What would a world without women in the workforce be like? Well, certainly one with a lot of lost potential and lack of growth. Having women as workers and employees is crucial for the economic growth of any country, and this is especially true for a major emerging market economy like Egypt’s. According to the […]
It was approaching 11 am as I resisted a growing feeling of frustration. It must have been the tenth interruption of the day, my mind shifting again from the budget breakdown on my screen to my seven year old son asking how to spell ‘also’. For a few weeks now since the announcement of the
In 2017, the Egypt Women on Boards Observatory (WoB) was established by a consortium led by the American University in Cairo’s (AUC) School of Business with the purpose of increasing women’s representation on corporate boards across many sectors. In the years since, the WoB has partnered with many key bodies including UN Women and the
In recent weeks, the country’s Financial Regulatory Authority (FRA) issued a declaration to all companies under its supervision including companies listed on the Egyptian Stock Exchange (EGX) and the non-banking financial sector to include at least one woman on their boards by the end of the year. The declaration affirms the FRA’s decisions numbers 123
In part one and part two of this series, we dived into the experiences of young women professionals working in office spaces and sectors predominantly occupied by men. They also told us what needs to change for their respective sectors to be more attractive to women and how they can retain their female employees. In
Challenging and changing the gender discourse requires commitment on the individual and leadership level in all contexts, including in the context of the workplace. Gender-related labor indicators such as the limited female workforce participation rate on the national level reflect the gap. Beyond the figures, working women may face bias and unequal career opportunities because
With the help of small amounts of funding and training, hundreds of young women in the Upper Egyptian governorate of Minya were able to heave themselves out of unemployment through their own micro businesses, according to findings by the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL). In 2016, a local NGO known as Maan (or
In the first part of this series, Business Forward spoke to Farah and Nour* about the challenges they have had to endure working in male-dominated sectors. In part two, they tell us about the few instances when their male colleagues stepped up, what organizations should do to make their work environments better for women and
Women empowerment is a current buzzword that needs to be analyzed so we can figure out how it actually translates in the daily lives of women and men. I find it helpful to think of gender issues at three intertwined levels. At the personal level: what does my gender, as a man or woman, mean
According to the latest national figures as reported by the International Labour Organization (ILO), in 2018, the labor force participation rate of Egyptian men was 67.7 percent, while it was only 18.4 percent for women. In the ILO’s more recent estimates for 2019, the figures only slightly improve at 70.9 and 21.9 percent respectively. Unsurprisingly,
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The 2019 annual monitoring report published by the Egypt-based Women on Boards Observatory (WoB) has revealed varying results in the gender parity performance of companies it has observed across many sectors and industries in Egypt. Focusing on the representation of women on boards in four key sectors, companies listed on the Egyptian stock exchange (EGX) and
It is March 8th, 2020, which many may know to be the day that International Women’s Day is commemorated. While women have been fighting for equal rights and opportunities for decades, with many strides being especially made in the last decade, major inequalities still exist which impede women from fully participating in the world’s economy.
