{"id":5475,"date":"2019-09-19T10:15:08","date_gmt":"2019-09-19T07:15:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/africasustainabilitymatters.com\/?p=5475"},"modified":"2026-01-11T05:30:33","modified_gmt":"2026-01-11T05:30:33","slug":"gender-equality-has-never-been-so-close-but-still-far-from-being-a-reality","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/2019\/09\/19\/gender-equality-has-never-been-so-close-but-still-far-from-being-a-reality\/","title":{"rendered":"Gender Equality Has Never Been So Close But Still Far From Being A Reality"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Patricia Scotland<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This month the Commonwealth\nWomen\u2019s Affairs Ministers Meeting will assemble in Nairobi, Kenya.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It has taken place regularly\nsince 1985, to take stock of the current status of gender equality in our\nmember countries, and to share perspectives and experience of how progress on\nthis important Commonwealth priority can be achieved more swiftly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Recommendations and decisions\nmade by ministers responsible for women\u2019s affairs and gender will go forward to\nthe Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting being convened in Rwanda next\nyear.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The past century has\nwitnessed the greatest advances for gender equality in human history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From New Zealand becoming the\nfirst self-governing country in 1893 to allow women to vote in parliamentary\nelections to Sri Lanka electing the world\u2019s first female Prime Minister in\n1960, the gender gap has never narrowed so quickly, but there is still much\nground to be gained.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In order to assess and\naccelerate progress, considerable efforts are now made by multilateral\norganizations to measure progress against indicators linked to gender equality\nand women\u2019s empowerment. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So we know, for instance, that in the Commonwealth a girl is as likely to attend primary school as a boy, and in some countries more so. In the parliaments of 13 Commonwealth countries, 30 percent or more of members are women. Women everywhere can now expect to outlive men.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yet against this progress,\nunderlying systemic inequality remains persistent and widespread.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In politics, only one in five parliamentarians is a woman. In education, of every ten girls, only seven attend secondary school.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the workplace, the law in\n32 countries does not mandate equal remuneration for work of equal value. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In social life, 19 countries\ndo not have legislation prohibiting early marriage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That is accordingly to\nresearch undertaken by the Commonwealth Secretariat in preparation for the\nWomen\u2019s Affairs Ministers Meeting in Kenya. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This research offers a\nsnapshot of progress towards gender equality within and across the Commonwealth\nin four priority areas: women in leadership, women\u2019s economic empowerment, ending\nviolence against women and girls, and gender and climate change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Women in leadership<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Commonwealth countries collectively have declared that their ambition is to ensure 30 percent of the political sphere is made up of women. This is a step on the way to achieving gender parity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rwanda is one of only three countries in the world to have achieved gender parity, with over 55 percent of seats occupied by women in both of its houses parliament.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 13 Commonwealth member countries, 30 percent or more of members of parliament are women.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The countries of our Caribbean and Americas region have an average of almost 25 percent female parliamentarians, which is relatively high compared to other Commonwealth regions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ten Commonwealth countries have achieved the target of 30 percent or more women ministers, and Canada leads with over 50 percent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Women\u2019s economic empowerment<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although gender gaps in enrolment and achievement in education have narrowed, this has not yet translated satisfactorily into women\u2019s equal participation in the formal labor force, or the elimination of the gender pay gap once women are in the workforce.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Pan-Commonwealth average for female labor force participation is 56.30 percent, which means that only just over 1 in 2 of women works in the formal sector. Rwanda, at 86 percent, has the highest percentage of women\u2019s participation in the labor force\u2026Read more>><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Patricia Scotland This month the Commonwealth Women\u2019s Affairs Ministers Meeting will assemble in Nairobi, Kenya. It has taken place regularly since 1985, to take stock of the current status of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":5476,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[101],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5475","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5475","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5475"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5475\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5476"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5475"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5475"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5475"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}