Thursday, March 28, 2024

Take practical steps in ensuring gender equality

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The Zambia National Women’s Lobby ZNWL has challenged stakeholders in the country to take practical steps towards ensuring that more women are put in decision making position if the nation is to make major strides in development.

ZNWL Executive Director Juliet Chibuta said gender equality is a key ingredient to development hence the need to have equal participation in the country’s decision making positions.

Speaking at the launch of the gender audit research handbook in Lusaka today Ms. Chibuta said the country still has a long way to go in attaining meaningful gender representation in key decision making positions in both the private and public institutions.

Ms Chibuta explained that the Gender Audit was initiated so as to have a true picture of women’s representation in decision making positions in various institutions and that the findings provides a mirror for organisations in diverse sectors to see the gender balance in their management structures which will help them compare themselves to others in the sector.

She noted that though sidelined, it has been proved that women are prudent managers than men as can be seen from the 2012 research by Credit Suisse on Gender Diversity in Corporate Leadership which indicated that it was more profitable to invest in companies that had women in management.

And Ms Chibuta has noted the need to prioritize gender mainstreaming interventions for the socio-economic empowerment in the country.

She also explained that it is anticipated that the audit will promote greater involvement of women in decision making processes and structures.

Meanwhile Ms. Chibuta explained that today’s launch will be followed by audits every year so as to ascertain women’s participation in decision making positions.

Ms. Chibuta implored or stakeholders to ensure that practical steps are put in place which will ensure gender equality in institutions.

She noted that political parties should not only use women to win votes but also make sure that they are given chances to stand as candidates at local government and parliamentary levels respectively.

1 COMMENT

  1. Actually what is needed is not equality but equity. The two are very much different though usually confused. Even if you do the equality, women will still be oppressed but with equity we all move forward

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