The Global Gender Gap Report, 2022, was just published by the World Economic Forum. The study provides statistics on the size of the gender gap in a variety of fields, such as political empowerment, economic engagement, health, and educational attainment. As expected, the news is dreadful. Pakistan is doing somewhat better than Afghanistan among 146 nations evaluated in the index, where it is ranked at position 145.
No one should be shocked by the report. Ever since Pakistan’s creation, women have mourned the anguish and pain of being a woman in a male-dominated society. The gaps are really large, and the report is useful if one is curious about just how large they are. Pakistan comes under one of only 16 nations in the world with a gender difference in secondary school enrollment more than 10%. Pakistan’s female education statistics are among the poorest in the world; we are grouped with many Sub-Saharan nations.
It’s also essential to remember that, despite the fact that Western countries are often cited as models of gender equality in education, many other countries, including those in South America, also give both genders equal access to educational possibilities. For those who claim that the indices are set up in a way that guarantees the dominance of Western nations, this should be of interest. Real information is obviously not biased in favor of Western democracies.
Even worse numbers can be found in the section on “health and survival.” Pakistan serves as a warning once more, even if the majority of nations have reduced their gender disparity and many have even attained full gender parity. Pakistan, along with China, India, Azerbaijan, and Qatar, has a gender imbalance of more than 5%. The “son preference” in these nations is one of the causes of this discrepancy, according to the World Economic Forum. This indicates that the natural ratio of male to female births is forcibly changed either by the abortion of female or through the maltreatment and neglect of female newborns, which causes their death before the age of five.
The tale of economic opportunity and involvement is just as bleak, if not, downright lethal. The best performers in this area are those with very little gender inequality in terms of economic involvement, such as Barbados and Burundi. In this area, Afghanistan has the lowest rating, with Pakistan only one place higher.
However, the gender gap is alarmingly wide globally, and it can be found in almost every country on this index. Iran, India, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia are among the nations with the lowest scores, along with Pakistan and Afghanistan. Unfortunately, according to the report of 2022:
Pakistan has the lowest percentage of women in senior, managerial, and legislative positions (4.5%) compared to Jamaica, where they make up 56.6% of workers in those positions, or Togo, where they make up 70.1% of senior positions.
The fact is that Pakistan consistently does poorly on indices linked to gender that can be used to learn few things. First, it seems that nobody in Pakistan, including a lot of women, cares about the insecure status of women. In reality, some educated working women are subjected to so much harassment from men, their families, and society at large that they lack the strength to fight back against their critics. Women who hold quota seats in the legislature are there because their spouse, father, uncle, nephew, or other relative arrange their appointment.
The majority of educated women in Pakistan are aware that the idea of becoming an independent woman is a fantasy unless you have strong enough government or family connections to offer protection from harassment and appointments to lucrative posts. Those who go to foreign countries, their everyday life is still miserable without facing any kind of harrassment. This results in a significant loss of Pakistan’s greatest talent. Pakistani women would be doing a way much better if Pakistani males will not be there to put obstacles in their way. Thus, those fighting it out there, deserves a special praise for their bravery.
The writer is a broadcast journalist based in Islamabad.
