Gender Gap Report 2009

"Women and girls make up one half of the human resources available to the world and it will be imperative that they are educated, empowered and integrated for a rapid economic recovery"

Saadia Zahihi, Director of Head Constituents, World Economic Forum

The World Economic Forum's Gender Gap Report came out yesterday. The Index benchmarks national gender gaps on economic, political, education- and health based criteria, and provides country rankings that allow for effective comparisons across regions and income groups, and over time.

The Global Gender Gap Index ranks countries according to their proximity to gender equality rather than to women’s empowerment. Our aim is to focus on whether the gap between women and men in the chosen variables has declined, rather than whether women are “winning” the “battle of the sexes”. Hence, the Index rewards countries that reach the point where outcomes for women equal those for men, but it neither rewards nor penalizes cases in which women are outperforming men in particular variables.

134 countries were ranked. Both South Africa and Switzerland have made significant improvements from 2008. Cameroon ranks 118th, Kenya ranks 98th, Slovenia ranks 52nd, Russia ranks 51st, and Poland ranks 50th.

check out the full report: http://www.weforum.org/pdf/gendergap/report2009.pdf