WOMEN ARE almost on par with men around the world in health and education, but they still lag in economic and political participation and opportunities, according to a World Economic Forum report published yesterday.
The Global Gender Gap Report found that 96 per cent of gaps in health and 93 per cent of disparities in education had been closed, compared with fewer than two-thirds of economic gaps and only a fifth of gaps in political participation.
“While women are starting to be as healthy and as educated as men, they are clearly not being channelled into the economy and into decision-making structures in the same numbers,” said Saadia Zahidi, a senior director at the forum and one of the authors of the report.
Topping the ranking of 135 countries was Iceland, followed by Norway, Finland, Sweden and Ireland, while the bottom five were Saudi Arabia, Mali, Pakistan, Chad and Yemen.
“While many developed economies have succeeded in closing the gender gap in education,” the report found, “few have succeeded in maximising the returns from this investment. The Nordic countries are leaders in this area.
“On the whole these economies have made it possible for parents to combine work and family.”
It also found that the policies had even led to a rising birth rate.
Some of the successful policies of the Nordic countries identified by the report were mandatory paternity leave, generous parental leave benefits provided by a combination of social insurance funds and employers, tax incentives and post-maternity re-entry programmes.
The report measured gender gaps in salaries, workforce participation, highly skilled employment, access to basic and higher-level education, representation in decision-making structures, life expectancy and sex ratio.
The United States moved up two spots to number 17, as did Germany to 11, while Britain dropped one spot to 16. China was unchanged at 61, Russia rose two spots to 43, as did South Africa to 14. France dropped two places to 48 and Japan fell four places to 98.
The report found that while the US ranked sixth in terms of economic participation and opportunity, “the perceived wage inequality for similar work remains high, placing the US 68th in the world on this variable”.
In China, almost three-quarters of women worked but men’s wages were growing faster, the report found. It also said that women made up almost half of those in Japan receiving tertiary education, “but only about 9 per cent of those occupy senior leadership positions, indicating an inefficient use of the female talent available in the country”. – (Reuters)