Gender Equality: India improves, but still ranks 135th out of 146 nations
According to the analysis, Covid-19 has pushed gender parity back a generation, and the global recovery is making matters worse. The WEF said that India's gender gap score reached its seventh-highest level in the previous 16 years.
FollowIndia was placed 135th in terms of gender parity despite a five-place gain since last year due to improved performance in economic participation and opportunity. According to the World Economic Forum's (WEF) annual Gender Gap Report 2022, Iceland is the world's most gender-equal country, followed by Finland, Norway, New Zealand, and Sweden. On the list of 146 countries, just 11 are ranked lower than India, with Afghanistan, Pakistan, Congo, Iran, and Chad ranking lowest.
The WEF cautioned that the cost of living issue is projected to strike women the hardest internationally, with a worsening gender disparity in the labour market, and that closing the gender gap will take another 132 years (compared to 136 in 2021). According to the analysis, Covid-19 has pushed gender parity back a generation, and the global recovery is making matters worse. The WEF said that India's gender gap score reached its seventh-highest level in the previous 16 years, although it remains among the poorest performers across all metrics. "With about 662 million females, India's level of achievement counts substantially on regional rankings," it stated.
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Since 2021, India has made the most substantial and favourable progress in terms of Economic Participation and Opportunity. However, labor-force participation has declined for both men and women since 2021.
However, in the subindex of political empowerment, where India ranks comparatively higher at 48th, the score has declined due to the decreasing percentage of years women have served as head of state during the last 50 years. On the health and survival subindex, India placed 146th and was one of five nations with gender discrepancies more than 5% (the others being Qatar, Pakistan, Azerbaijan, and China).
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Meanwhile, India was placed first in the world for gender parity in primary and secondary education enrollment, and ninth for the role of head of state. India was placed sixth best in South Asia overall, below Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, the Maldives, and Bhutan. India was outperformed by Iran, Pakistan, and Afghanistan.
South Asia has the greatest gender disparity of any region (62.3%), with poor ratings across all evaluated gender gaps and little progress achieved in most nations since 2021. According to the WEF, just one in every five of the 146 economies evaluated has managed to reduce the gender gap by at least 1% in the last year.
(With PTI inputs)
