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Arab women call for gender equality on Int'l Women's Day

Xinhua, March 8, 2016 Adjust font size:

Arab female executives and academics said here Tuesday that whilst the region progressed towards better gender equality, more still needs to be done on institutional and mindset levels.

They made the call at the two-day Global Women Leaders Conference in Dubai's Burj Al Arab Hotel.

Rfah Alyami, a Saudi Arabian scholar and professor at the University of Reading in Bolton, the United Kingdom, said "gender equality starts with education for girls, and there still exists room for improvement in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere in the Middle East."

Alyami said that by 2018 all primary and secondary schools for girls in Saudi Arabia will be raised to "development standards," which is an educational level guaranteeing equal teaching and classroom standards similar to boys' schools.

She said she hopes developing countries will follow the Saudi model of raising girls' education levels step-by-step.

Quoting a UNESCO study, Alyami said that if in Sub-Saharan Africa all women completed primary education, there would be 70 percent fewer maternal deaths, thus saving 113,400 women's lives.

Kuwaiti Rana Al-Nibari, CEO of Injaz, a non-profit organization which empowers young Arabs to become business leaders, gave a presentation which showed that Arab countries still rank very low with respect to the global gender gap, according to the World Economic Forum (WEF).

"Barriers facing women's empowerment are low wages due to high unemployment rates, political turmoil and insufficient education and training systems in the Arab world," Al-Nibari said.

Al-Nibari proposed an improvement action plan which includes legislation recognizes women's equal rights constitutionally in most countries, a child care system so that women with families can work, and restructuring labor markets to improve incentives for women in the private sectors.

Shireen Chaya, a business administration instructor at the American University in Dubai, said "it must become essential that women work, as employing women is still viewed as a luxury for companies. We need sustainable job modalities for women." Enditem