World Bank launches report on women economic empowerment

Islamabad:The gender gap in earnings in Pakistan stands at 18 percent which shows that employed women earn less than their men counterparts. Among the employed, 68 per cent of women work in agriculture compared with only 28 per cent of men. While 84 per cent of men possess a mobile phone, only 35 per cent of women own one.

These statistics make part of the report titled “Women’s Economic Empowerment in Pakistan: An Evidence Guided Toolkit for More Inclusive Policies” launched by World Bank on the occasion of the World Human Rights Day. The report highlights the breadth of the gender gaps in wage employment and entrepreneurship over past 20 years, quantifies the gender gaps in productive assets and highlight key gender challenges with respect to safety, mobility, agency and social norms, and studies the co-related factors besides identifying the policy priorities that can address gender gaps. The report summary was presented by Economist, South Asia Gender Innovation Lab, World Bank Sofia Amaral.

The key findings of the report show that women’s access to and utilisation of computers and internet are limited. A mere 8 per cent of women reported that they had used the internet at least once compared with 22 per cent of men. The gender gap is similarly pronounced in access to computers. While 20 per of men reported that they had used computer once, only 9 per cent of women did so, revealing 11 percentage point gap. This underscores a significant gender gap in digital inclusion.

The report mentions that while account ownership at a financial institution by individuals witnessed a 50 per cent surge globally over the last decade, a more modest increase of approximately 11 percentage points were experienced in Pakistan. Currently only 21 per cent of the population in Pakistan holds an account and around 55 million Pakistani women appear to be unbanked. It says that disparity by gender in account ownership may be attributed to factors such as women’s limited access to official identification document, lack of ownership of mobile phone or other technological devices and lower rate of financial literacy. It says that low level of financial inclusion is particularly worrisome in the case of women entrepreneurs.

The report further says that although women in Pakistan have the legal right to inherit, only one third of women inherit any property from their fathers. In most of the cases, property passes to other family members. A mere 3 per cent of women report that they own home, compared with 72 per cent of men. Additionally, 27 per cent of men own land as compared with only 2 per cent of women.

The report further says that almost a third of women report that they need permission to become employed, a significant barrier to their economic autonomy and participation in the workforce. The lack of autonomy over mobility has profound implications particularly among women entrepreneurs. There is an 18 per cent age point difference in the awareness of market conditions between women who have autonomy over their mobility and women who do not. It says that women perceive public spaces to be unsafe at more than double the rate among men.

The launch event ended with a panel discussion moderated by Country Director for Pakistan, World Bank Najy Benhassine and was participated by Assistant Professor, Lahore School of Economics Zunia Tirmazee, Federal Ombudsperson for Protection Against Harrassment of Women at the Workplace Fauzia Viqar and Senior Joint Director, Agricultural Credit & Financial Inclusion Department, State Bank of Pakistan, Umair Ahmad.