Ensuring gender equality is the right thing, the good thing and a must for the survival of our humanity

ILO Country Office Director Changhee Lee speaks at the "Working together to create a future of diversity and inclusion for enterprises" event

Today is the day we look back and celebrate what we have achieved for advancing gender equality, reflect where more progresses are to be made, and discuss what and how we can work together for creating a future of diversity and inclusion for enterprises.

China has made important progress towards protecting women’s rights through stronger legal frameworks, with the latest amendments to the Women’s Protection Law. We have a great momentum for better future of women and the economy at large in China. We need seize the momentum.

Ensuring gender equality at work and in our society is the right thing to do

Men and women are borne equal and they should enjoy same rights and opportunities. That is why achieving gender equality and empowering all women and girls is a global commitment clearly enshrined in the SDG 5. That is why the UN Global Compact promotes gender equality among its member companies, as the basic human and labour rights. And that is also why the International Labour Organizations(ILO) adopted two fundamental Conventions on gender equality, namely ILO Convention No 100 on Equal Renumeration, and Convention No 111 on Discrimination (Employment and Occupation), that all ILO member states must promote and uphold. A good thing is that the People’s Republic of China ratified both Conventions.

Ensuring gender equality is not just a right thing to do, but also a good thing to do for better business performance and better economic performance

ILO analysis finds that enterprises with gender-balanced boards are almost 20 per cent more likely to have enhanced business outcomes. Accelerating progress towards gender parity will not only improve outcomes for women and girls but benefit economies and societies more widely, reviving growth, boosting innovation and increasing resilience. According to an UN estimate, closing gender gaps in employment could boost GDP per capita by 20 per cent.

And we see some important progresses in the world. One prominent example is that women are surpassing men in higher education and across diverse academic disciplines. More than half (52 per cent) of students awarded a degree in 2020 were women.

Yet if we turn our eyes to workplaces, the picture is not positive. Today, women and men are not yet represented in the workforce on an equal footing. While women make up 50 per cent of the global workforce, their share of employment is just 40 per cent; Fewer women attain management and executive level positions compared to their male counterparts. Women occupy 28 per cent of management positions; globally, across the public and private sectors, women earn on average about 20 per cent less than men.

We know business having gender-inclusive culture requires a critical mass of women in management, senior leadership and on boards of directors - at least at 30 per cent. Unfortunately, most businesses currently do not have this level of gender diversity. The representation of women decreases as the level of management increases, resulting in persistent male dominance in the chief executive level and boards. According to the ILO enterprise survey in 13,000 enterprises of 70 countries, over 78 per cent of enterprises surveyed reported having a male CEO. With increasing enterprise size, the percentage of female CEOs drops from 26 per cent in small enterprises, to 20 per cent in mid-sized enterprises, to only 16 per cent in large enterprises. This is what we call ‘Glass Ceilings’.

But we have another obstacle to gender diversity in the enterprise, which is known as “Glass Walls”. Many managerial positions are segregated by gender. Women are more in management positions with support functions, such as human resources, finance and administration, while men dominate functions that are considered to be more strategic, such as R&D, operations and sales that easily lead to the chief executive level and board membership.

Of course we know many enterprises have introduced various measures to advance gender equality and women empowerment. And I am sure participants today in this event are champions of gender equality at work. And I am very keen to learn about your experiences, progresses and also challenges you face.

However, I must say overall progress has been patchy and, in some cases, the pace of change has not been as fast as it could and should be. To achieve true gender equality at enterprises requires a comprehensive ecosystem from public policy and social infrastructure to enterprise-specific efforts.

More specifically, enterprise should take following approaches;

1. Promoting a gender-inclusive business culture, and adopting a holistic approach to equal opportunity and treatment for women and men, from recruitment to promotion.
2. Making equitable salary offers to men and women who carry out job of equal value, through gender sensitive job evaluation.
3. Ensuring unconscious gender bias does not affect performance reviews.
4. Investing in women for future business leaders. Making jobs more flexible so that more women access higher-level jobs.
5. Creating workplace free from violence and harassment.

Adopting a policy one thing, putting a policy into an action is another. Almost 75 per cent of the enterprises ILO surveyed globally have equal opportunity or diversity and inclusion policies, but more specific actions are needed so that women gain the experiences that prepare them to be promoted to strategic areas of business.

We should do it because it is the right thing to do, because it is the good thing for businesses and workers.

Ensuring gender equality is a must for the survival of our countries and our humanity as well

I would like to share one sad story from Korea, which happens to be where I come from. Korea faces what media call ‘demographic cliff’. Last year fertility rate in Korea fell to 0.72, the lowest in the world. And it is projected to fall below 0.68 in 2024. If this trend continues, the population of South Korea, which stands at around 50 million, would fall below 20 millions in 2100. The New York Times said that the impact of low fertility rates on population in today’s South Korea is more serious than the Black Death in Europe during the Middle Age, which wiped out between one third and half of the total population – in Korea, it would wipe out two thirds of the population! This is not an exaggeration! Now many think the lowest fertility rates is the biggest threat to the national security and development. 

There are many factors for this unfortunate demographic crisis: for example, high education costs, high housing costs. I guess it sounds very familiar to our Chinese friends. China is not as bad as Korea. And I hope you would not follow Korea’s footsteps in this respect. But I am afraid that you may find soon yourself in a similar situation, if no serious and comprehensive efforts are made rather urgently. And one of most important places to make efforts are workplace. If I look at various studies on demographic crisis in Korea, one of most important factors is the lack of gender equality in labour market and at the workplace, combined with highly competitive workplace cultures. Competitive pressures at workplace leaves little space for work-life balance. And when it comes to family responsibilities, whether taking care of children or elderly, whether carrying out daily household work such as cooking, the responsibilities and burdens usually fall on women much more than men though both of them may work. So no wonder many young women have no plan to get married.

So, ensuring gender equality and ensuring family friendly working environment in our workplaces matter for the future of humanity. It is a must we should work together with a sense of urgency.

I would also like to add that creating environment for women to realize their full potential, through empowerment and gender sensitive policies at work, is very crucial for maintaining or even improving national productivity, when overall working age population keep shrinking and when there are skill shortages. There are abundant pools of talented and well educated women whose full potentials are not materialized due to biased system and culture at work. There is plenty of scope for enterprises to build their competitive advantage by tapping into the significant pool of female talent.

Finally, we believe that the whole society must also value and recognize the vital contribution women make to economies through paid and unpaid care work. Women spend around three times more time on unpaid care work than men and if these activities were assigned a monetary value they would account for more than 40 per cent of GDP.

I know today’s participants are all champions of gender equality in your companies, in your organizations, in your families and in your communities. I am very keen to learn from your experiences and eager to discuss how we can bring changes to cultures and practices at the workplaces in every corner of China and the world. It is a right thing to do, a good thing to do, and it is a must for the survival of humanity.