BY TSEGAYE TILAHUN
Women thoughmake up almost half of the total global population and contribute significantly to countries’development; their role had always been unnoticed and less valued. Worse than this, they were not accorded equal status with their counterparts and deprived of their basic rights for long. This was reflected in various ways ranging from physical, emotional and sexual violence to powerlessness to make decision, unable to accumulate wealth and assets of their own and being unequal before the law.
Even these days, it is not possible to say that women’s strenuous burdens have lessened as many are still shouldered with some type of constraints and there is still wider gender gap in education and employment opportunities,in places of work and leadership positions. Sadly, some are still denied the right to take decisions, which have a direct and indirect impact on their lives.
Furthermore, in workplaces, women experience untold challenges and they are paid less than men. According to the 2019 UN Women Annual Report, women constitute 70 percent of the world’s poor. Their earning still lags that of their male counterparts.
In fact, progresses are being made to lessen their burden through narrowing gender gap and empowering women. Particularly,efforts are underway to empower women through increasing girls’ enrollment in school, engaging women in income generating activities, increasing their participation in leadership positions and enhancing their decisions making capacities. In turn, encouraging improvements are witnessed.
The situation is not different in Ethiopia. Women, compared with men, have had very limited opportunities in most economic and social activities. The situation though is improved,and much better than it was decades ago, as studies indicate, many women could not realize their goals due to gender based discriminations. Further advancement has been also hampered due to some type of barriers, such as restrictive cultural and traditional practices.
Recently, the Ethiopian Statistics Association in collaboration with the Central Statistics Agency and UN-WOMEN had organized the 29th Annual Conference to deliberate on the matter.
Speaking on the occasion, Fistum Assefa (Ph.D), Planning and Development Commission Commissioner said that there is a gap in due course of providing women with the required attention. Hence, the country is losing potential benefits that could have been produced by the women.
Therefore, gender issues should be a priority agenda and have to come at the forefront of national endeavors to bridge the gaps at all sectors in the country. The government is also committed to enhance women’s participation in entrepreneurship, job creation, agriculture and other sectors. Statisticians should overcome gender issue challenges through ethical values, integrity, professional and technical competence.
As to him, to fill the overall gender gaps, creating a priority environment is important. Women are under-represented as leaders, elected officials, economic beneficiaries and other issues due to cultural and social norms, which limit their participation in the political process power in the government and different institutions. Gender equality can benefit the whole society.
According to studies, in Ethiopia, women’s contributions often go largely unrecognized and their fathers or husbands often restrict access to resources and community participation. One in three women experience physical, emotional or sexual violence.
Investing in empowering women and girls by promoting equal access to education, health, and economic opportunities, creating the opportunities for more equitable participation in society for females will enable to improve their participation.
In Ethiopia, women often face different and more basic economic constraints than men, including less access to financial services, and market information among others. To support women’s ability and improve their participation in every stream, concerned bodies should encourage them and do a lot. Empowering women and enhancing their decision-making ability at all levels in political, economic and public life is crucial to fully exploit their potential and gain long-lasting economic returns.
Gender equality is about ensuring equal rights, opportunities, and fair distribution of resource, power and influence. Gender equality and women’s empowerment are both human rights and are necessary for achieving comprehensive, unbiased, and sustainable development. Thus, women and men should have equal opportunity to make decisions in all sectors. Changing the situation in gender inequality, gender discrimination and unbalance that exit still in many fields, especially in economic benefits is critical to empower women and make them contribute their share to the development of society. However, women are still not involved in the economy and politics as deeply as men and almost in all sectors, there is visible men domination even if the situation is improving to this day. Proportional representation of women in political participation has been progressing.
According to the Commissioner, emphasizing more on gender issues is instrumental in making informed decisions on various, social, economic and political issues that affect the lives of all people including the disadvantaged groups of the society.
“As Ethiopia has been missing a lot of women’s contributions, we have to change the narrative by taking the issues of women into account. Nowadays, the country is investing in women to help them be active participants in a range of engagements,”he added.
Dr. Essey Kebede, Deputy President of the Ethiopian Statistics Association,on his part said, the Association has been performing various activities to develop the profession of statistics.
In Ethiopia, gender equality and equal opportunities have been improving especially at higher government decision making level over recent years. However, there are still large persistent gender gaps between women and men when comparing their educational attainment, labor market participation, income and wage rates and provision of unpaid work and distribution of time.
The economic case for gender equality emphasizes the economic benefits of gender equality at the macro level. In this part, Ethiopia has been making significant progress on several dimensions of gender equality and women’s empowerment although disparities between rural and urban areas and across regions have persisted. Progress also remains slow on women’s educational, economic and inter-personal/familial empowerment.
The Ethiopian Herald 27 March 2021
