Global Gender Gap Index: Where Women Are Treated (Almost) Equally

In its 2008 Global Gender Gap Report released yesterday, the World Economic Forum ranked the Philippines next to Norway, Finland, Sweden, Iceland and New Zealand in terms of closing the global gender gap index.

The index examines the gap between men and women in four fundamental categories: economic participation and opportunity, educational attainment, political empowerment and health and survival.

Norway led the survey in closing the gender gap with a score of 0.8239, followed by two other Nordic countries – Finland and Sweden.

The Philippines, a developing Asian economy headed by a female president, has retained its ranking as the sixth out of 130 countries in the world in terms of narrowing the gender gap between men and women.
At the bottom of the list was Yemen with a score of 0.4664, followed by Chad and Saudi Arabia.

The three highest-ranking countries have closed a little over 80 percent of their gender gaps, while the lowest-ranking country has closed only a little over 45 percent of its gender gap.

Previously higher-ranking countries such as Germany (11), United Kingdom (13) and Spain (17) slipped down the Index but stayed in the top 20, while the Netherlands (9), Latvia (10), Sri Lanka (12) and France (15) made significant gains.

The United States, at 27th spot, made progress this year and closed gender gaps in estimated earned income and perceived income gaps for similar work. The United States also made strides in political empowerment, driven by increased participation of women in political decision-making positions.


Source: abs-cbnNEWS.com, dpa, afn, AP