48 places advanced with the continuation of the gender parity methodology in the country

The UAE is the first in the Arab region in terms of gender equality

The UAE has maintained its leadership among the countries of the region in terms of bridging the gender gap and achieving gender equality, according to the Global Gender Gap Report 2021, which was issued by the World Economic Forum yesterday.

The state’s renewed leadership in the countries of the region indicates the UAE’s preservation of the momentum in its positive performance in the report’s indicators despite the various repercussions caused by the “Covid-19” pandemic, which had a significant impact on the performance of countries around the world in this report.

The UAE’s performance witnessed an unprecedented qualitative leap, which helped the country to advance 48 ranks in the general ranking, which led to its inclusion among the five most advanced countries in the world.

According to the report, the UAE has so far managed to bridge 71.6% of the quality gap, and many of the country's performance indicators in the report have witnessed an improvement. In the Political Empowerment Index, for example, the UAE closed 4.03 of the gap, ranking 24th in the world compared to the 75th position last year.

As for the gap in the economic opportunities index, it witnessed a dam rate of 5.10, compared to 4.72 the repayment rate last year.

The general rate of equal wages between females and males working in the UAE has improved, the gap in the general income rate has narrowed, and the number of the female workforce has increased at the higher levels of employment and among senior officials and managers.

The multiple reforms in the country in the area of ​​gender parity have contributed significantly to the tremendous progress witnessed by the Emirati performance, including the special federal decree on organizing labor relations, which was issued by the President of the State, which stipulates equal wages for women with men in the private sector.

Distinguished Emirati performance

Roberto Crotti, director of the Center for New Economy and Society, said: “The UAE’s performance witnessed one of the best advances at the global level in the 2021 edition of the Global Gender Gap Report.

The state was able to continue to close the overall qualitative gap, which raised it by 48 places.

“In this year's report, we find that the improvement in the UAE’s performance is evident in the indicators of political empowerment and economic opportunity,” Crotty added.

We find the UAE is advancing at a fast and steady pace, especially that the country has reached equal representation in parliamentary representation. ”

The Arab region

In the Arab world, and despite the good performance of many countries in the region, the Middle East and North Africa region is still witnessing the largest qualitative gap that has not yet been filled by 39.1%.

Tunisia climbed to second place in the Arab world, while Egypt came third, ahead of Kuwait, which fell by a large rate to ninth place.

Despite the slight improvement (+0.5 percentage points), regional progress is not at the required level, and it will take 142.4 years to close the gender gap, largely due to the wide economic gender gap, with only 31% of women participating in the labor force. .

A whole generation

The Global Gender Gap Report 2021 concluded that another generation of women will have to wait for gender parity to be achieved. With the continuing impact of the consequences of the "Covid-19" pandemic, the time required to bridge the global gender gap increased by an entire generation, as it was 99.5 years, according to the report. Last year, she is 135.6 years old today.

The report, which has entered its fifteenth year, measures the development of gender gaps in four areas: economic opportunities, political empowerment, educational attainment, health and survival.

The report examines the causes of the gaps and identifies the policies and practices needed for a comprehensive recovery.

Population density

The deterioration we see in this year's report results is partly due to the widening political gender gap in many densely populated countries. Although more than half of the 156 countries covered by the index recorded an improvement, women still hold only 26.1% of parliamentary seats and 22 .6% of ministerial positions around the world.

According to these results, it is expected that it will take 145.5 years to close the political gender gap, compared to 95 years in the 2020 edition of the report, an increase of more than 50%.

The economic gender gap has only improved marginally, and it is expected that it will take another 267.6 years to close.

Slow progress is attributed to opposing trends, and although the proportion of women among the skilled workers is constantly increasing, income disparities remain a major constraint, which is accompanied by the underrepresentation of women in managerial positions.

Despite these negative results, the gender gaps in the fields of education and health are almost closing. In the field of education, 37 countries have reached full parity, while in other countries it will take another 14.2 years to close this gap due to slow progress.

In the field of health, more than 95% of this gender gap has been closed, and despite the very positive result, it is a slight decrease from the result of last year.

The impact of the epidemic

"The epidemic has mainly affected gender equality, in both the workplace and the home, which has led to a decline in progress at the rate of several years," said Saadia Zahidi, Director-General of the World Economic Forum.

“If we want to have a dynamic economy in the future, it is imperative that women be represented in the jobs of tomorrow,” Zahidi added.

It is very important that the focus of leadership attention, commitment to fixed goals and mobilization of resources is in the interest of achieving parity now more than ever. This is the right moment to consolidate gender parity in the world’s recovery process. ”

The COVID-19 pandemic

The impact of the pandemic has been more negative for women than men, as women have lost their jobs at higher rates (5% versus 3.9% among men, according to the International Labor Organization), partly due to their disproportionate representation in sectors that have been directly disrupted by the closure, such as the consumer sector.

Data from the United States also indicates that women from historically disadvantaged and marginalized racial and ethnic groups are most affected.

According to data obtained by a survey from Ipsos, when care institutions are closed, housework and caring for children and the elderly fall on the shoulders of women, which contributes to raising their stress levels and lowering their levels of productivity at work.

Women in emerging jobs

The years prove that sectors with a low representation of women are the sectors of "jobs of tomorrow" that are experiencing rapid growth. In the field of cloud computing, for example, women make up 14% of the workforce in engineering 20%, and in data and artificial intelligence 32%, and it is considered a transformation. Women are harder to enter these emerging roles than men.

The report provides new metrics for tracking progress in closing the gender gaps in the jobs of tomorrow.

While care and education roles also provide areas for future growth and women have stronger representation, they are often lower-paying roles compared to other jobs of tomorrow.

Recovery effect

The impact of the epidemic in accelerated automation, the increasing mix of work and care, and other labor market dynamics such as gender segregation within institutions and workplaces is likely to have a long-term impact on women's economic opportunities, leading to the risk of declining re-employment opportunities and a sustained decline in income.

The most improved

North America (76.4%), which includes Canada and the United States, is the region that improved the most, with an increase of about 3.5%.

Therefore, it will take 61.5 years to close the gender gap.

Much of the continent's progress this year has to do with improvements in the political gender gap, after it narrowed from 18.4% to 33.4%.

Latin America and the Caribbean (72.1%) saw an improvement in scores for 15 of the 25 countries listed in this region.

Eastern Europe

Eastern Europe and Central Asia (71.2%) lag behind Western Europe, not only in terms of the closed percentage but also in the pace of progress.

As such, the estimated time to close the gender gap is 134.7 years, more than twice the time required in Western Europe (52.1 years).

The regional average includes large variations between countries in bridging the political empowerment gap.

While Serbia, Lithuania, Albania and Latvia closed at least 30% of this gap, the Russian Federation and Azerbaijan closed less than 10% of their gaps.

Europe is the best

Western Europe continues to be the best performing region, and its performance has improved significantly, with 77.6% of the overall gender gap closed.

At this rate, it would take 52.1 years to close the gender gap.

Six of the top ten countries in the index belong to this geographic region.

Worst performance

South Asia is the second worst performing region, closing 62.3% of the overall gender gap and declining compared to last year.

This decrease, which reached 3.8 points, would require 195.4 years to close the gender gap, and it must be noted that India's performance has a major impact on the overall score for the region.

The

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