Global Gender Gap Report 2006

The Global Gender Gap Report 2006

Watch an interview with author, Saadia Zahidi, Economist and Head, Women Leaders Programme

The Global Gender Gap Report 2006 covers all current and candidate European Union countries, 20 from Latin America and the Caribbean, over 20 from sub-Saharan Africa and 10 from the Arab world. Together, the 115 economies cover over 90% of the world’s population.

The index mainly uses publicly available "hard data" indicators drawn from international organizations and some qualitative information from the Forum’s own Executive Opinion Survey. The Global Gender Gap Report 2006 includes an innovative new methodology including detailed profiles of each economy that provide insight into the economic, legal and social aspects of the gender gap.

The Report measures the size of the gender gap in four critical areas of inequality between men and women:
1. Economic participation and opportunity – outcomes on salaries, participation levels and access to high-skilled employment
2. Educational attainment – outcomes on access to basic and higher level education
3. Political empowerment – outcomes on representation in decision-making structures
4. Health and survival – outcomes on life expectancy and sex ratio
http://www.weforum.org/en/initiatives/gcp/Gender%20Gap/index.htm#interview

http://www.weforum.org/en/initiatives/gcp/Gender%20Gap/Profiles/index.htm

0ut of 115 countries, Australia ranked No 1 on the following. For educatIon, literacy rate and enrolment, the score was 100% equality. Professional and technical workers also scored 100% in Economic Participation and opportunity. We ranked number 8 on equality of income.

Australia also achieved the highest score on
Basic Rights and Social Institutions**
**data on a 0-to-1 scale (1 = worst score, 0 = best score)
Paternal versus maternal authority....... .....0.00
Female genital mutilation.................. ......0.00
Polygamy...................... .....0.00
Legislation punishing acts of violence against women.. ..0.50

The single factor responsible for lowering our overall score is lack of Political Empowerment, most particularly, no female head of state.
Years with female head of state (last 50).........rank 41
The survey appears to disregard suffrage prior to federation.

We also have a problem with Life expectancy.