Gender equality: Belgium 10th in WEF world ranking

Belgium came 10th out of 142 countries in an annual gender gap ranking published on Tuesday in Geneva by the WEF (World Economic Forum). Unsurprisingly, Nordic countries were at the top of the league, headed by Iceland, Finland, Norway and Finland, and followed by Denmark, which came 5th. Belgium, having moved up a place since the 2013 rankings, needs to make more progress when it comes to equal pay, says the WEF.

At world level, the WEF notes that 9 years of measuring disparities between men and women have only shown a slight improvement in favour of women in the work place. When it comes to economic participation and prospects, the gender gap currently stands at 40% worldwide, which is only a 4% improvement on the 2006 figure of 44%.

‘’If the trend continues, all being equal elsewhere, it will take 81 years for the world to completely fill this gap’’, says the WEF press release.

In the 142 countries ranked, the lowest disparity between men and women concerned health. In fact it represents 000
4% worldwide, and in 35 countries including Belgium it has completely disappeared.

The next issue is education where gender equality stands at 6% around the world, and there is no gap in 24 countries.

Bottom of the class are economic participation and prospects, and, even worse, the fourth issue of political participation. The gap to fill currently represents a huge 79% in spite of unprecedented progress in this field since 2006.

(Source: Belga


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