. The GFA aims to address this global issue by preventing risks and addressing immediate and long-term consequences of unplanned explosions at munition sites through ammunition management. Similarly to small arms control measures, ammunition management can also prevent ammunition diversion and hinder ammunition to be used in committing sexual and gender-based violence, and intimate partner violence, and ultimately reduce armed violence.   

Objective 14 in the GFA recognises the importance of strengthening gender mainstreaming and ensuring the full, equal, meaningful and effective participation of women. Under objective 4, the GFA also explicitly seeks to integrate the GFA into the Women, Peace and Security Agenda. During the meeting, states addressed the importance to explore how ammunition is used in gender-based violence, emphasised the need for improved disaggregated data collection, the need for increased understanding of differentiated impacts of unplanned explosions at munition sites, and diversion of conventional ammunition.  

Ammunition management is still a male-dominated and militarised field, and several states addressed the need for increasing women in ammunition management. WILPF rejects militarism in all its forms and, in its statement delivered at GFA Prep Meeting, WILPF  problematised this overrepresentation of men and highlighted that as more civilian and diverse stakeholders are being engaged, there are increased opportunities for the participation of women in the field. While diverse participation shouldn’t have to be justified, there are studies from the field of humanitarian demining showing how diverse participation can influence decision making and policies leading to more effective and improved outcomes by ensuring a coherent response to differentiated needs and priorities —resulting in safer societies for all.  

A working paper submitted by Canada, Costa Rica, Germany, Trinidad and Tobago, the Small Arms Survey, and UNIDIR particularly addressed women’s underrepresentation in arms control, identified structural barriers, and provided recommendations for ensuring the full, equal, meaningful and effective participation of women in the work of the GFA. Among other things, the working paper encourages member states to support the Woman Managing Ammunition Network (WoMA-Network) established in 2022. Several women from the network participated in the meeting and its side events.   

Moving forward – how civil society can engage 

During The GFA Prep Meeting two reports were launched focusing on how to operationalise the GFA. Implementing the Global Framework for Through-life Conventional Ammunition Management: A Voluntary Guide, is a comprehensive 188 pages report on how to operationalise all fifteen objectives. Meanwhile,  A Practical Guide for Gender and Multi-Stakeholder Cooperation in the Global Framework for Through-Life Conventional Ammunition Management focuses specifically on the role of civil society in supporting implementation of Objective 14 on gender mainstreaming and women’s participation, as well as Objective 15, which encourages dialogue and strengthens the exchange of information and good practices with relevant stakeholders, including non-governmental organisations and civil society. The latter, prepared by the Gender Equality Network on Small Arms Control (GENSAC), lists several actions civil society can take, including: 

  • Partnering with women’s organisations, youth groups, and communities near ammunition storage or disposal sites to document lived experiences;  
  • Share testimonies of survivors affected by unplanned explosions and diversion of ammunition;  
  • Mapping risks around ammunition storage sites (communities have, for example, informed about civilians using fireworks near ammunition depots and incidents when children been playing with hazardous material);  
  • Translate and break down dense policy research into local languages or visual formats for grassroots education or workshops;  
  • Conduct advocacy that potentially can improve legislation and proper oversight, such as finding or creating opportunities to present concerns in national arms control forums or meetings with ministries of defense, interior or gender (including meetings organised by National Small Arms Commissions or dialogue between civil society and government representatives); and  
  • Organise joint discussions, webinars, or peer-learning activities with partners from other regions to share good practices and lessons learned.   

The International Action Network on Small Arms (IANSA)  has also published a report with recommendation for civil society on how to engage in the GFA.  

In the end, the outcome document was adopted and accepted by all states besides from Russia, who similarly to what it did at the Review Conference of the UNPoA in 2024, disassociated itself form the outcome document. States decided that the reporting cycle should be held on biannually basis during even years, coinciding with the UNPoA reporting and with the first voluntary reports to be submitted in 2028. However, ahead of the Meeting of States in 2027, states are encouraged to “provide a voluntary initial overview” already in 2026. Just as for the national reporting under the UNPoA process, these reports on the GFA implementation will provide a tool for civil society to keep states accountable.  

When moving forward towards the implementation of the GFA, it will be important for states to ensure that civil society, women’s groups, and feminist organisations are invited to participate and contribute to future panels, briefings, and expert meetings related to the work of the GFA. This was something WILPF highlighted in its statement and that was reflected in the adopted outcome document. It will also be important to urge states to recognise diversity in terms of all genders, moving beyond a socially prescribed men-women binary. For example, intersectional analysis from the Beirut port explosion in 2020 shows how housing discrimination resulting from racism, transphobia, and homophobia limited shelter options amongst displaced marginalised groups. While the Beirut explosion was not caused due to ammunition, lessons can be drawn from this case on how binary understanding of gender leaves vulnerable groups behind. This is important for states to consider not least in relation to Objective 13 on data collection and analysis that reflects the differential impacts of ammunition.