Closing gender gaps benefits countries as a whole, not just women and girls
According to the World Bank’s 2012 World Development Report: Gender Equality and Development, closing these gender gaps matters for development and policymaking.
Greater gender equality can enhance economic productivity, improve development outcomes for the next generation, and make institutions and policies more representative.
Every aspect of gender equality access to education and health, economic opportunities, and voice within households and society has experienced a mixed pattern of change over the past quarter century.
In some areas, such as education, the gender gap has closed for almost all women; but progress has been slower for those who are poor and face other disadvantages, such as ethnicity.
In other areas, the gap has been slow to close even among well off women and in countries that have otherwise developed rapidly.
Since 1980, women have been living longer than men in all parts of the world.
But across all developing countries, more women and girls still die at younger ages relative to men and boys, compared with rich countries.
As a result of this “excess female mortality,” about 3.9 million girls and women under 60 are “missing”
About two-fifths of them are never born, one sixth die in early childhood, and more than one-third die during their reproductive years.
Female mortality is growing in sub Saharan Africa, especially for women of childbearing age and in the countries hit hardest by the HIV/AIDS pandemic (World Bank, 2011, Chapter 3).
This is an issue important to everyone.
The role women play in their communities has a massive impact on economic development, poverty rates, and sustainable development.
One woman earning a promotion, landing an interview, becoming a homeowner is changing the trajectory of her family for generations.
She is also improving her community in big ways.
Companies receive great benefits from increasing employment and leadership opportunities for women.
“Women that work so hard with all the traumas, tensions and with all the vulnerabilities involved, 30% and above of them dare to be independent”
Tristan James Jr.
In an article from Wealth Matters, UN Women estimated that companies with three or more women in senior management functions score higher in all dimensions of organizational performance.
When we empower women, we increase the skilled workforce, local economies are strengthened, businesses do better, and families rise out of poverty and create generational wealth and self sufficiency. We all benefit.
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