Women’s economic opportunity
A new pilot index and global ranking fromthe Economist Intelligence Unit
Findings and methodology

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Preface
Women’s economic opportunity: A new global index and ranking, is an Economist Intelligence Unitpublication. It presents the results of a global benchmarking model built and scored by the Economist
Intelligence Unit. Leila Butt, Senior Economist, was the research manager, working with Leo Abruzzese,the company’s Editorial Director in North America. William Shallcross advised on construction of themodel and Mike Kenny was responsible for layout and design. We would like to thank the researchers,
economists and gender specialists from dozens of organisations who lent their expertise to this project.
This publication was funded by the World Bank through a Trust Fund ﬁnanced by various donors.
June 2010

For further information, please contact:
Economist Intelligence Unit
Leila Butt, Research Manager:
leilabutt@eiu.com/+1 212 698 9715
Joanne McKenna, Press Ofﬁcer:
joannemckenna@eiu.com/+ 44 (0)20 7576 8188
http://www.eiu.com/sponsor/weo

The ﬁndings, interpretation, and conclusions expressed herein are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily
reﬂect the views of the World Bank, its Board of Executive Directors or the governments they represent.
The World Bank does not guarantee the accuracy of the data included in this work. The boundaries, colours,
denominations, and other information shown on any map in this work do not imply any judgment on the part of theWorld Bank concerning the legal status of any territory or the endorsement or acceptance of such boundaries.
1© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Acknowledgements
The following economists, researchers, gender specialists and country analysts contributed to the report. We thank themfor their participation.
Economist Intelligence Unit specialists and contributors
Justin Alexander, John Andrew, Pascale Balze, Anjalika Bardalai, Tomas Brynjolfsson, Sam Campbell, Margaret Cauley,Sara Constantino, Annamaria De Crescenzio, Vladimir Dohnal, Madelaine Drohan, Clare Dunkley, Kevin Dunning,
Christopher Eads, Tom Ehrbar, Stephen Evans, Hilary Ewing, Rory Fyfe, Arzu Geybullayeva, Edward George, Aiden
Glendinning, Paula Gosis, Megan Greene, Philip Gunson, Ann-Louise Hagger, Joan Hoey, Toby Iles, Maya Imberg, Duncan
Innes-Ker, Ben Jones, Bernard Kennedy, Stephen Keppel, Jane Kinninmont, Monika Kubik-Kwiatkowska, Michele Labrut,
Joseph Lake, Gareth Leather, Joanna Lillis, Andrea Machin, Dan Martin, Alice Mummery, Jiri Nadoba, Tunde Obadina,
James Owen, Robert Powell, Neil Prothero, Fung Siu, Krisztina Radosavljevic-Szilagyi, Patrick Raleigh, Rebecca Ridley,
Margarida Matos Rosa, Federico Barriga Salazar, Mohammed Shakeel, Ondine Smulders, Linda Spahia, Paul Stubbs, SeekMui Sum, Sergei Souglobine, Daniela Terzi-Barbarosie, Pat Thaker, Keren Uziyel, Marja Novak Vogric, Philip Walker, Gerard
Walsh, Karol Zemek.
External contributors
Maria Jose Alcala (United Nations Development Fund for Women), Laura Ardito (Steptoe & Johnson LLP), Alberto Chaia(McKinsey & Company), Letty Chiwara (United Nations Development Fund for Women), Hanny Cueva Beteta (United
Nations Development Fund for Women), Denis Drechsler (previously of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation
and Development, Development Centre), Katherine Giscombe (Catalyst), Caren Grown (American University), Tim
Hanstad (Rural Development Institute), Neville Howlett (PricewaterhouseCoopers), Johannes Jutting (Organisation
for Economic Co-operation and Development, Development Centre), Sophie Lambin (PricewaterhouseCoopers), Sandra
Lawson (Goldman Sachs), Lex Mundi and its global network of leading independent law ﬁrms, Duncan Mayall (Pelham
Bell Pottinger), Rekha Mehra (International Centre for Research on Women), Lesa Mitchell (Kaufmann Foundation),
Inez Murray (Women’s World Banking), Virginia Seitz (Millennium Challenge Corporation), Christine Shields (Standard
Chartered Bank), Janet Stotsky (International Monetary Fund).
Special thanks to the following international experts for their advice and comments: Richard Carey (Organisation for
Economic Co-operation and Development, Development Assistance Committee), Geeta Rao Gupta (International Center
for Research on Women), Ricardo Hausmann (Harvard University), Laura Liswood (Council of Women World Leaders), Jim
O’Neill (Goldman Sachs), John Page (Brookings Institution).

2© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Table of contents
Executive summary

4

Overall Women’s Economic Opportunity rankings table

7

Rankings by income classiﬁcations

8

Regional performance

9

Scoring criteria and categories

10

Potential drivers of women’s economic opportunity

12

1 Labour Policy and Practice13

2 Access to Finance23

3 Education and Training

29

4 Women’s Legal and Social Status

34

Methodology

39

Country pages

45

Appendix I
The economic research behind selected indicators

103

1 Labour Policy and Practice103

2 Access to Finance112

3 Education and Training

117

4 Women’s Legal and Social Status

120

Appendix II
Sources and deﬁnitions of the Women’s Economic Opportunity Index
1 Labour Policy and Practice127

2 Access to Finance132

3 Education and Training

133

4 Women’s Legal and Social Status

135

5 General business environment

137

Appendix III
Principal Components Analysis

3

127

138

© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Executive summary
Women’s political and economic empowerment has been a deﬁning feature of the last century. Millions
of women in the early 1900s rejected convention and ignorance to ﬁght for the right to vote. Thirty years
later the daughters and granddaughters of those suffragettes, defying stereotypes, ﬂocked to factories
to help build the machines that won the second world war. The next generation of women secured theirrights in law, then entered the workforce in droves, fuelling economic growth in the 1980s and 1990s.
At the start of the 21st century women are not just enfranchised and fully engaged in the workplace,but leading global corporations and countries of every size. Germany’s Angela Merkel, Liberia’s EllenJohnson-Sirleaf, and Pepsico’s Indra Nooyi are three among many.
Yet after a century of impressive progress, overall economic opportunities for women still lag thoseof men. Women, on average, earn 75% of their male co-workers’ wages, and the difference cannot be
explained solely by schooling or experience. In many countries, women have fewer educational andemployment opportunities than men, are more often denied credit, and endure social restrictions that
limit their chances for advancement. In some developing countries women still cannot vote, own property
or venture outside the home without a male family member.
To gain a better understanding of the factors that inﬂuence women’s economic opportunity—and
how countries have addressed them—the Economist Intelligence Unit constructed a pilot Women’s
Economic Opportunity Index, the ﬁrst of its kind. This index builds on, and extends, prior work done by
the UN Development Programme on its Gender-related Development Index (GDI) and the World Economic
Forum’s Global Gender Gap Index. Women’s economic opportunity is deﬁned as a set of laws, regulations,practices, customs and attitudes that allow women to participate in the workforce under conditions
roughly equal to those of men, whether as wage-earning employees or as owners of a business. The goalof this Index is to spur debate and research on the factors that affect women’s ability to access jobs andbusiness opportunities. It is also intended to prompt improvements in policy and programmes that willencourage women’s participation in the workplace and thus create more productive economies overall.
Working closely with a panel of experts and advisers, determinants of women’s economic opportunity
in the formal sector were identiﬁed, from educational attainment to legal and regulatory restrictions.
Gender-related data were collected and analysed from a wide range of trusted international sources,
including the World Bank, the UN, the International Labour Organisation (ILO), the World Economic
Forum and the OECD. Existing datasets were supplemented with new indicators created and scored by
the Economist Intelligence Unit’s own team of analysts and contributors. The new indicators attempt to4© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

capture information that research shows is important to women’s economic opportunity but for which
there are no globally comparable data, such as access to childcare and the availability of training for
women running small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The determinants of women’s economic
opportunity are listed in the Scoring criteria and categories section (page 10), and are discussed in the
Potential drivers of women’s economic opportunity part of this report (page 12). They are reviewed ingreater detail in Appendix I, which provides supporting literature (page 103), and in Appendix II, which
explains scoring and coding (page 127) .
The result is a new ranking of economic opportunity for women in 113 economies. Sweden, Belgium
and Norway occupy the top spots in the Index. These countries have particularly open labour markets for
women, high levels of educational achievement, and liberal legal and social regimes. However, the index
tells other stories as well. Hong Kong (China) performs best in the Asia region, ranking in the top 25%
in most categories. Mauritius is Africa’s best ﬁnisher; its labour policies are among the most favourable
to women in the region. Excluding Canada and the US, Brazil edges Chile and Mexico for the best scorein the Americas. Eastern European countries, especially Bulgaria, have particularly balanced labour-law
protections, although retirement ages for men and women are often different. Tunisia comes ﬁrst in
Northern Africa, and Sri Lanka in Southern Asia.
The index reveals laggards as well as leaders. Chad, Yemen and Sudan ﬁll the bottom three spots in
the index. Only 20% of women in Chad can read and write, and teenage girls are more likely to become
pregnant there than anywhere else.
The 26 indicators in the index were selected from among hundreds of choices. Topic-speciﬁc working
groups—on labour policy and practice, for example—were assembled to review the options and makerecommendations. Although the choice of indicators involved an element of subjectivity, the extensive
literature on women’s economic empowerment pointed in important directions. For example, researchsuggests that the guarantee of maternity leave, particularly paid leave, will raise women’s participationin the labour force before giving birth and increase the likelihood of a return to work when the leaveends (see Appendix I). However, who pays the beneﬁts also matters, since employers are more likely tohire women if maternity leave is provided under a universal system ﬁnanced by taxes or insurance than
through one in which the employer shoulders the full amount. Hence, a sophisticated maternity leaveindicator has been included in the benchmarking model that takes into account both these aspects,
as well as the length of maternity leave provided. Although the determinants of women’s economic
opportunity are not understood perfectly, metrics were included from every step of the social andeconomic value chain—from primary education and adolescent fertility to ﬁnancial access and differential
retirement age.
No index of this kind can ever be perfect. This one focuses entirely on the formal sector—jobs thatusually have set hours and agreed levels of pay, and that are reﬂected in national accounts. Many women,
especially in lower-income economies, work in the informal sector, where activity is often untaxed andnot usually counted by the authorities, but also where labour rights and contracts cannot be enforced.
While informal employment can lead to short-term gains, these may be outweighed by informality’s longterm negative impact on economic growth and job creation. For example, a study in Mexico found that5

© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

1. J R de Laiglesia, R Bazillier, R
S Parker, U Quijano, A Saracho,
A Scorza and V Scorza, “Workand Well-Being in Mexico:
Integrating the Employment
and Social Development
Agendas”, draft report prepared
for the Mexican Ministry ofSocial Development, OECD
Development Centre: Pairs,
2008. Cited in Is Informal
Normal? Towards More and Better
Jobs in Developing Countries,
OECD Development Centre: Paris,
2009.

6

women moving from informal to formal employment enjoyed a signiﬁcant increase in earnings.1 Even so,
including only the formal sector almost certainly understates the economic opportunities for women inpoorer countries. Yet the absence of reliable data on informal employment made it impossible to include aquantitative evaluation of this type. Future editions of the Index will probably take greater account of theinformal sector.
The indicators in this Index are embedded in a model that offers a wide range of analytical tools,
allowing a deeper investigation of the standing of women globally. Users can, for example, restrict theiranalysis to include only low-income or middle-income countries (see the tables that follow), or just thosein a particular region. Any two countries may be compared directly, and correlations between indicators
can be examined. Each country can also be proﬁled, permitting a deeper dive into the structure ofwomen’s economic opportunity. Importantly, the weights assigned to each indicator can be changed toreﬂect different assumptions about the importance of categories and indicators. The model also allows
the ﬁnal scores to be benchmarked against external factors that may potentially inﬂuence women’s
economic empowerment. For example, many of the countries that offer the best opportunities for womenare also among the world’s most democratic.
Indeed, this new index is intended to spur further debate on the drivers of, and constraints on,
women’s economic opportunity. The results ultimately were validated against existing externalbenchmarks, such as the ratio of female-to-male participation in the labour force. The scores were also
correlated against other standards of women’s achievement, such as the UN Development Programme’s
Gender Empowerment Measure. The index was reviewed at critical stages by a peer panel of international
development and gender experts.
The index breaks new ground by focusing speciﬁcally on a country-by-country comparison of economic
opportunities for women, going beyond a measurement of gender gaps. For that reason it includes
an assessment of the national business environments in which women must function. The index alsobuilds on well-established legal codes, such as the ILO’s annual evaluation of equal-pay conventions;in this case, the project team created a scoring scheme based on the ILO’s written assessments. Entirely
new qualitative measures were also created, including an Economist Intelligence Unit assessment of
whether customary practice overrides statutory law in matters of gender equality, speciﬁcally in property
ownership. Owning property can increase a woman’s access to credit, and may confer broader social andeconomic beneﬁts, including enhanced food security, wealth, authority and a greater propensity to makeinvestments in land or property.
A ﬁnal goal of the Women’s Economic Opportunity Index is to promote the collection of comparable,
sex-disaggregated data that will encourage further research and dialogue on the binding constraints towomen’s economic opportunities. This is a pilot project; future indices will look to include a wider groupof countries; time and data availability limited geographic reach for this ﬁrst effort. Even so, we havechosen a representative sample from each geographical region to be as inclusive as possible and allow forcross-country comparisons. New and better data sources will also be considered as they become available.
For now, this index opens a window on to the landscape in which women live and work, acknowledging
countries that are coming closer to full equity and challenging those that still have work to do.

© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Overall Women’s Economic Opportunity rankings table

Unweighted total of all category scores(0-100 where 100=most favourable)
Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29

SwedenBelgium
NorwayFinlandGermany
IcelandNetherlands
New Zealand
CanadaAustralia
FrancePortugal
Denmark
United Kingdom
United States
Ireland
Hungary
Switzerland
Austria
Bulgaria
Slovenia
Czech RepublicHong Kong, China
Luxembourg
Lithuania
Spain
Estonia
IsraelGreece

88.2
86.4
85.3
85.2
83.9
82.9
82.5
81.2
80.5
80.5
79.4
78.3
77.6
76.8
76.7
76.4
75.3
75.0
74.0
73.3
73.2
73.1
72.9
71.9
71.6
70.5
70.4
70.2
69.4

30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58

LatviaItaly
Japan
PolandSingapore
Korea, Rep.
Slovak Republic
Mauritius
BrazilRomania
Chile
MexicoSouth Africa
Croatia
Tunisia
Uruguay
PanamaArgentina
Thailand
Malaysia
Albania
Costa Rica
Colombia
UkrainePeru
SerbiaKazakhstan
Armenia
Dominican Republic

68.5
68.3
68.2
68.0
66.7
66.2
65.2
64.0
61.2
61.0
60.9
60.4
60.3
59.8
59.7
59.2
58.2
58.0
56.8
55.3
54.9
54.7
54.4
53.7
53.0
52.7
52.1
51.6
51.5

59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87

Namibia
Moldova
El Salvador
Egypt
Philippines
RussiaChina
BahrainGeorgia
TurkeyParaguay
United Arab Emirates
Botswana
Honduras
Sri Lanka
Venezuela
Ecuador
KuwaitNicaragua
MoroccoVietnam
Oman
JordanIndonesia
Tanzania
India
Azerbaijan
Ghana
Kyrgyz Republic

51.0
51.0
50.9
50.5
50.4
50.3
49.4
49.3
49.2
49.2
49.0
48.6
48.3
48.2
47.5
47.4
46.5
46.4
45.6
44.1
43.7
43.7
43.5
43.1
42.7
42.7
42.5
42.3
42.2

88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113

LebanonBenin
Kenya
Bolivia
Cambodia
Algeria
SenegalMalawi
ZambiaUgandaSaudi Arabia
Nigeria
Laos
Madagascar
Burkina Faso
Iran
Bangladesh
Cameroon
Syria
Ethiopia
Pakistan
Togo
Côte d’Ivoire
Chad
Yemen
Sudan

41.9
41.4
41.3
39.8
39.2
38.5
38.0
37.3
36.9
36.8
35.9
35.7
35.7
35.2
34.9
33.0
32.6
32.2
31.7
31.3
29.9
29.2
28.9
25.2
19.2
14.5

7

© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Rankings by income classiﬁcations

Overall Women’s Economic Opportunity score by income group (World Bank classiﬁcations)
Unweighted total of all category scores (0-100 where 100=most favourable)

High income(US$11,909 or more)

Upper middle income(US$3,856–US$11,905)

Lower middle income(US$976-US$3,855)

Low income(US$975 or less)

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38

SwedenBelgium
NorwayFinlandGermany
IcelandNetherlands
New Zealand
CanadaAustralia
FrancePortugal
Denmark
United Kingdom
United States
Ireland
Hungary
Switzerland
Austria
Slovenia
Czech RepublicHong Kong, China
Luxembourg
Spain
Estonia
IsraelGreeceItaly
Japan
Singapore
Korea, Rep.
Slovak Republic
Croatia
Bahrain
United Arab Emirates
KuwaitOman
Saudi Arabia

88.2
86.4
85.3
85.2
83.9
82.9
82.5
81.2
80.5
80.5
79.4
78.3
77.6
76.8
76.7
76.4
75.3
75.0
74.0
73.2
73.1
72.9
71.9
70.5
70.4
70.2
69.4
68.3
68.2
66.7
66.2
65.2
59.8
49.3
48.6
46.4
43.7
35.9

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27

Bulgaria
Lithuania
LatviaPolandMauritius
BrazilRomania
Chile
MexicoSouth Africa
Uruguay
PanamaArgentina
Malaysia
Costa Rica
Colombia
Peru
SerbiaKazakhstan
Dominican Republic
Namibia
RussiaTurkeyBotswana
Venezuela
LebanonAlgeria

73.3
71.6
68.5
68.0
64.0
61.2
61.0
60.9
60.4
60.3
59.2
58.2
58.0
55.3
54.7
54.4
53.0
52.7
52.1
51.5
51.0
50.3
49.2
48.3
47.4
41.9
38.5

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29

Tunisia
ThailandAlbania
UkraineArmenia
Moldova
El Salvador
Egypt
Philippines
China
GeorgiaParaguay
Honduras
Sri Lanka
EcuadorNicaragua
MoroccoJordanIndonesia
India
Azerbaijan
Bolivia
Nigeria
Iran
Cameroon
Syria
PakistanCôte d’Ivoire
Sudan

59.7
56.8
54.9
53.7
51.6
51.0
50.9
50.5
50.4
49.4
49.2
49.0
48.2
47.5
46.5
45.6
44.1
43.5
43.1
42.7
42.5
39.8
35.7
33.0
32.2
31.7
29.9
28.9
14.5

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19

Vietnam
Tanzania
Ghana
Kyrgyz Republic
Benin
Kenya
Cambodia
SenegalMalawi
ZambiaUgandaLaosMadagascar
Burkina Faso
Bangladesh
Ethiopia
Togo
Chad
Yemen

43.7
42.7
42.3
42.2
41.4
41.3
39.2
38.0
37.3
36.9
36.8
35.7
35.2
34.9
32.6
31.3
29.2
25.2
19.2

8

© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Regional performance

Macro-geographical regions created by the United Nations Statistics Division
Overall Women’s Economic Opportunity score by region
Unweighted total of all category scores (0-100 where 100=most favourable)
Regional table (overall score)
AfricaAmericas

EuropeAsia

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25

MauritiusSouth Africa
Tunisia
Namibia
Egypt
Botswana
MoroccoTanzania
Ghana
Benin
Kenya
Algeria
SenegalMalawi
ZambiaUgandaNigeria
Madagascar
Burkina Faso
Cameroon
Ethiopia
Togo
Côte d’Ivoire
Chad
Sudan

64.0
60.3
59.7
51.0
50.5
48.3
44.1
42.7
42.3
41.4
41.3
38.5
38.0
37.3
36.9
36.8
35.7
35.2
34.9
32.2
31.3
29.2
28.9
25.2
14.5

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19

CanadaUnited States
BrazilChile
MexicoUruguay
PanamaArgentina
Costa Rica
Colombia
Peru
Dominican Republic
El Salvador
Paraguay
Honduras
Venezuela
EcuadorNicaragua
Bolivia

80.5
76.7
61.2
60.9
60.4
59.2
58.2
58.0
54.7
54.4
53.0
51.5
50.9
49.0
48.2
47.4
46.5
45.6
39.8

Country

Score

New ZealandAustralia

81.2
80.5

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34

SwedenBelgium
NorwayFinlandGermany
IcelandNetherlands
FrancePortugal
Denmark
United Kingdom
Ireland
Hungary
Switzerland
Austria
Bulgaria
Slovenia
Czech Republic
Luxembourg
Lithuania
Spain
Estonia
GreeceLatvia
Italy
PolandSlovak Republic
Romania
Croatia
Albania
UkraineSerbiaMoldova
Russia

88.2
86.4
85.3
85.2
83.9
82.9
82.5
79.4
78.3
77.6
76.8
76.4
75.3
75.0
74.0
73.3
73.2
73.1
71.9
71.6
70.5
70.4
69.4
68.5
68.3
68.0
65.2
61.0
59.8
54.9
53.7
52.7
51.0
50.3

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33

Hong Kong, China
IsraelJapan
Singapore
Korea, Rep.
Thailand
Malaysia
Kazakhstan
Armenia
Philippines
China
BahrainGeorgia
TurkeyUnited Arab Emirates
Sri Lanka
KuwaitVietnam
Oman
JordanIndonesia
India
Azerbaijan
Kyrgyz Republic
LebanonCambodia
Saudi Arabia
Laos
Iran
Bangladesh
Syria
Pakistan
Yemen

72.9
70.2
68.2
66.7
66.2
56.8
55.3
52.1
51.6
50.4
49.4
49.3
49.2
49.2
48.6
47.5
46.4
43.7
43.7
43.5
43.1
42.7
42.5
42.2
41.9
39.2
35.9
35.7
33.0
32.6
31.7
29.9
19.2

9

OceaniaRank

1
2© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Scoring criteria and categories
The Women’s Economic Opportunity Index is a dynamic quantitative and qualitative scoring model,
constructed from 26 indicators, that measures speciﬁc attributes of the environment for women
employees and entrepreneurs in 113 economies.
Five category scores are calculated from the unweighted mean of underlying indicators and scaled from
0-100, where 100=most favourable. These categories are: Labour policy and practice (which comprises
two sub-categories: Labour policy and Labour practice); Access to ﬁnance; Education and training;
Women’s legal and social status; and the General business environment. Each category or sub-category
features either four or ﬁve underlying indicators.
The overall score (from 0-100) is calculated from a simple average of the unweighted category andindicator scores. That is, every indicator contributes equally to their parent category and every category
contributes equally to the overall score. This is the baseline overall score for the Women’s Economic
Opportunity Index.
Principal Components Analysis (PCA) was also conducted on the model (for further details on thiseconometric technique please refer to Appendix III) to ensure relevance and robustness of the chosen
indicators and categories. The results obtained from the unweighted model were very similar to thoseusing PCA, suggesting that the indicators and categories in the model had a direct bearing on women’s
economic opportunity. Generally equal weights across categories and indicators is a sign of very little
redundancy across sub-groups and similar importance in explaining variation in the Index.
The categories and indicators are:1)

Labour policy and practice1.a) Labour policy
1.a.1) Equal pay for equal work: ILO Equal Remuneration Convention (No 100); country progress inaligning national policy with the terms of the Convention
1.a.2) Non-discrimination: ILO Discrimination (Employment and Occupation) Convention (No 111);
country progress in aligning national policy with the terms of the Convention
1.a.3) Maternity and paternity leave and provision (a composite indicator that assesses the length ofmaternity and paternity leave, and maternity beneﬁts coverage)
1.a.4) Legal restrictions on job types for women
1.a.5) Difference between the statutory (pensionable) retirement age between men and women
1.b) Labour practice
1.b.1) Equal pay for equal work: ILO Equal Remuneration Convention (No 100); country progress inenforcing the provisions of the Convention
1.b.2) Non-discrimination: ILO Discrimination (Employment and Occupation) Convention (No 111);
country progress in enforcing the provisions of the Convention
10© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

1.b.3) Degree of de facto discrimination against women in the workplace
1.b.4) Availability, affordability and quality of childcare services, as well as the role of the extended
family in providing childcare
2)
2.1)
2.2)
2.3)
2.4)

Access to ﬁnance
Building credit histories (a composite measure of the ability to build a credit history)
Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes (availability of outreach programmes to women thattarget the provision of ﬁnancial services through either government initiatives or private lenders)
Delivering ﬁnancial services
Private-sector credit as a percent of Gross Domestic Product (this indicator has been banded toreﬂect both risk (unsustainable levels of credit that could result in macroeconomic instability), as
well as poor ﬁnancing conditions (low levels of credit availability)

3)
3.1)
3.2)
3.3)
3.4)

Education and training
School life expectancy (primary and secondary); women
School life expectancy (tertiary); women
Adult literacy rate; women
Existence of government or non-government programmes offering small and medium-sizedenterprise (SME) support/development training

4)
4.1)
4.2)
4.3)

Women’s legal and social status
Addressing violence against women (existence of laws protecting women against violence)
Freedom of movement (opportunity to move freely outside the house) for women
Property ownership rights (this indicator considers if men and women have equal ownership rights
over moveable and immoveable property both by law and in practice)
Adolescent fertility rate (age-speciﬁc fertility rate per 1,000 women, 15-19 years of age)Country ratiﬁcation of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against
Women (CEDAW)

4.4)
4.5)

5)
5.1)
5.2)
5.3)
5.4)

General business environment
Regulatory quality
Procedures, duration, cost and paid-in minimum capital for starting a business (a composite
measure for starting a business)
Infrastructure risk
Mobile cellular phone subscribers per 100 inhabitants

A detailed explanation of each indicator and the sources is given in Appendix I.

11© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Potential drivers of women’s economic
opportunity
The thematic categories and individual indicators in the pilot Women’s Economic Opportunity Index wereselected over the course of 18 months by teams of researchers and gender specialists. Many possibilities
were reviewed and analysed. This section provides an overview of the key categories that comprise theIndex, and includes a discussion of many of the indicators. For more information on speciﬁc indicators,
including empirical evidence behind the choices, please see Appendix I. For details on the scoring
schemes for each indicator, as well as sources and deﬁnitions, see Appendix II. The benchmarking modelfor the Women’s Economic Opportunity Index, as well as the full dataset, is available on the Economist
Intelligence Unit’s website, at http://www.eiu.com/sponsor/WEO, and we encourage researchers to use
these data.

12© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

1 Labour Policy and Practice
Indicators in this category:Labour Policy
1.a.1) Equal pay for equal work: ILO Equal Remuneration Convention (No 100); country progress inaligning national policy with the terms of the Convention
1.a.2) Non-discrimination: ILO Discrimination (Employment and Occupation) Convention (No 111);
country progress in aligning national policy with the terms of the Convention
1.a.3) Maternity and paternity leave and provision (a composite indicator that assesses the length ofmaternity and paternity leave and maternity beneﬁts coverage)
1.a.4) Legal restrictions on job types for women
1.a.5) Difference between the statutory (pensionable) retirement age between men and womenLabour Practice
1.b.1) Equal pay for equal work: ILO Equal Remuneration Convention (No 100); country progress inenforcing the provisions of the Convention
1.b.2) Non-discrimination: ILO Discrimination (Employment and Occupation) Convention (No 111);
country progress in enforcing the provisions of the Convention
1.b.3) Degree of de facto discrimination against women in the workplace
1.b.4) Availability, affordability and quality of childcare services, as well as the role of the extended
family in providing childcare
Please note that this section includes a discussion of some, but not all, of the above indicators

2. International Labour
Organisation Employment
Trends, “Women in labour
markets: Measuring progress andidentifying challenges”, 978-922-123319-0 (web print) (ISBN).
ILO: Geneva, 2010.
3. “Global employment trends
for women”, International
Labour Organisation: Geneva,
March 2009.
4. “Gender (in)equality
in the labour market: an
overview of global trends anddevelopments”, International
Trade Union Confederation:
Brussels, March 2009.

13

Women are the world’s most underutilised resource. According to the International Labour Organisation(ILO), female labour force participation reached just 51.7% in 2008 (up from 50.2% in 1980), well
below the 77.7% rate for men.2 More positively, the share of women in salaried employment rose by
4.5 percentage points between 1999 and 2008, to 47.3%. Yet women are still paid less than their malecounterparts, and men continue to dominate in sectors with higher wage-earning potential, such astechnology and ﬁnance. Women, meanwhile, are overrepresented in “feminised” professions such asteaching and nursing. This is partly explained by the fact that women often choose to ﬁnd jobs that allow
them to balance work and family commitments. “[W]omen are too often trapped in insecure employment
situations with low productivity and low earnings … [and] face persistent earnings gaps which cannot
always be justiﬁed by differences in skills, experience, or tenure”, according to the ILO.3
Equal pay, codiﬁed in law, is a principal step in providing a level playing ﬁeld for women. Yet research
indicates that wage differentials between men and women still exist in all countries. According to theInternational Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), the average gender pay gap was 22.4% in 2008, basedon a survey of 20 developing and developed countries.4 This varied from a high of 38.5% in Brazil to a lowof 11.1% in Paraguay.
© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

The Equal pay for equal work indicator shows that although most countries covered in the pilot
Women’s Economic Opportunity Index have legislation that enshrines the principle of equal pay,
implementation remains weak, owing to a lack of ﬁnancial resources and trained personnel. In Europe,
where policy is generally good, enforcement remains weak, albeit substantially better than in Africa andAsia. In the Index, Germany, Finland and Denmark earned the top score for implementation of equal pay
provisions, along with the US and Canada.
Mandating equality of opportunity and treatment in employment (captured by the Non-discrimination
indicator) is another important step in providing full opportunities for women. As with equal pay,
however, many countries boast good policies but weak enforcement. According to the ILO, “economic
independence or at least co-determination in resource distribution within the family is highest when
women earn wages and salaries or are employers, lower when they are own-account workers and lowest
when they are contributing family workers.” 5 For this indicator, the Americas region posts similar
performance to Europe on average, both in terms of policy and practice. Policies and enforcement
mechanisms lag behind in Asia and Africa.
Even when women are employed in male-dominated ﬁelds, they are often confronted with a “glassceiling”—an implicit form of discrimination—that may discourage them from working and that impedes
career progress. For example, only 2% of CEOs of Fortune 500 companies, and 5% of those in the FTSE
stock index, are women. In Turkey this ﬁgure is 12%, on par with Norway, and Brazil has 11% of womenCEOs, making them among the economies with the highest percentage of female CEOs (World Economic
Forum 2010).6 Perceived opportunities for women to rise to senior management positions are captured by

Equal pay for equal work
ILO Convention 100 (average score)
PolicyPractice

8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
5. “Global employment trends
for women”, International
Labour Organisation: Geneva,
March 2009.
6. “The corporate gender gap
report 2010”, World Economic
Forum: Geneva, March 201014

0
Africa(25 countries in region)

Americas(19 countries in region)Asia(33 countries in region)

Europe(34 countries in region)

Oceania(2 countries in region)

Source: Creation of a coding and scoring scheme by the Economist Intelligence Unit based on International Labour Organisation documents.
Geographical regions created by the United Nations Statistics Division.
Due to data limitations the model does not cover every country in the world. As a result, country coverage within each region is not always
complete. Expanded country coverage is expected in future editions of the model.

© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Non-discrimination in employment and occupation
ILO Convention 111 (average score)
PolicyPractice

8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
Africa(25 countries in region)

Americas(19 countries in region)Asia(33 countries in region)

Europe(34 countries in region)

Oceania(2 countries in region)

Source: Creation of a coding and scoring scheme by the Economist Intelligence Unit based on International Labour Organisation documents.
Geographical regions created by the United Nations Statistics Division.
Due to data limitations the model does not cover every country in the world. As a result, country coverage within each region is not always
complete. Expanded country coverage is expected in future editions of the model.

the Degree of de facto discrimination against women indicator, which is a survey response taken fromthe World Economic Forum. It asks if businesses provide women the same opportunities as men to rise topositions of leadership.
The Index also captures explicit forms of discrimination in the labour market, such as legal restrictions
on women working in certain sectors. Although many of these limitations were originally envisaged associal protections, such legislation has a negative impact on a woman’s equality of opportunity, reducing
the range of available options. In addition, some of these restrictions, which aim to protect maternal
health, could have adverse effects on men’s health as well. About 60 countries in the Index have at least
one legal restriction on the types of jobs that women can ﬁll, and these apply even when they are notpregnant or nursing. According to the Index, Colombia, France, Morocco, Sudan and Vietnam have thehighest number of restrictions, at four each.
In Lebanon, for example, women cannot be employed in sectors involving metal work, alcohol
production, tanning, butchering and mining. Thailand prohibits women from work that entails driving
or operating a vehicle, using vibrating machinery and engines, and working on a boat, among otherlimitations. In Morocco, women cannot hold posts in certain ministries (the Ministries of Interior, Civil
Protection, National Defence and National Security).
Some countries have also legislated a differentiated retirement age for men and women (that is,
the statutory pensionable age may be different for men and women). In some countries, it is necessary(mandatory) to retire at the statutory pensionable age. Differentiated retirement ages are sometimes
conceived as a social protection for women. But if there is a difference in retirement ages between the two
15© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Restrictions on job types for women who are not pregnant or nursing(% of total restrictions)

Restrictions on the lifting of heavy weights, arduous work or labour beyond a woman’s strength33

Restrictions on work with hazardous materials (chemicals, lead gases etc.)

4

Restrictions on work that threatens a women’s future maternity/reproductive functions

2

Restrictions on work that threatens women’s general mental and physical health(dangerous, harmful or injurious work)

32

Restrictions on work that is against women’s morals

11

Restrictions on manual work in mines, quarries, underground or in water

24

Restrictions on operating or utilising certain machinery

5

There are no explicit restrictions on women in the labour code,
but the possibility of a restriction is implied

5

Source: Creation of a coding and scoring scheme by the Economist Intelligence
Unit based on documents from the International Labour Organisation and theWorld Bank Group's Women, Business and the Law Database.

sexes, women’s economic opportunities may be affected. This is especially so because women have longer
life expectancy than men but typically have lower retirement savings and/or pensions due to lower lifetime
earnings. This is the result of both lower wages and fewer years in the labour market—women often taketime off to look after children. A shorter career may also make it less attractive for women to invest in
professional education, or for employers to provide on-the-job training. This may reduce opportunities forpromotion to more senior positions—as will the shorter time spent in employment—further exacerbating
the “glass ceiling” effect. According to the Index, 51 economies recommend different retirement ages for
women and men, and 13 actually make it mandatory to retire at a speciﬁc age.
Inequality in labour opportunities and outcomes can occur because a disproportionate share of
unpaid work falls on women. Social protection schemes, such as the provision of maternity leave andbeneﬁts, in addition to access to childcare, help to mitigate this. The design of maternity leave andbeneﬁts coverage schemes is a complex issue, as it affects both women’s employment outcomes andchildren’s cognitive development. Only two countries in the Index do not have legislation mandating
maternity leave beneﬁts—the US and Australia. (On May 12th 2009 the Australian government committed

Difference between the statutory (pensionable) retirement age between men and women(% of countries)
No difference

Difference of up to 3 years

Difference of 3 or more years

Africa (25 countries)
88

4

8

Americas (19 countries)
53

5

42

Asia (33 countries)
39

6

52

Europe (34 countries)
44

9

47

Oceania (2 countries)
50

0

16

20

50

Source: International Labour Organisation; Social Security Online.
40
60
80
100
Geographical regions created by the United Nations Statistics Division.
Due to data limitations the model does not cover every country in the world. As a result, country coverage withineach region is not always complete. Expanded country coverage is expected in future editions of the model.

© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

A$731m to create a paid parental leave scheme; it takes effect January 1st 2011. The new legislation is
not reﬂected in the Index, which considers conditions in 2009.) Of the countries covered in the Index,
49 provide at least 14 weeks of maternity leave (the standard set by the ILO in Convention 183) with
beneﬁts covered by social insurance or public funds (universal coverage). Universal coverage is thepreferred option, as it reduces the perceived cost to an organisation of hiring women of child-bearing age.
The second-best option is a mixed system, whereby both the employer and the state provide maternity
beneﬁts coverage, followed by schemes that are wholly funded by the employer. There are 63 countries
in the Index that provide universal coverage and a further 19 offer beneﬁts as part of a mixed system—
although the length of maternity leave is less than the ILO’s standard of 14 weeks in some cases.
Some countries also have maternity policies that cover the self-employed, which is of particular
relevance to women entrepreneurs. In the interest of gender equality, some countries have also
introduced paternity leave, but coverage is spottier, with just 34 countries offering some level of leave.
Access to childcare also enhances women’s employment and entrepreneurship opportunities by
allowing mothers to divide childcare responsibilities with others (be they family members, or paid
professional carers), thus giving them time to pursue work outside the home. The access to childcare

Maternity leave and benefits coverage(Overall score multiplied by share of women in non-agricultural wage employment, average sub-regional score)(0) Number of countries in each region
3.0

2.5

2.0

1.5

1.0

Note: For further details on the construction of the indicator please refer to Appendix II.

Western Europe (7)Southern Europe (8)Northern Europe (10)Eastern Europe (9)Western Asia (14)Australia and New Zealand (2)Source: Creation of a coding and scoring scheme by the Economist Intelligence Unit based on documents from theInternational Labour Organisation and Social Security Online.

South-Eastern Asia (8)Southern Asia (5)Eastern Asia (4)Central Asia (2)Northern America (2)South America (10)Central America (6)Caribbean (1 country)

Western Africa (7)Southern Africa (3)Northern Africa (5)Middle Africa (2)0.0Eastern Africa (8)0.5

Geographical sub-regions created by the United Nations Statistics Division.
Due to data limitations the model does not cover every country in the world. As a result, country coverage withineach sub-region is not always complete. Expanded country coverage is expected in future editions of the model.

17© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

7. “Women’s Economic
Participation: Enablers,
Barriers, Responses”,
PricewaterhouseCoopers, 2007.

18

indicator considers the availability, affordability and quality of childcare services across countries.
It scores not only access to paid professional care (including for the purposes of this indicator, earlychildhood education), but also considers the role of the extended family in providing childcare.
Within the extended family, only care provided by adult family members was taken into account;
Economist Intelligence Unit analysts did not score care provided by older siblings positively since such
responsibilities may rob older children (especially girls) of time to study and play.
Publicly funded, full-time places in childcare centres are widely available in Norway—which is one of
twelve economies that have the maximum score for this indicator—although there is a shortage of placesin rural areas and in some parts of big cities. The government pays between 75% and 100% of the cost ofchildcare, and there is also a cash beneﬁt covering children up to three years of age (for up to 23 months) if
the child does not (or cannot) make use of state-ﬁnanced day care centres. School after-care is available toall children aged six to nine, with municipalities determining the proportion of the cost paid by parents.
In Hungary—another country that fares well in the Index for access to childcare—services are publicly
provided as part of the social beneﬁts scheme. However, the labour participation rate of women withchildren under the age of six is a signiﬁcant 35 percentage points below that of women with no children
or older children. (The corresponding difference is 20 percentage points in Germany and less than 2
percentage points in Denmark). Only 30% of women raising children under the age of ﬁve enter the labour
market in Hungary. This is due to social conventions (women are traditionally expected to stay home withsmall children) as well as to an insufﬁcient number of childcare spaces. Paradoxically, generous paid
parental leave from the state, which is available until a child is aged three, is a factor discouraging womenin Hungary from returning to work.
There is no agreement among labour policy experts on the optimal length of leave, although there
is considerable evidence that maternity leave of between three and six months has negligible impact
on women’s wages (for further details please refer to Appendix I). Indeed, designing parental beneﬁtschemes that protect mothers but do not adversely impact their employment opportunities is crucial.
According to a report by PricewaterhouseCoopers,7 employers in Germany may be reluctant to promotewomen of child-bearing age to senior positions because of a perception that they will take advantage ofgenerous maternity leave beneﬁts, which are available for three years after the birth of a child.
In China, which also scores well in the Index for this indicator, state provision of childcare has
fallen sharply in recent years, especially with the reform of state-owned enterprises in the late 1990s,
many of which provided kindergarten and similar facilities. According to the 2004 China Health andNutrition Survey, 55% of pre-school children who did not have stay-at-home mothers were cared for“informally” by relatives or nannies. Childcare provided by the extended family is taken into account by
and treated favourably in the scoring criteria for this indicator. About 9% of children were looked afterin public facilities and 36% by private agencies. In South Korea, which had an equal score to China forthis indicator, childcare facilities are largely centred around out-of-school education, as success in the
education system is highly valued. Early childhood education and after-school programmes are bothconsidered resources for childcare within this Index.
In Africa, both Ethiopia and Ghana rank well for this indicator. In Ethiopia, as in many developing
countries, the extended family is the primary supplier of childcare. More than 90% of children in rural© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

areas do not attend any form of pre-school and are looked after by family members. In most communities,
social networks exist to take care of children. For middle-class Ethiopians living in urban areas, hiring
childcare (or more likely house help that also looks after children) is an affordable option because wages
are very low. This is similar to the situation in Ghana, where reasonable childcare can be easily foundthrough social networks if the extended family is unable to help. Early Childhood Development (ECD)
programmes are widely available in urban areas and are provided by non-governmental organisations(NGOs), private providers and government agencies. However, the quality of ECD centres varies widely,
and the number of children beneﬁting from these services remains low.

19

© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Labour Policy and Practice

AfricaAmericas

EuropeAsia

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25

Tunisia
Benin
Tanzania
MauritiusSouth Africa
UgandaEgypt
Ghana
Namibia
ZambiaChad
Algeria
MalawiBurkina Faso
Kenya
Cameroon
Senegal
Ethiopia
Togo
Nigeria
Botswana
Côte d’Ivoire
Madagascar
Morocco
Sudan

65.1
64.9
59.7
59.6
55.5
52.0
50.8
50.5
50.4
47.0
45.3
45.3
45.1
45.0
43.5
41.1
40.7
38.9
38.7
38.1
36.3
34.9
33.1
31.9
15.1

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19

CanadaUnited States
MexicoBrazilArgentina
Peru
Venezuela
Costa Rica
EcuadorNicaragua
Uruguay
Chile
Dominican Republic
PanamaParaguay
Honduras
El Salvador
Colombia
Bolivia

80.8
78.4
63.9
61.3
57.0
53.3
51.7
51.4
50.6
49.0
48.2
47.7
47.6
47.4
43.9
43.5
40.8
40.1
36.0

Country

Score

New ZealandAustralia

85.5
73.6

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34

FinlandSwedenNorwayNetherlands
Denmark
Belgium
Iceland
Switzerland
Germany
Portugal
Austria
Bulgaria
FranceUnited Kingdom
Luxembourg
Spain
IrelandLithuania
Czech RepublicHungary
PolandSlovenia
LatviaEstonia
GreeceItaly
Romania
Slovak Republic
Albania
Moldova
UkraineCroatia
RussiaSerbia

93.1
90.6
90.5
90.0
87.6
87.4
84.2
80.0
79.5
77.4
76.4
75.1
74.6
73.9
73.6
73.4
69.3
66.5
65.1
64.4
61.9
61.2
59.7
59.2
57.0
52.9
52.1
50.8
50.2
47.9
43.5
41.9
34.5
30.1

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33

Hong Kong, China
Israel
Korea, Rep.
Philippines
ArmeniaJapan
ThailandIndia
Indonesia
China
KuwaitGeorgia
Singapore
Laos
Cambodia
TurkeyKazakhstan
Vietnam
Malaysia
Sri Lanka
Bangladesh
Azerbaijan
United Arab Emirates
LebanonOman
Kyrgyz Republic
JordanBahrainPakistan
Syria
Iran
Yemen
Saudi Arabia

70.9
66.3
60.2
59.3
58.8
52.4
49.8
49.5
49.0
46.7
43.8
43.4
43.2
41.1
40.4
40.2
40.1
38.2
38.1
38.0
38.0
37.9
34.5
34.4
32.8
29.6
29.0
28.5
27.4
27.0
20.8
16.1
9.3

20

OceaniaRank

1
2© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Labour Policy and Practice breakdown

AfricaAfricaLabour Policy

AmericasLabour PracticeAmericasLabour Policy

Labour Practice

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
=8
=8
10
11
12
=13
=13
=13
16
17
=18
=18
=20
=20
22
23
24
25

Tanzania
Tunisia
Benin
Mauritius
Namibia
ZambiaSouth Africa
Malawi
UgandaBurkina Faso
Ghana
Algeria
Cameroon
Côte d’Ivoire
Egypt
Togo
Chad
Kenya
SenegalBotswana
MoroccoEthiopia
Nigeria
Madagascar
Sudan

80.0
75.0
72.1
71.4
68.6
65.7
63.8
62.9
62.9
60.7
60.0
57.1
55.0
55.0
55.0
54.3
52.9
52.1
52.1
48.6
48.6
47.1
46.4
33.6
22.9

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25

Benin
Tunisia
MauritiusSouth Africa
Egypt
UgandaGhana
Tanzania
Chad
Kenya
Algeria
Madagascar
Namibia
Ethiopia
Nigeria
SenegalBurkina Faso
ZambiaMalawiCameroon
Botswana
Togo
MoroccoCôte d’Ivoire
Sudan

57.7
55.1
47.7
47.2
46.6
41.1
40.9
39.5
37.8
34.9
33.5
32.6
32.3
30.7
29.7
29.3
29.3
28.3
27.3
27.2
24.1
23.2
15.3
14.8
7.4

=1
=1
=3
=3
5
6
=7
=7
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19

CanadaMexicoBrazilPeru
Nicaragua
United States
Chile
Dominican Republic
Venezuela
Ecuador
Uruguay
Costa Rica
Paraguay
Argentina
El Salvador
PanamaBolivia
Colombia
Honduras

85.7
85.7
74.3
74.3
72.1
71.4
68.6
68.6
67.1
66.4
65.7
64.5
63.6
62.9
55.7
54.3
53.6
44.3
38.6

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19

United States
CanadaArgentina
Honduras
BrazilMexicoPanamaCosta Rica
Venezuela
Colombia
EcuadorPeru
Uruguay
Chile
Dominican Republic
El Salvador
NicaraguaParaguay
Bolivia

85.3
75.8
51.2
48.4
48.3
42.0
40.6
38.3
36.3
36.0
34.9
32.4
30.6
26.8
26.6
25.9
25.8
24.2
18.5

Oceania

Labour Policy
Rank

1
2

21

Oceania

Labour PracticeCountry

Score

Rank

New ZealandAustralia

94.3
71.0

1
2

Country

Score

New ZealandAustralia

76.7
76.3

© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Labour Policy and Practice breakdown, continued

Asia

Asia

Labour Policy

EuropeLabour Practice

EuropeLabour Policy

Labour Practice

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
=11
=11
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
=20
=20
=20
23
=24
=24
=26
=26
28
=29
=29
31
32
33

Armenia
Philippines
IsraelJapan
Hong Kong, China
Indonesia
Korea, Rep.
Georgia
India
TurkeyBangladesh
Thailand
Malaysia
KuwaitChina
Cambodia
Azerbaijan
Laos
Kyrgyz Republic
Kazakhstan
LebanonUnited Arab Emirates
JordanPakistan
Singapore
Sri Lanka
Vietnam
Yemen
Bahrain
Oman
Syria
Iran
Saudi Arabia

85.2
74.3
73.6
72.1
71.4
65.7
65.0
64.3
60.7
58.8
57.9
57.9
55.0
54.3
51.4
47.1
46.4
44.3
42.9
41.4
41.4
41.4
39.3
36.4
36.4
34.3
34.3
32.1
31.4
31.4
29.3
22.1
16.4

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33

Hong Kong, China
Israel
Korea, Rep.
Singapore
Philippines
Vietnam
China
ThailandSri Lanka
Kazakhstan
India
Laos
Oman
Cambodia
KuwaitJapan
Armenia
Indonesia
Azerbaijan
United Arab Emirates
LebanonBahrain
Syria
Georgia
TurkeyMalaysia
Iran
JordanPakistan
Bangladesh
Kyrgyz Republic
Saudi Arabia
Yemen

70.4
59.0
55.4
50.0
44.4
42.1
41.9
41.8
41.7
38.7
38.2
37.9
34.1
33.7
33.3
32.6
32.3
32.3
29.3
27.6
27.3
25.6
24.7
22.6
21.5
21.2
19.5
18.7
18.4
18.1
16.3
2.2
0.0

=1
=1
=1
=4
=4
=6
=6
=6
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
=16
=16
=16
19
20
=21
=21
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34

FinlandNetherlands
Portugal
NorwaySwedenBelgium
Denmark
Spain
Iceland
IrelandGermany
Hungary
Luxembourg
Estonia
Bulgaria
Austria
GreeceUnited Kingdom
Switzerland
Romania
FranceLatviaLithuania
Czech Republic
PolandItaly
Slovenia
Moldova
Albania
Slovak Republic
UkraineCroatia
RussiaSerbia

97.1
97.1
97.1
94.3
94.3
91.4
91.4
91.4
88.6
86.4
85.7
83.6
82.9
82.4
81.9
81.4
81.4
81.4
80.2
78.6
77.1
77.1
76.7
74.1
73.6
70.0
67.9
64.3
63.6
60.0
55.0
47.9
43.6
40.7

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34

FinlandSwedenNorwayDenmark
Belgium
Netherlands
Iceland
Switzerland
Germany
FranceAustria
Bulgaria
United Kingdom
Luxembourg
Portugal
Lithuania
Czech Republic
Spain
Slovenia
Ireland
PolandHungary
LatviaSlovak Republic
Albania
Estonia
Croatia
Italy
GreeceUkraineMoldova
Romania
RussiaSerbia

89.1
86.9
86.6
83.9
83.4
82.8
79.9
79.7
73.2
72.1
71.5
68.3
66.4
64.3
57.6
56.4
56.2
55.3
54.5
52.3
50.2
45.3
42.3
41.5
36.8
36.0
35.9
35.8
32.5
32.0
31.5
25.7
25.4
19.5

22

© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

2 Access to FinanceIndicators in this category:
2.1)
2.2)
2.3)
2.4)

Building credit histories (a composite measure of the ability to build a credit history)
Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes (availability of outreach programmes to women thattarget the provision of ﬁnancial services through either government initiatives or private lenders)
Delivering ﬁnancial services
Private sector credit as a percent of Gross Domestic ProductPlease note that this section includes a discussion of some, but not all, of the above indicators

8. P Honohan, “Cross-country
variation in household accessto ﬁnancial services”, prepared
for the conference “Access toFinance”, Washington DC, March
2007.

23

The ability to obtain a loan is crucial for women entrepreneurs, while, more generally, access to a savings
account helps to boost savings and growth. According to Honohan (2007),8 countries with deep ﬁnancial
markets suffer from less absolute poverty, with wider ﬁnancial development having a “favourable impact
both on economic growth and on the degree to which growth is pro-poor.” Although many emerging
markets have reasonably developed ﬁnancial sectors geared towards providing funding to the corporate
sector, lending to small businesses and individuals lags behind. This is due to several factors: the loan
applicant may lack collateral, a credit history or ofﬁcial documentation; and, for the ﬁnancial institution
there is a disincentive to process large numbers of small loans, since the operating cost per loan is high.
Financial institutions may be wary of extending credit to women because they may have less professional/
business experience, and also because women’s businesses are often concentrated in low-growth sectors.
Women may sometimes face greater difﬁculties than men in accessing credit, as in many countries
women’s access to moveable and immoveable property is restricted either by law or by social andcustomary practices, leaving them with very few assets. Moreover, choices regarding how a woman candispose of her income and assets may be decided by the male head of the household, a designation either
by tradition, or in some countries, by law. Norms are gradually changing as women gain more decisionmaking power within the family, in part due to their increasing economic participation and corresponding
ability to contribute ﬁnancially.
There are no comprehensive sex-disaggregated data relating to ﬁnancial services. Most of the
ﬁnancial indicators in the Index therefore are based on the disproportionately positive effect they haveon women’s ability to access ﬁnancial services. Improvements in national conditions measured by these
indictors would have a positive effect on women’s employment and business opportunities. For example,
the building credit histories indicator considers if credit registries can distribute credit information fromretailers, trade creditors or utilities companies; if businesses can use moveable assets as collateral andwhether ﬁnancial institutions accept such assets as collateral; and if microﬁnance institutions can provide
information to credit bureaus. These factors may be especially important for new entrants to the labour© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Credit registry coverage(% of adults, average regional score)(0) Number of countries in each region
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20

Geographical sub-regions created by the United Nations Statistics Division.
Due to data limitations the model does not cover every country in the world. As a result, country coverage withineach sub-region is not always complete. Expanded country coverage is expected in future editions of the model.

Western Europe (7)Southern Europe (8)Northern Europe (10)Eastern Europe (9)Western Asia (14)Australia and New Zealand (2)Source: World Bank Group, Doing Business Project.

South-Eastern Asia (8)Southern Asia (5)Eastern Asia (4)Central Asia (2)Northern America (2)South America (10)Central America (6)Caribbean (1 country)

Western Africa (7)Southern Africa (3)Northern Africa (5)Middle Africa (2)0Eastern Africa (8)10market who are hoping to set up a new business, or those who have obtained a loan from a microﬁnanceinstitution in the past and wish to expand their business. Credit registries are themselves important, as
academic research suggests that they improve ﬁnancial intermediation and assessment, which in turn
encourages ﬁnancial institutions to extend credit to individuals who they may have previously refused.
The women’s access to ﬁnance programmes indicator assesses whether governments or the formal
ﬁnancial sector have programmes aimed at providing ﬁnancial accounts to women, improving both accessto loans and ﬁnancial literacy.
For example, in 2006, Access Bank in Nigeria launched a Gender Empowerment programme to help
women entrepreneurs develop their businesses; the initiative included the provision of technical advice
and workshops. In Uganda, women own about 40% of businesses with registered premises but only receive
about 9% of commercial credit. Even so, initiatives designed to provide ﬁnancial services to women,such as the Development Finance Company of Uganda—which has disbursed over US$9.2m to women
entrepreneurs—helped 1,800 women set up deposit accounts and trained more than 350 women inbusiness skills. The largest bank in Saudi Arabia, the Al Rajhi Bank, recently started a wealth management
division targeted at women, as an estimated 40% of private wealth in Saudi Arabia is owned by women.
In October 2009, Credit Guarantee Corporation Malaysia Berhad (CGC) and Standard Chartered Bank
24

© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

9. “Financial Access 2009:
Measuring access to ﬁnancial
services around the world”,
Consultative Group to Assist thePoor, 2009.
10. M Bruhn and I Love, “TheEconomic Impact of Banking
the Unbanked: Evidence from
Mexico”, World Bank Policy
Research Working Paper No.
4981, World Bank: Washington
DC, 2009.
11. M Pickens, D Porteousand S Rotman, “Scenarios for
Branchless Banking in 2020”,
Consultative Group to Assist the
Poor: Washington DC, 2009.
12. ibid.

25

Malaysia launched a joint programme—a “Portfolio Guarantee Scheme”—that aims to give women
entrepreneurs fast access to ﬁnance. In addition, the government has allocated M$46.3m to a Women
Entrepreneurs Scheme, which consists of soft loans and grants. Vietnam has formal initiatives toprovide ﬁnancial accounts to women. Sacombank operates special branches for women entrepreneurs,and Agribank runs a programme to open savings and other accounts in rural areas that target women.
Moreover, the Vietnam Women’s Union collaborates with banks to provide ﬁnancing for women forhousehold economic activities and entrepreneurial activities. Only around 10% of Vietnamese, however,
have a bank account, meaning that the scope of these programmes is currently limited.
The delivering ﬁnancial services indicator assesses bank initiatives to provide ﬁnancial services in
two areas: the provision of basic, low-fee accounts for low-income clients, and whether private operators
can provide ﬁnancial services at post ofﬁces. The former captures accounts that either do not have feesor ones that are very low, that offer a small number of free automatic teller machine (ATM) transactions,and that have no minimum balance requirements. Of 139 countries surveyed by the Consultative Group to
Assist the Poor (CGAP),9 20 had ﬁnancial regulations that mandated the provision of these accounts. From
the developing countries covered in the Women’s Economic Opportunity Index, only Argentina, Chile,
Colombia, Hungary, India, Iran, Malaysia, Mexico, Morocco and Pakistan had such provisions.
For example, in Mexico (which has a low-fee bank account policy in place), the opening in 2002 of a
new bank targeting Mexico’s middle and working classes was not only a major commercial success but
also resulted in increased entrepreneurial activity, employment and income for its customers. Startingin 2002, Banco Azteca opened 815 branches in 250 Mexican cities in short succession. Results from an
impact evaluation showed that after a bank branch opened, more informal businesses owned by men
opened, and more women became employed as wage-earners.10 The evaluation hypothesises that with the
new bank, the increased availability of credit allowed men to start or expand their informal businesses,
which then in turn employed women as wage-earners. Banco Azteca has since expanded to other Central
and South American countries, including Brazil and Peru.
Even so, this sort of policy may only be effective if banks are within reach and if potential clients are
ﬁnancially literate—access to banks is an issue in rural areas in many developing countries. Obtaining aloan or opening a bank account typically involves a visit to a bank branch in most countries. The provisionof ﬁnancial services at post ofﬁces is one way to reach underserved markets: according to CGAP, about
70% of the countries it surveyed delivered ﬁnancial services through post ofﬁces. Banking at post ofﬁces
is just one aspect of so-called branchless banking, for which there has been a growing demand, especiallyin developing countries. Financial service providers are keen to meet that demand by supplying innovative
new services such as banking over mobile phones. In Kenya, more than 7m people have signed up for amobile payment service called M-PESA, offered by Safaricom, Kenya’s largest mobile network operator,
since its commercial launch in 2007. Partly as a result of M-PESA’s success, the proportion of Kenyans
considered to be formally ﬁnancially included has almost doubled, to 41% in just three years.11 A different
approach to branchless banking that has been successful in Brazil has been to combine mobile banking
with point-of-sale devices that are operated by agents such as small convenience stores.12 Future updatesof this model may explore the increasing take-up of branchless banking approaches.

© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Delivering financial services(% of countries)

Provision of basic,
low-fee accounts

Private operators
providing financial
services at post offices

80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Africa(25 countries in region)

Americas(19 countries in region)Asia(33 countries in region)

Europe(34 countries in region)

Oceania(2 countries in region)

Source: Consultative Group to Assist the Poor. Geographical regions created by the United Nations Statistics Division.
Due to data limitations the model does not cover every country in the world. As a result, country coverage within eachregion is not always complete. Expanded country coverage is expected in future editions of the model.

In Brazil, the federal postal system has forged an agreement with Banco Bradesco—one of the fourlargest banks in Brazil—to set up and operate banking branches in post ofﬁces. In an effort to tap thelarge portion of the population that does not have bank accounts—estimated at some 40m Brazilians—
Bradesco launched its Postal Bank project in 2002. It had set up 6,067 outlets in post-ofﬁce branches by
end-2009, up from 5,946 outlets at end-2008.
Egypt Post is one of the country’s major savings institutions. Postal savings accounts can be opened
for just E£10, making these accounts an attractive savings method for low-income citizens. Interest on
money deposited with the postal authority is exempt from tax. Each post ofﬁce holds an account at the
National Investment Bank (NIB), where customers’ savings are placed. In recent years, Egypt Post has
started offering services in competition with the banking sector, such as high-yield deposit accounts,
ATMs and payment systems for ﬁrms. Additionally, Egypt Post has expanded its physical presence, witharound 3,700 locations.

26© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Private sector credit(% change year on year)

WEO countries

25
20
15
10
5
0
-5
-10
-15
2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

2009

Source: IMF, International Financial Statistics.

The Index also includes a measure of Private sector credit. Credit growth is generally considered
to reﬂect a process of ﬁnancial deepening—credit tends to grow more quickly than GDP as an economy
develops, although the debate still rages over the direction of causality. However, rapid credit growth
can lead to the emergence of sizeable macroeconomic imbalances and surging asset prices, subsequently
followed by corrections, busts or outright ﬁnancial crises—as evidenced by the most recent global
ﬁnancial and economic crisis, which hit boom countries in Europe and the US particularly hard. For thisreason, we have banded this indicator to reﬂect both risk (unsustainable levels of credit that could resultin macroeconomic instability) as well as poor ﬁnancing conditions (low levels of credit availability).

27© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Access to Finance

AfricaAmericas

EuropeAsia

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
=8
=8
10
11
12
13
=14
=14
16
=17
=17
=17
20
21
22
23
24
25

South Africa
Mauritius
MoroccoEgypt
Namibia
Botswana
Tunisia
Malawi
Nigeria
Kenya
SenegalBurkina Faso
Ethiopia
Ghana
Tanzania
Benin
Cameroon
Côte d’Ivoire
Togo
ZambiaAlgeria
UgandaChadMadagascar
Sudan

57.4
53.1
52.9
45.5
37.0
29.6
29.2
25.0
25.0
19.1
12.9
12.7
12.5
12.5
12.5
7.2
6.5
6.5
6.5
6.3
6.3
6.3
0.0
0.0
0.0

=1
=1
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19

CanadaUnited States
Chile
Colombia
BrazilMexicoUruguay
PanamaEl Salvador
Honduras
Argentina
Costa Rica
Dominican Republic
Paraguay
Ecuador
Peru
Nicaragua
Bolivia
Venezuela

68.8
68.8
58.5
52.6
52.3
44.4
36.8
36.5
36.2
33.4
33.3
32.8
30.3
24.4
24.0
20.5
19.6
19.6
6.3

Country

Score

Australia
New Zealand

70.8
52.1

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
=16
=16
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34

Germany
Belgium
SwedenFranceHungary
GreeceCzech Republic
Ireland
Portugal
NorwayItaly
Bulgaria
LatviaSlovak Republic
Slovenia
IcelandUnited Kingdom
Austria
PolandNetherlands
SerbiaLithuania
Estonia
Finland
Switzerland
Croatia
UkraineLuxembourg
Spain
Romania
RussiaAlbania
Denmark
Moldova

87.1
86.8
83.3
80.4
77.2
72.3
71.5
70.8
66.9
66.7
66.2
65.0
64.0
63.6
62.8
62.5
62.5
59.8
55.1
54.9
54.8
54.6
54.3
53.1
48.4
47.1
37.9
37.5
36.3
36.3
34.2
26.7
26.1
25.0

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
=30
=30
=30
33

Japan
Singapore
Malaysia
Korea, Rep.
Hong Kong, China
IsraelThailandKazakhstan
Bahrain
Vietnam
India
Lebanon
China
JordanKuwait
Iran
Saudi Arabia
Sri Lanka
United Arab Emirates
TurkeyIndonesia
Oman
Pakistan
Bangladesh
Philippines
Georgia
Kyrgyz Republic
Armenia
Azerbaijan
Cambodia
Laos
Syria
Yemen

81.6
70.9
70.5
63.3
58.7
58.7
56.9
44.9
41.9
40.7
39.2
38.9
37.9
37.7
36.3
35.2
35.0
33.6
33.4
32.2
29.6
27.1
26.2
25.1
19.5
15.6
13.5
13.4
7.4
6.3
6.3
6.3
0.0

28

OceaniaRank

1
2© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

3 Education and Training
Indicators in this category:
3.1)
3.2)
3.3)
3.4)

School life expectancy (primary and secondary); women
School life expectancy (tertiary); women
Adult literacy rate; women
Existence of government or non-government programmes offering small- and medium-enterprise(SME) support/development training

Please note that this section includes a discussion of some, but not all, of the above indicators
Education increases a woman’s earning potential and productivity, and helps her shift from informal
or low-skilled employment to white-collar work. But it does more than that—it also helps to break theinter-generational cycle of poverty by boosting health outcomes for both mothers and children, reducing
fertility rates and supporting overall economic growth.
Primary and secondary education, women
Adolescent fertility rate
Number of births per 1,000 women in the 15 to 19 age group

Correlation co-efficient -0.61

250

200

150

100

50

0

Czech
Republic

-50
0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

18

Primary and secondary education, women
Number of years in education
29© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

According to data from the UN Educational, Scientiﬁc and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) for 2007,
only 60% of countries have achieved gender parity in primary education, dropping to 30% for secondary
education and 6% for tertiary education. Klansen (1999)13 has found that if South Asia and Sub-SaharanAfrica had achieved a more balanced outcome in terms of educational achievements in the 1960s, thiswould have boosted their rates of economic growth by 0.9% per year in subsequent periods.
In countries where women have lower rates of education, there is a correspondingly low ratio of womenin paid employment. According to Psacharopoulos and Patrinos (2004),14 the average rate of returnfrom investment in education is 9.8% for women, compared with 8.7% for men, although the results
vary considerably by country. However, the returns to primary education are higher for men than for
women—20.1% versus 12.8%, respectively—whereas gains are reversed for secondary education (18.4%
for women compared with 13.9% for men). Returns to secondary schooling are greater for women thanmen because women start from a lower level—that is, they spend fewer years in secondary education thanmen, in addition to the fact that enrolment rates for women are lower. As a result, women have more room
to improve.
Tertiary education is important because it builds skills that are not covered at the primary andsecondary levels. It also substantially increases lifetime earnings. Psacharopoulos and Patrinos foundthat the rate of return on tertiary education is roughly the same for both men and women, at about 11%.
However, women are more likely to focus on health- and welfare-related subjects, and on the humanities
and education. These female-dominated ﬁelds often have lower social status and are less well-paid. Men,by comparison, tend to focus on subjects such as engineering, computer science and those related toPrimary and secondary education, women(Average number of years spent in education)
Africa(24 countries)

Americas(19 countries)Asia(33 countries)

Europe(34 countries)

Oceania(2 countries)

20
18
16
14
12
10
8
13. S Klasen, “Does Gender
Inequality Reduce Growth andDevelopment? Evidence from
Cross-Country Regressions”,
World Bank: Washington DC,
1999.
14. G Psacharopoulos and H
Patrinos, “Returns to Investment
in Education: A Further Update”,
Education Economics, Vol. 12,
No.2, 2004.

30

6
4
2
0

1999

2003

2007

Source: UNESCO. Note that the sample size varies from year to year, owing to the lack of available data.
Geographical regions created by the United Nations Statistics Division.
Due to data limitations the model does not cover every country in the world. As a result, country coverage within eachregion is not always complete. Expanded country coverage is expected in future editions of the model.

© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Wage employees; Female/male ratio
Tertiary education, women
Number of years in education

Correlation co-efficient 0.72

6

5

4

3

2

Sri Lanka
1

0

-1

0.0

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

1.0

1.2

Wage employees; Female/male ratio
Female/male ratio. >1 means more female employees than male employees

15. “Gender and Sustainable
Development: Maximising
the economic, social andenvironmental role of women”,
OECD: Paris, 2008.
16. ibid.

31

manufacturing. The Index shows that Finland has the highest level of tertiary education for women, andTanzania the lowest.
Many women face greater barriers than men to setting up businesses, owing to the fact that theirenterprises are often particularly small and concentrated in the retail or services sectors. (Evidence
suggests that companies with fewer than 20 employees face more than ﬁve times the administrative
burden per employee as larger ﬁrms.15) According to the OECD, women have less conﬁdence andunderstanding than men in making ﬁnancial decisions, and are less linked to business networks or unable
to afford business-related services.16 This calls for training programmes in management to provide theskills needed to run a successful business. These programmes need to be affordable, easily accessible andtake into account women’s time burdens—working women, particularly working mothers, require training
programmes that do not take them away from their families for an extended period of time, or which aresuitably timed. The existence of government or non-government programmes offering small- andmedium-enterprise (SME) support/development training indicator aims to capture these issues.
Australia, Portugal and the UK score best on this indicator.
A wide range of programmes to support female entrepreneurship exist in different countries. In Oman,
which earns 4 out of 5 points on this indicator (see Appendix II for detailed scoring criteria), the Ministry© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and rankingof Manpower has run the Sanad programme (Self-employment and National Autonomous Development)
since 2001. This programme is aimed at helping Omanis establish SMEs, and is available to both womenand men. Training courses run under the Sanad programme are often aimed at very speciﬁc groups,
for example courses training women to become tailors, which therefore overcomes cultural problems.
However, this means that course training for jobs regarded as “male” will be not be available to women,
and might increase occupational segregation between the sexes. In addition to the Sanad programme,
the Sharakah Fund for the Development of Youth Projects has been helping young Omani women set up
small businesses since it was established with a donation from the Sultan.
In Slovakia, the National Agency for Development of Small and Medium Enterprises (NADSME)
organises training programs and conferences for doing business in Slovakia and abroad, and offers
programmes targeted speciﬁcally at women. It also confers an annual “Businesswoman of the Year”
award.
In South Africa, networks such as the South African Women Entrepreneurs Network (SAWEN) have been
set up to focus speciﬁcally on the delivery of SME support to women. SAWEN brings together all women’senterprise groups, co-operatives, organisations and initiatives into a national umbrella body that canlobby for policies and programmes to support small women-owned enterprises.

32© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Education and Training

AfricaAmericas

EuropeAsia

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25

South Africa
Mauritius
Tunisia
Botswana
Namibia
Algeria
Kenya
Egypt
Cameroon
Ghana
Madagascar
UgandaMalawi
MoroccoTanzania
ZambiaNigeria
SenegalTogo
Benin
Ethiopia
Sudan
Côte d’Ivoire
Burkina Faso
Chad

62.9
60.8
57.6
51.3
48.8
46.4
43.4
42.5
42.2
38.0
36.1
35.8
35.7
34.6
32.0
31.5
30.7
25.1
24.5
23.6
21.7
18.9
17.8
11.6
6.9

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19

United States
Uruguay
CanadaArgentina
Chile
Venezuela
PanamaBrazilColombia
Dominican Republic
Costa Rica
Peru
MexicoHonduras
Bolivia
El Salvador
Paraguay
EcuadorNicaragua

83.6
81.9
78.5
77.1
72.9
66.0
65.5
62.6
62.0
60.6
59.8
59.5
55.3
54.5
54.0
53.4
52.3
51.5
45.7

Country

Score

Australia
New Zealand

70.8
52.1

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34

IcelandFinland
NorwaySwedenSlovenia
United Kingdom
Denmark
Netherlands
Belgium
Germany
Ireland
Italy
Portugal
PolandSpain
Lithuania
LatviaFranceHungary
Switzerland
Estonia
Slovak Republic
GreeceCzech Republic
Austria
Croatia
Luxembourg
Romania
UkraineRussiaBulgaria
Moldova
Albania
Serbia

95.4
92.4
91.2
87.1
86.5
84.8
84.4
84.2
83.8
82.1
81.5
81.0
80.2
79.8
79.6
79.3
79.1
79.0
78.5
78.0
77.0
76.3
76.3
76.1
73.3
72.5
70.2
69.7
69.3
67.7
66.5
57.5
57.5
55.7

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33

IsraelSingapore
Korea, Rep.
Japan
BahrainKazakhstan
Hong Kong, China
JordanUnited Arab Emirates
Malaysia
LebanonPhilippines
Saudi Arabia
Sri Lanka
Thailand
Oman
China
Kyrgyz Republic
KuwaitTurkeySyria
Georgia
Indonesia
Iran
Armenia
VietnamAzerbaijan
Cambodia
India
Laos
Bangladesh
Yemen
Pakistan

76.2
75.3
73.9
69.5
69.3
66.4
66.3
64.8
62.0
59.2
58.9
57.1
56.7
56.3
56.1
56.0
54.5
54.2
53.4
52.4
52.1
52.0
51.2
51.2
49.9
43.8
43.7
40.4
33.1
33.0
27.0
20.9
14.4

33

OceaniaRank

1
2© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

4 Women’s Legal and Social Status
Indicators in this category:
4.1)
4.2)
4.3)
4.4)
4.5)

Addressing violence against women (existence of laws protecting women against violence)
Freedom of movement (opportunity to move freely outside the house) for women
Property ownership rights (this indicator considers if men and women have equal ownership rights
over moveable and immoveable property both by law and in practice)
Adolescent fertility rate (age-speciﬁc fertility rate per 1,000 women, 15-19 years of age)Country ratiﬁcation of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against
Women (CEDAW)

Please note that this section includes a discussion of some, but not all, of the above indicators

17. A Sen, “The many faces ofgender equality”, Frontline,
Vol. 18, Issue 22, October 27thNovember 9th 2001.
18. A Morrison, D Raju and N
Sinha, “Gender Equality, Poverty
and Economic Growth”, WorldBank Policy Research Working
Paper World Bank: Washington
DC, 2007.

34

Cultural norms and attitudes play a role in determining a woman’s economic opportunities. Indeed,
attitudes towards women often supersede laws designed to protect them. At its most extreme, apreference for boys can be so deeply entrenched in some countries that large imbalances emerge between
the sexes.
In adulthood, women more often than men face the triple burden of work outside the home, householdchores, and child- and elder-care responsibilities. According to the Nobel prize-winning economist
Amartya Sen, it is “quite common in many societies to take it for granted that while men will naturally
work outside the home, women could do it if and only if they could combine it with various inescapableand unequally shared household duties.”17 In many societies, mothers face a stigma when they leave theirchildren to go to work.
Nevertheless, attitudes are gradually changing as economies develop and opportunities for women
expand. Countries with stagnant or slow-growing populations increasingly realise that women are
essential to an expanding labour force—and, hence, to faster economic growth. Greater gender equality
is correlated not only with higher growth outcomes, but also with lower poverty rates (Morrison, Raju andSinha 2007).18
Some countries have taken positive steps to legislate women’s rights by formally acknowledging
the principle of gender equality. The Index includes an indicator that considers whether countries
are signatories to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women(CEDAW), and whether they signed the accompanying Optional Protocol, which allows a key committee
to hear complaints from individuals or groups of women about violations of their rights, and to conduct
inquiries into grave violations of the Convention. The document has been described as an internationalbill of rights for women, and marked its 30th anniversary in 2009. Ratiﬁcation of CEDAW is widely
regarded as an afﬁrmation of a country’s commitment to achieve gender equality. Many countries,© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women(% of countries)
Africa(25 countries in region)

Americas(19 countries in region)Asia(33 countries in region)

Europe(34 countries in region)

Oceania(2 countries in region)

100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0

CEDAW
not ratified

CEDAW
ratified with reservations

CEDAW
ratified without reservations

Optional Protocol ratified

Source: United Nations Treaty Collection. Geographical regions created by the United Nations Statistics Division.
Due to data limitations the model does not cover every country in the world. As a result, country coverage within eachregion is not always complete. Expanded country coverage is expected in future editions of the model.

however, have ratiﬁed the Convention subject to certain “reservations”, exempting them from having
to meet particular articles in CEDAW.
Of the countries in the Index, three have not ratiﬁed the convention, and 38 have ratiﬁed CEDAW
with reservations; 58 countries have both ratiﬁed CEDAW without reservations and signed the Optional
Protocol. Some that have ratiﬁed CEDAW with reservations have also signed the Optional Protocol, such as
Brazil, France and Thailand. It is worth noting that many of the speciﬁc provisions covered by CEDAW are
addressed in other parts of the Index, such as access to education and non-discrimination in employment
and property rights.
CEDAW can make a difference. In 2007 Mexico passed a General Law on Women’s Access to a Life Freeof Violence, which drew on CEDAW’s General Recommendation 19. The law acknowledges government
responsibility for preventing violence against women. Morocco’s 2004 Family Code gives women
greater protection and equality within marriage and divorce—an issue also covered by CEDAW. Effective
implementation of these rights has been addressed through the creation of Family Courts.
Property ownership rights for women is another important indicator covered under this category.
Such rights may be constrained by social customs and sometimes legislation, hampering a woman’s
economic status. This is most evident through unequal access to land markets, discriminatory inheritancepractices and gender-biased land reform. The property ownership indicator is based, ﬁrst, on whether
women have mandated, equal ownership rights over moveable and immoveable property by law. Eight
countries in the Women’s Economic Opportunity Index do not have such rights; these are Cameroon, Chad,
Chile, Indonesia, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Togo and Zambia. The indicator also assesses if customary
35© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Ownership rights over moveable and immoveable property(% of countries)
Africa(25 countries in region)

Americas(19 countries in region)

Men and women do nothave equal ownershiprights over property bylaw

Legal equality between
men and women, but
customary practices takeprecedence overstatutory law in the vast
majority of casesAsia(33 countries in region)

Europe(34 countries in region)

Oceania(2 countries in region)

100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Legal equality between
men and women, but
customary practices takeprecedence overstatutory law

Legal equality between
men and women, but
customary practices
occasionally takeprecedence overstatutory law

Legal equality between
men and women andcustomary practices do
not take precedence overstatutory law/ there are
no relevant customary
practices

Source: World Bank Group, Economist Intelligence Unit. Geographical regions created by the United Nations Statistics Division.
Due to data limitations the model does not cover every country in the world. As a result, country coverage within each region is
not always complete. Expanded country coverage is expected in future editions of the model.

practices take precedence over legislation (statutory law) in ways that are harmful to women, resulting
in less-than-full ownership rights for women over their property. Customary practices are unwritten rules
and norms established by long usage (based on customs and cultures).
Customary practices are most prevalent in Africa and in many parts of Asia, and often prevent womenfrom exercising full control over any assets they have brought to a marriage or acquired independently.
For example, whereas women in Turkey have full ownership and decision-making rights over any assets
they acquired independently, custom generally allows husbands and sometimes male relatives toinﬂuence women’s decisions over their property, or even dictate to them in ways that would not occur if
genders were reversed. In addition, decisions regarding the shared property of married couples are more
likely to be taken by men; such property may legally be registered to the man only.
Burkina Faso has well-established laws on gender equality; under existing land law all Burkinabe,regardless of gender, have rights to control and transfer property. However, fewer than 6% of womenare landowners, suggesting that agricultural and land-reform provisions are not being implemented in abalanced fashion. Moreover, many villages in the country’s remote interior are under the jurisdiction of
local chiefs, and customary law predominates. Nonetheless, Burkinabe chiefs have a reputation for fairly
mediating village disputes, regardless of gender, and in most cases women who believe their rights havebeen abused have a legal means of seeking redress.
36© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

19. A Sen, “Gender andcooperative conﬂict”, Working
Paper of the World Instituteof Development Economics
Research, 1986, in Irene Tinker(ed.), Persistent Inequalities:
Women and World Development,
Oxford University Press, 1990.
20. L Friedman and S Couper,“The Cost of Domestic Violence:
A Preliminary Investigation of
the Financial Cost of Domestic
Violence”, Victim Services
Agency: New York, 1987. S Lloyd,“The Effects of Domestic Violenceon Women’s Employment”, Law
and Policy, Vol. 19, No. 2, 1997,
pages 139-167.
21. A Morrison and M B Orlando,“The Socioeconomic Costs
of Domestic Violence: Chileand Nicaragua”, in Morrisonand Biehl (eds.), Too Close to
Home: Domestic Violence in
the Americas, Inter-American
Development Bank: Washington
DC, 1999.

The adolescent fertility rate also features in the Index, in part because academic research suggests a
negative correlation between early child-bearing and education, wages and employment. The bargaining
power within a household is radically altered in a man’s favour if his wife has lower levels of education andearnings, and if she has fewer assets at her disposal.19 According to the UN Department for Economic andSocial Affairs, from which the data were sourced, countries with the highest adolescent fertility rates areconcentrated in Africa, followed by the Americas. Rates are considerably lower in many countries in Asia,with the lowest in Europe.
The Index also considers if countries have laws that address violence against women, in three areas:
domestic violence, sexual harassment and sexual assault/violence. Of the counties in the Index, 61 havelaws that protect women against all three kinds of violence, with a further 33 providing protection in
two areas. (The quality and enforcement of a law is as important as its existence, but this was beyond thescope of this pilot Index.) Physical threats (a dangerous environment) against women may discouragethem from working or setting up a business. The effects of violence can also impede a woman’s ability
to perform to her full capacity in the workplace. The academic literature, however, has drawn no ﬁrm
conclusions on the impact of domestic violence on employment. Some studies suggest that althoughviolence may not prevent a woman from ﬁnding employment, it may hinder her ability to keep a job forvery long.20 Morrison and Orlando (1999)21 estimate that women in Santiago, Chile, who suffered fromdomestic violence earned only $150 per month, whereas those who did not earned more than double
that. In Uganda, about 9% of violent incidents force women to lose time from paid work, amounting toapproximately 11 days a year (ICRW 2009).22
Freedom of movement, which also features in the Index, is a basic right that facilitates access to
education, health and economic resources. According to the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), to “provide
for their own needs, as well as those of their children, women require the ability to move freely within
and outside the household”.23 Only a few governments have laws that prohibit women from leaving theirhomes or the country in which they reside without the permission of a male relative or guardian (thisincludes restrictions on a woman’s ability to obtain a passport). These include Oman, Saudi Arabia, Syria
and Yemen. But cultural attitudes prevalent in Western Asia and Northern Africa may prevent some womenfrom easily leaving their homes on their own or without permission. Indeed, the freedom of movement
indicator—a qualitative assessment from the OECD Development Centre—shows that women in 21
countries face cultural barriers to moving outside their homes.

22. “Intimate Partner Violence:High Costs to Household andCommunities”, International
Centre for Research on Women:
Washington, DC, 2009.
23. http://www.unicef.org/
sowc07/proﬁles/inequality_
household.php

37© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Women’s Legal and Social Status

AfricaAmericas

EuropeAsia

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

Rank

Country

Score

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25

Tunisia
Mauritius
BotswanaSouth Africa
SenegalNamibia
Kenya
MoroccoGhana
Burkina Faso
Madagascar
Egypt
Benin
Tanzania
Nigeria
ZambiaAlgeria
Côte d’Ivoire
Togo
Ethiopia
MalawiChad
UgandaCameroon
Sudan

89.6
86.5
84.9
79.6
78.1
77.5
73.1
71.7
70.8
69.8
69.1
65.7
64.9
64.0
58.7
58.3
58.1
55.3
52.6
50.5
49.9
48.3
46.9
42.1
20.6

1
=2
=2
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19

CanadaCosta Rica
Uruguay
Paraguay
PanamaBrazilPeru
El Salvador
MexicoColombia
Dominican Republic
Honduras
Argentina
Venezuela
Nicaragua
EcuadorUnited States
Chile
Bolivia

98.7
93.6
93.6
93.4
91.3
89.4
89.0
88.2
86.6
85.2
85.0
83.9
83.7
80.7
78.8
78.1
75.9
75.1
74.3

Country

Score

Australia
New Zealand

88.6
87.2

1
2
=3
=3
=5
=5
=7
=7
=7
=10
=10
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34

Netherlands
Slovenia
Denmark
SwedenFinland
NorwayBelgium
Germany
Luxembourg
Czech Republic
GreeceSpain
Croatia
Iceland
Portugal
Lithuania
Hungary
SerbiaRomania
Bulgaria
Albania
Estonia
PolandSlovak Republic
Moldova
UkraineSwitzerland
Italy
FranceAustria
IrelandUnited Kingdom
LatviaRussia

99.8
99.7
99.6
99.6
99.3
99.3
99.2
99.2
99.2
99.1
99.1
99.0
98.9
98.7
98.4
98.2
98.1
97.7
96.5
96.2
93.9
93.1
92.2
91.3
90.9
90.4
89.8
89.5
89.4
89.0
88.4
87.5
86.8
83.9

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33

CambodiaJapan
Kazakhstan
Kyrgyz Republic
Georgia
Azerbaijan
IsraelThailandTurkeyArmenia
Korea, Rep.
Hong Kong, China
China
Singapore
Sri Lanka
Philippines
Laos
Vietnam
Malaysia
India
JordanKuwaitBahrain
Syria
Indonesia
United Arab Emirates
Oman
Pakistan
LebanonBangladesh
Saudi Arabia
Iran
Yemen

89.8
88.0
85.7
85.6
84.7
83.9
83.6
80.4
79.9
79.3
78.3
78.1
78.0
77.9
77.3
74.5
72.0
69.9
68.9
58.8
55.6
55.4
55.3
54.0
53.2
52.8
50.7
49.8
48.3
45.2
41.1
37.6
36.8

38

OceaniaRank

1
2© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Methodology
The Women’s Economic Opportunity Index measures ﬁve categories that determine whether theenvironment for both women employees and women entrepreneurs is favourable (please refer to the
Scoring criteria and categories section for details on the categories and indicators).
Data for the quantitative indicators are drawn from national and international statistical sources.
Where quantitative or survey data were missing values, the Economist Intelligence Unit has estimated thedata.
Some qualitative indicators have been created by the Economist Intelligence Unit, based on legal
documents and texts; others have been drawn from a range of surveys and data sources and adjusted by
the Economist Intelligence Unit.
The main sources used in the Women’s Economic Opportunity Index are the Economist Intelligence Unit;
the International Labour Organisation (ILO); the World Bank Group; the International Monetary Fund;the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD); the United Nations Educational,
Scientiﬁc and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO); the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP);
the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division; the UN SecretaryGeneral’s database on violence against women; the International Telecommunication Union (ITU); Social
Security Online; the Consultative Group to Assist the Poor (CGAP); the World Economic Forum; Worldwide
Governance Indicators; Freedom House; Vision of Humanity; and national statistical ofﬁces.

Indicator choice
The criteria used in this study were chosen in close consultation between the Economist Intelligence Unitand panels of experts, some of whom provided advice on a conﬁdential basis. Those who agreed to beacknowledged include:
Access to ﬁnance working group
Johannes Jutting, OECD Development Centre
Denis Drechsler, (formerly) OECD Development Centre
Rekha Mehra, International Centre for Research on Women
Janet Stotsky, IMF
Caren Grown, American University
Alberto Chaia, McKinsey & Company
39© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Christine Shields, Standard Chartered Bank
Inez Murray, Women’s World Banking
Education and training working group
Katherine Giscombe, Catalyst
Lesa Mitchell, Kauffman Foundation
Women’s legal and social status working group
Maria Jose Alcala (United Nations Development Fund for Women)
Hanny Cueva Beteta (United Nations Development Fund for Women)
Virginia Seitz, Millennium Challenge Corporation

Data Modelling
Indicator scores are normalised and then aggregated across categories to enable a comparison of broader
concepts across countries. Normalisation rebases the raw indicator data to a common unit so that it canbe aggregated.
The indicators where a higher value indicates a more favourable economic/business environment for
women—such as Maternity and paternity leave and provision; Literacy rate; Property ownership rights;
and Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes—have been normalised on the basis of:x = (x - Min(x)) / (Max(x) - Min(x))
where Min(x) and Max(x) are, respectively, the lowest and highest values in the 113 economies for any
given indicator. The normalised value is then transformed from a 0-1 value to a 0-100 score to make it
directly comparable with other indicators. This in effect means that the country with the highest raw data
value will score 100, while the lowest will score 0.
For the indicators where a high value indicates an unfavourable environment for women employees andentrepreneurs—such as Legal restrictions on job types for women; Freedom of movement; and Starting abusiness—the normalisation function takes the form of:x = (x - Max(x)) / (Max(x) - Min(x))
where Min(x) and Max(x) are, respectively, the lowest and highest values in the 113 economies for any
given indicator. The normalised value is then transformed into a positive number on a scale of 0-100 to
make it directly comparable with other indicators.

Calculating the Women’s Economic Opportunity Index
Modelling the indicators and categories in the model results in scores of 0-100 for each country, where
100 represents the most favourable economic/business environment for women, and 0 the lowest. The
overall score, as well as the category scores, are unweighted averages of the normalised scores for each of
the indicators. The 113 economies assessed can then be ranked according to these indices.
40© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

To ensure the relevance of the choice of indicators and categories, Principal Components Analysis(PCA) was performed. Details of this process are given in Appendix III.

Model validation
To validate the results of the Women’s Economic Opportunity Index, the Economist Intelligence Unit
correlated the model’s overall score against several “output” (dependent) variables. The scatter plots(below) show the correlations between the Women’s Economic Opportunity Index and the following
variables:
1) Wage and salaried workers (employees); Female/male ratio: Employees are workers with “paidemployment jobs”, that is, those jobs where the workers hold an explicit (written or oral) or implicit
employment contract that provides a basic remuneration, which is not directly dependent upon therevenue of the unit for which they work.
The results indicate a high degree of correlation (0.79 on a scale of 0 to 1) between wage and salaried
employees and the overall Women’s Economic Opportunity Index score.
2) Employers; Female/male ratio: Employers are those individuals who, working on their own accountor with one or a few partners, hold the type of jobs deﬁned as “self-employment jobs” (that is, jobs
where the remuneration is directly dependent upon the proﬁts derived from the goods and services
produced) and, in this capacity, have engaged, on a continuous basis, one or more persons to work forthem as employees.
The correlation between employers and the overall Women’s Economic Opportunity Index score is
0.28. This is lower than for wage and salaried employees because the external factors that motivate
women employees are somewhat different from those that inﬂuence a woman’s decision to become
an entrepreneur. Better business environments for women employees tend to result in higher levelsof female employment in the formal (wage-earning) sector. By comparison, the number of women
entrepreneurs in low- and high-income countries tends to be higher than in middle-income countries.
This is because women in low-income countries often become entrepreneurs out of necessity (because
they might face discrimination in wage employment), while women in high-income countries become
entrepreneurs in search of opportunity. This inﬂuences the correlation results.
3) Vulnerable employment: This indicator captures the share of vulnerable employment in total
employment for women. Vulnerable employment is deﬁned as people who are employed underrelatively precarious circumstances, as indicated by their status in employment. Because contributing
family workers and own-account workers are less likely to have formal work arrangements, access to
beneﬁts or social protection programmes, and are more “at risk” to economic cycles, these are thestatuses categorised as “vulnerable”.
The results indicate a high correlation between the share of women in vulnerable employment andthe Women’s Economic Opportunity Index (-0.80). The correlation is negative, indicating that acountry with good legal and social protections for working women has fewer women in vulnerable

41© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

employment.
4) Gender-related Development Index (United Nations Development Programme gender measure):
The Gender-related Development Index (GDI) measures achievement in the same basic areas as the
UNDP’s Human Development Index (HDI), but takes note of inequality between women and men. The
methodology imposes a penalty for inequality, such that the GDI falls when the achievement levelsof both women and men in a country go down or when the disparity between their achievements
increases. The greater the gender disparity in basic capabilities, the lower a country’s GDI comparedwith its HDI. The GDI is simply the HDI discounted, or adjusted downwards, for gender inequality.
The results indicate a high correlation between the GDI and the Women’s Economic Opportunity Index(0.85).

Wage employees; Female/male ratio
Overall score
Rating 0=100 where 100 = most favourable

All 113 countries in the model

Europe

100
90
80
70

Czech Republic

60
50
40
30
20
10
0

0.0

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

1.0

1.2

Wage employees; Female/male ratio
Female/male ratio. >1 means more female employees than male employees

42© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Employees; Female/male ratio
Overall score
Rating 0=100 where 100 = most favourable

All 113 countries in the model

Americas

100
90
80
70
60
50
40

Bolivia

30
20
10
0

0.0

0.1

0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5

0.6

0.7

0.8

0.9

Employees; Female/male ratio>1 means more female employers than male employers

Vulnerable employment
Overall score
Rating 0=100 where 100 = most favourable

All 113 countries in the model

Asia

100
90
80
70
60

Thailand

50
40
30
20
10
0

0

20

40

60

80

100

120

Vulnerable employment
Share of vulnerable employment in total employment (%), women43© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Gender-related development index
Overall score
Rating 0=100 where 100 = most favourable

All 113 countries in the model

Africa

100
90
80
70
South Africa

60
50
40
30
20
10
0

0.0

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

1.0

1.2

Gender related development index

44© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Country pages
Albania
Algeria
Argentina
Armenia
Australia
Austria
Azerbaijan
Bahrain
Bangladesh
Belgium
Benin
Bolivia
Botswana
BrazilBulgaria
Burkina-Faso
Cambodia
Cameroon
Canada
Chad
Chile
China
Colombia
Costa Rica
Cote D’Ivoire
Croatia
Czech Republic
Denmark
Dominican Republic
EcuadorEgypt
El Salvador
Estonia
Ethiopia
FinlandFranceGeorgia
Germany

45

46
46
47
47
48
48
49
49
50
50
51
51
52
52
53
53
54
54
55
55
56
56
57
57
58
58
59
59
60
60
61
61
62
62
63
63
64
64

Ghana
GreeceHondurasHong Kong (China)
Hungary
Iceland
India
Indonesia
Iran
IrelandIsraelItaly
Japan
JordanKazakhstan
Kenya
Korea, Rep. Of
KuwaitKyrgyz Republic
Laos
LatviaLebanonLithuania
Luxembourg
Madagascar
MalawiMalaysia
Mauritius
MexicoMoldova
MoroccoNamibia
Netherlands
New Zealand
Nicaragua
Nigeria
Norway
Oman

65
65
66
66
67
67
68
68
69
69
70
70
71
71
72
72
73
73
74
74
75
75
76
76
77
77
78
78
79
79
80
80
81
81
82
82
83
83

Pakistan
PanamaParaguay
Peru
Philippines
PolandPortugal
Romania
RussiaSaudi Arabia
SenegalSerbiaSingapore
Slovak Republic
Slovenia
South Africa
Spain
Sri Lanka
Sudan
SwedenSwitzerland
Syria
Tanzania
Thailand
Togo
Tunisia
TurkeyUgandaUkraineUnited Arab Emirates
United Kingdom
United States
Uruguay
Venezuela
Vietnam
Yemen
Zambia

84
84
85
85
86
86
87
87
88
88
89
89
90
90
91
91
92
92
93
93
94
94
95
95
96
96
97
97
98
98
99
99
100
100
101
101
102

Notes
Indicator scores are normalised
to lie within a consistent range
between 0-100, based on source
data.
Section scores are the weighted
sum of the underlying indicatorscores.
All scores 0-100 where 100=mostfavourable© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Albania

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

26.7

76

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

51.3

50

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Starting a business

78.0

16

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Regulatory quality

49.4

60

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

6.6

78

Mobile telephone subscribers

47.3

45

OVERALL SCORE

54.9

50

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Infrastructure risk

30.8

=74

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

50.2

55

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

57.5

61

LABOUR POLICY

63.6

=58

Literacy rate, women

98.7

37

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

85.7

=12

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 85.7

=23

Primary and secondary education, women

48.9

81

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

Tertiary education, women

22.2

78

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

71.4

=30

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

93.9

22

Differential retirement age

0.0 =103

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

36.8

56

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

63.8

67

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

33.3

=43

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

16.7

=48

Algeria

Adolescent fertility rate

94.2

=26

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Albania
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

6.3

104

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

29.4

90

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Mobile telephone subscribers

43.8

54

Building credit histories

0.1

97

Starting a business

26.5

101

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Infrastructure risk

24.2

=83

OVERALL SCORE

38.5

93

Private sector credit

0.0

=96

Regulatory quality

23.1

101

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

45.3

68

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

46.4

85

LABOUR POLICY

57.1

70

Primary and secondary education, women

61.2

52

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Literacy rate, women

57.7

90

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

71.4

=27

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 71.4

=41

Tertiary education, women

26.8

71

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

42.9

=68

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

58.1

92

Differential retirement age

0.0 =103

Adolescent fertility rate

99.0

=2

LABOUR PRACTICE

33.5

66

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

De facto discrimination at work

50.7

=89

Freedom of movement, women

50.0

=93

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

33.3

=43

Property ownership rights

50.0

=79

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

25.0

=97

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

16.7

=48

46

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Algeria
World average
Best in World© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Argentina

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

33.3

68

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

40.1

71

Building credit histories

83.3

=9

Mobile telephone subscribers

55.4

28

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Infrastructure risk

45.1

=57

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Starting a business

32.9

92

OVERALL SCORE

58.0

47

Private sector credit

0.0

=96

Regulatory quality

27.0

98

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

57.0

40

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

77.1

26

LABOUR POLICY

62.9

=60

Literacy rate, women

97.3

42

Tertiary education, women

83.8

13

Primary and secondary education, women

67.1

28

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

71.4

=27

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 57.1

=51

Legal restrictions on job types

50.0

=82

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

83.7

58

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

51.2

30

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

75.0

=60

Adolescent fertility rate

68.6

79

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

83.3

=4

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

50.0

=24

De facto discrimination at work

38.0 =106

Access to childcare

33.3

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50
25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training=42

Armenia

LabourPractice

Argentina
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

13.4

92

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

49.7

53

Building credit histories

28.8

50

Starting a business

76.8

17

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Regulatory quality

53.6

52

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Mobile telephone subscribers

47.3

44

OVERALL SCORE

51.6

57

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Infrastructure risk

20.9

=91

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

58.8

39

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

49.9

83

LABOUR POLICY

85.2

15

Literacy rate, women

99.4

8

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

43.4

90

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

85.7

=12

Tertiary education, women

36.6

55

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 85.7

=23

SME support/development training

20.0 =104

Differential retirement age=63
WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

79.3

64
=1

83.3

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

71.4

=30

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

LABOUR PRACTICE

32.3

72

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

62.6

69

Adolescent fertility rate

88.0

=48

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

50.0

=24

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

16.7

=48

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

47

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Addressing violence against women

33.3

=95

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Armenia
World average
Best in World© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Australia

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

70.8

=10

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

80.9

4

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Starting a business

97.7

=3

Building credit histories

83.3

=9

Regulatory quality

93.9

6

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Infrastructure risk

82.4

=16

50.0

=41

Mobile telephone subscribers

49.7

39

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

80.5

10

Private sector credit

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

73.6

18

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

95.1

3

LABOUR POLICY

71.0

42

Primary and secondary education, women

100.0

1

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

85.7

=12

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Tertiary education, women

81.4

17

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Differential retirement age

83.3

=63

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

88.6

40

Maternity and paternity leave and provision

0.0 =112

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

76.3

11

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

83.3

=8

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

83.3

=4

Adolescent fertility rate

93.2

=33

De facto discrimination at work

71.8

43

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

50.0

=78

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Austria

Score

Rank

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Australia
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

59.8

25

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

69.0

26

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

90.2

13

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Infrastructure risk

85.7

=13

Score

Rank

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Mobile telephone subscribers

61.7

15

OVERALL SCORE

74.0

19

Building credit histories

39.2

40

Starting a business

38.2

86

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

76.4

14

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

73.3

34

LABOUR PRACTICE

71.5

15

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

83.3

=8

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

83.3

=4

Primary and secondary education, women

62.8

44

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Tertiary education, women

51.4

43

De facto discrimination at work

52.5

88

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

89.0

39

LABOUR POLICY

81.4

=20

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

100.0

=1

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Adolescent fertility rate

94.8

=24

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 71.4

=41

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

50.0

=78

Differential retirement age

=71

48

50.0

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Austria
World average
Best in World© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Azerbaijan

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

7.4

98

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

44.1

64

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Starting a business

81.2

15

Building credit histories

4.6

81

Regulatory quality

36.0

82

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Mobile telephone subscribers

35.2

71

OVERALL SCORE

42.5

85

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Infrastructure risk

24.2

=83

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

37.9

94

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

43.7

88

LABOUR POLICY

46.4

=90

Literacy rate, women

99.3

9

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 85.7

=23

Primary and secondary education, women

62.0

48

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

Tertiary education, women

13.6

85

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

SME support/development training

0.0

113

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

28.6

=82

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

83.9

=55

Legal restrictions on job types

25.0

=95

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

29.3

=80

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

84.0

=17

Adolescent fertility rate

78.0

67

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

33.3

=43

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

Bahrain

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Azerbaijan
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

41.9

47

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

72.4

21

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Mobile telephone subscribers

88.9

3

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Infrastructure risk

72.5

=26

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

17.5

61

Regulatory quality

69.1

34

OVERALL SCORE

49.3

66

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Starting a business

59.1

45

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

28.5

107

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

69.3

40

LABOUR POLICY

31.4 =108

Literacy rate, women

83.1

72

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

28.6

=82

Primary and secondary education, women

71.6

17

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

14.3

=99

Tertiary education, women

42.5

48

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

55.3

95

Differential retirement age

0.0 =103

Adolescent fertility rate

93.2

=33

LABOUR PRACTICE

25.6

93

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

De facto discrimination at work

69.1

50

Freedom of movement, women

50.0

=93

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Addressing violence against women

33.3

=95

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

25.0

=97

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

49

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

BahrainWorld average
Best in World© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Bangladesh

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

25.1

79

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

22.2

106

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Starting a business

46.7

=69

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Regulatory quality

22.2

102
105

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

0.5

95

Mobile telephone subscribers

12.4

OVERALL SCORE

32.6

104

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Infrastructure risk

7.7 =107

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

38.0

93

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

27.0

103

LABOUR POLICY

57.9

=68

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Literacy rate, women

34.5

103

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

Primary and secondary education, women

29.5

101

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

71.4

=27

Tertiary education, women

3.9

103

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

28.6

=82

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

45.2

108

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

LABOUR PRACTICE

18.1

107

Freedom of movement, women

50.0

=93

De facto discrimination at work

38.9

103

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

50.0

=78

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Adolescent fertility rate

34.6

105

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Property ownership rights

25.0

=94

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

Belgium

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

BangladeshWorld average
Best in World

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

86.8

2

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

Score
74.1

Rank
18

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Infrastructure risk

85.7

=13

Delivering ﬁnancial services

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

85.7

17

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Starting a business

72.0

=22

2

Building credit histories

47.1

33

Mobile telephone subscribers

53.0

35

87.4

6

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

83.8

11

83.4

6

SME support/development training

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

100.0

=1

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

83.3

=8

Primary and secondary education, women

69.8

21

Tertiary education, women

66.3

25

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

86.4

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICELABOUR PRACTICE

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

83.3

=4

De facto discrimination at work

66.8

59

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

99.2

=7

LABOUR POLICY

91.4

=7

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

85.7

=12

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Adolescent fertility rate

95.8

=18

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 85.7

=23

50

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Belgium
World average
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Benin

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

7.2

99

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

23.0

105

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Regulatory quality

32.2

91

Building credit histories

3.6

84

Starting a business

20.9

103

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Infrastructure risk

20.9

=91

OVERALL SCORE

41.4

89

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Mobile telephone subscribers

18.1

95

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

64.9

27

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

23.6

106

LABOUR POLICY

72.1

=36

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

24.6

104

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

85.7

=12

Literacy rate, women

9.0

110

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

Tertiary education, women

0.8

110

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

57.1

=48

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

64.9

87

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 42.9

=66

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

57.7

21

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

66.7

=18

Property ownership rights

50.0

=79

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

66.7

=16

De facto discrimination at work

64.1

66

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Bolivia

Adolescent fertility rate

41.4

102

Addressing violence against women

33.3

=95

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Benin
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

19.6

87

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

18.6

109

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Mobile telephone subscribers

23.0

86

Building credit histories

28.3

53

Infrastructure risk

17.6

=96

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Starting a business

17.3

107

OVERALL SCORE

39.8

91

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Regulatory quality

16.7

105

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

36.0

96

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

54.0

72

LABOUR POLICY

53.6

80

Literacy rate, women

82.5

73

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

59.9

56

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 71.4

=41

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

Tertiary education, women

33.7

62

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

28.6

=82

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

74.3

77

Legal restrictions on job types

25.0

=95

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

18.5

105

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

33.3

=43

De facto discrimination at work

24.0

111

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

16.7

=48

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

51

Adolescent fertility rate

55.0

90

Property ownership rights

50.0

=79

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Bolivia
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Botswana

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

29.6

73

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

51.7

49

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Regulatory quality

59.2

46

Building credit histories

43.3

39

Infrastructure risk

58.2

=41

Score

Rank

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Starting a business

52.9

59

OVERALL SCORE

48.3

71

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Mobile telephone subscribers

36.3

69

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

36.3

95

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

51.3

80

LABOUR PRACTICE

24.1

97

Literacy rate, women

78.6

78

De facto discrimination at work

96.4

=3

Primary and secondary education, women

62.4

46

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Tertiary education, women

4.1

100

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

84.9

53

LABOUR POLICY

48.6

=85

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

28.6

=82

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

Adolescent fertility rate

74.3

=71

Property ownership rights

50.0

=79

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50
25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

0.0 =111

BrazilLabourPractice

Botswana
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

52.3

40

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

40.3

70

Private sector credit

75.0

=28

Regulatory quality

50.1

58

Building credit histories

59.2

26

Starting a business

38.9

=84

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Mobile telephone subscribers

36.9

68

OVERALL SCORE

61.2

38

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Infrastructure risk

35.2

=69

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

61.3

31

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

62.6

50

LABOUR POLICY

74.3

=30

Literacy rate, women

87.9

61

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

Primary and secondary education, women

67.7

25

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy=12

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Tertiary education, women

34.7

58

85.7

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Legal restrictions on job types

50.0

=82

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

89.4

37

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

48.3

34

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

66.7

=18

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

50.0

=24

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

75.0

=60

De facto discrimination at work

43.3

99

Adolescent fertility rate

71.7

77

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

52

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

BrazilWorld average
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Bulgaria

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

65.0

18

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

61.6

36

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Mobile telephone subscribers

65.9

11

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

75.0

=32

Regulatory quality

65.5

38

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Starting a business

63.2

36

OVERALL SCORE

73.3

20

Building credit histories

34.8

43

Infrastructure risk

51.6

=52

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

75.1

15

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

66.5

43

LABOUR POLICY

81.9

19

Literacy rate, women

97.6

41

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

56.7

66

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

71.4

=27

Tertiary education, women

51.9

41

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

71.4

=30

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

96.2

21

Differential retirement age

66.7

=69

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

68.3

17

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

73.3

39

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

50.0

=24

Adolescent fertility rate

81.2

64

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

50.0

=24

Burkina-Faso

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Bulgaria
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

12.7

94

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

25.3

97

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Starting a business

40.7

=80

Score

Rank

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Regulatory quality

36.0

81

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

0.6

94

Infrastructure risk

17.6

=96

OVERALL SCORE

34.9

102

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Mobile telephone subscribers

7.0

109

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

45.0

70

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

11.6

112

LABOUR POLICY

60.7

=63

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

4.4

111

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

Tertiary education, women

1.1

109

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

Literacy rate, women

0.9

112

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

42.9

=68

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

69.8

83

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 42.9

=66

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

29.3

82

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

83.7

=19

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Property ownership rights

50.0

=79

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Adolescent fertility rate

32.5

106

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

53

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Burkina-Faso
World average
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Score

Cambodia

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

6.3 =105

Rank
GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

17.8

110

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Regulatory quality

31.8

93

Building credit histories

0.0 =102

Infrastructure risk

14.3 =103

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Mobile telephone subscribers

12.9

102

OVERALL SCORE

39.2

92

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Starting a business

12.2

110

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

40.4

83

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

40.4

92

LABOUR POLICY

47.1

=88

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Literacy rate, women

59.4

89

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

Primary and secondary education, women

38.3

98

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 42.9

=66

Tertiary education, women

4.1

101

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

28.6

=82

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

89.8

33

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

14.3

=99

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

33.7

65

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

68.2

=52

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Adolescent fertility rate

73.8

74

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

Score

Rank

Cameroon

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

CambodiaWorld average
Best in World

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

6.5 =100

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

20.1

108

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Infrastructure risk

27.5

=79

Building credit histories

0.9

=90

Regulatory quality

26.6

99

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Mobile telephone subscribers

14.5

99

OVERALL SCORE

32.2

105

Private sector credit

0.0

=96

Starting a business

11.7

111

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

41.1

80

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

42.2

91

LABOUR POLICY

55.0

=72

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Literacy rate, women

49.3

98

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

Primary and secondary education, women

33.6

99

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 57.1

=51

Tertiary education, women

5.8

96

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy=80
WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

42.1

109

100.0

=1

28.6

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

14.3

=98

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

LABOUR PRACTICE

27.2

87

Freedom of movement, women

50.0

=93

De facto discrimination at work

75.4

34

Addressing violence against women

33.3

=95

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Adolescent fertility rate

27.2

108

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Property ownership rights

0.0 =106

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

54

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Cameroon
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A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Canada

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

68.8

=13

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

75.7

15

Building credit histories

100.0

=1

Starting a business

98.6

2

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

90.7

11

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Infrastructure risk

82.4

=16

OVERALL SCORE

80.5

9

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Mobile telephone subscribers

31.0

77

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

80.8

9

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

78.5

23

LABOUR PRACTICE

75.8

12

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

De facto discrimination at work

86.6

10

Tertiary education, women

70.5

24

Primary and secondary education, women

64.5

36

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

83.3

=4

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

98.7

=14

LABOUR POLICY

85.7

=12

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

85.7

=12

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Adolescent fertility rate

93.7

=30

Score

Rank

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 57.1

=51

Chad

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

CanadaWorld average
Best in World

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

0.0 =110

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

5.0

113

Building credit histories

0.1

=98

Regulatory quality

10.0

110

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Mobile telephone subscribers

6.9

110

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Infrastructure risk

3.3 =111OVERALL SCORE

25.2

111

Private sector credit

0.0

=96

Starting a business

0.0

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

45.3

67

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

6.9

113

LABOUR POLICY

52.9

81

SME support/development training

20.0 =104

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Tertiary education, women

7.7

91

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 57.1

=51

Primary and secondary education, women

0.0

113

Legal restrictions on job types

50.0

=82

Literacy rate, women

0.0

113

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55
WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

48.3

105

=98

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

14.3

LABOUR PRACTICE

37.8

55

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

75.0

=60

De facto discrimination at work

68.0

=56

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

50.0

=24

Property ownership rights

0.0 =106

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Adolescent fertility rate

0.0

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

55

113

113

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

ChadWorld average
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Country pages

Chile

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

58.5

28

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

63.7

33

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

88.4

16

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Infrastructure risk

69.2

=31

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Starting a business

55.4

=53

OVERALL SCORE

60.9

40

Building credit histories

33.9

44

Mobile telephone subscribers

41.5

59

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

47.7

62

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

72.9

35

LABOUR POLICY

68.6

=44

Literacy rate, women

95.8

45

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Legal restrictions on job types=1

Primary and secondary education, women

62.0

47

Tertiary education, women

53.8

38

100.0

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

57.1

=38

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

75.1

75

Differential retirement age

0.0 =103

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

26.8

88

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

40.4

100

Adolescent fertility rate

75.4

70

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Property ownership rights

0.0 =106

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

China

100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Chile
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

37.9

51

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

32.8

81

Building credit histories

51.8

30

Infrastructure risk

45.1

=57

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Regulatory quality

38.9

75

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Starting a business

25.3

102

Mobile telephone subscribers

22.1

90

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

49.4

65

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

46.7

66

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

54.5

70

LABOUR POLICY

51.4

84

Literacy rate, women

87.6

62

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

57.1

=38

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

57.1

=48

Primary and secondary education, women

49.3

80

Legal restrictions on job types

50.0

=82

Tertiary education, women

21.1

81

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

78.0

70

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 42.9

=66

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

41.9

43

Adolescent fertility rate

98.4

=6

De facto discrimination at work

67.7

58

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

33.3

=32

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

50.0

=78

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

56

Labour Policy

Score

Rank

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

China
World average
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Colombia

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

52.6

39

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

46.0

61

Building credit histories

60.5

23

Starting a business

54.0

57

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Regulatory quality

51.6

56

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Mobile telephone subscribers

43.4

56

OVERALL SCORE

54.4

52

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Infrastructure risk

35.2

=69

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

40.1

85

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

62.0

51

LABOUR POLICY

44.3

=92

Literacy rate, women

91.2

54

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 85.7

=23

Primary and secondary education, women

63.1

41

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

Tertiary education, women

33.9

61

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

42.9

=68

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

85.2

51

Legal restrictions on job types

0.0 =109

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

36.0

59

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

60.5

74

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

50.0

=24

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Adolescent fertility rate

50.8

93

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Costa Rica

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Colombia
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

32.8

69

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

39.1

73

Building credit histories

56.0

28

Regulatory quality

57.9

48

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Infrastructure risk

41.8

=61

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Starting a business

37.7

87

OVERALL SCORE

54.7

51

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Mobile telephone subscribers

19.1

93

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

51.4

49

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

59.8

55

LABOUR POLICY

64.5

54

Literacy rate, women

95.4

46

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Primary and secondary education, women

56.7

65

Tertiary education, women

27.1

70

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Differential retirement age

83.3

=63

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

71.4

=27

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 57.1

=51

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

93.6

=23

Legal restrictions on job types

25.0

=95

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

38.3

52

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

69.7

=45

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

50.0

=24

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

33.3

=32

Adolescent fertility rate

68.1

=80

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

57

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Costa Rica
World average
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Score

Côte d’Ivoire

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

6.5 =100

Rank
GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

23.9

101

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Infrastructure risk

41.8

=61

Building credit histories

0.9

=90

Mobile telephone subscribers

23.4

84

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Regulatory quality

19.1

104

OVERALL SCORE

28.9

110

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Starting a business

11.3

112

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

34.9

97

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

17.8

110

LABOUR POLICY

55.0

=72

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Literacy rate, women

22.5

107

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

Tertiary education, women

4.5

99

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 57.1

=51

Primary and secondary education, women

4.2

112

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

28.6

=80

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

55.3

96

14.3

=98

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

14.8

110

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

75.0

=60

De facto discrimination at work

59.3

=77

Adolescent fertility rate

42.9

101

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Addressing violence against women

33.3

=95

Property ownership rights

25.0

=94

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

Croatia

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Côte d’Ivoire
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

47.1

43

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

56.3

46

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

75.0

=32

Mobile telephone subscribers

63.3

14

Private sector credit

75.0

=28

Regulatory quality

58.7

47

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

38.5

42

Infrastructure risk

58.2

=41

OVERALL SCORE

59.8

43

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Starting a business

44.9

=74

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

41.9

78

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

72.5

36

LABOUR POLICY

47.9

87

Literacy rate, women

97.8

40

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Primary and secondary education, women

61.5

51

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

28.6

=80

Tertiary education, women

50.6

44

Legal restrictions on job types

25.0

=95

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

98.9

13

Differential retirement age

0.0 =103

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

35.9

60

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

43.6

98

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Adolescent fertility rate

94.2

=26

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

33.3

=43

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

58

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Croatia
World average
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Czech Republic

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

71.5

8

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

61.5

37

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

74.9

30

Private sector credit

75.0

=28

Infrastructure risk

65.9

=34

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

60.9

22

Mobile telephone subscribers

63.6

13

OVERALL SCORE

73.1

22

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Starting a business

41.7

76

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

65.1

25

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

76.1

31

LABOUR POLICY

74.1

33

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 85.7

=23

Primary and secondary education, women

69.6

24

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

Tertiary education, women

55.8

34

Differential retirement age

66.7

=69

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

99.1

=10

42.9

=68

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

56.2

24

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

66.7

=18

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

58.2

81

Adolescent fertility rate

95.3

=22

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

Denmark

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Czech Republic
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

26.1

78

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

80.2

5

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

96.3

4

4.3

82

Infrastructure risk

90.1

=9

Building credit histories
Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Starting a business

74.5

19

OVERALL SCORE

77.6

13

Private sector credit

0.0

=96

Mobile telephone subscribers

59.8

20

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

87.6

5

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

84.4

9

LABOUR POLICY

91.4

=7

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

100.0

=1

Tertiary education, women

81.4

16

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

77.2

7

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1
WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

99.6

=3

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

57.1

=48

LABOUR PRACTICE

83.9

5

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

100.0

=1

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

85.5

=14

Adolescent fertility rate

97.9

=9

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

50.0

=24

59

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Denmark
World average
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Dominican Republic

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

30.3

71

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

38.0

74

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Starting a business

55.4

=53

Building credit histories

46.1

34

Regulatory quality

38.3

76

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Mobile telephone subscribers

34.0

73

Infrastructure risk

24.2

=83

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

51.5

58

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

47.6

63

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

60.6

54

LABOUR POLICY

68.6

=44

Literacy rate, women

87.0

64

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

56.0

69

Tertiary education, women

39.5

50

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

71.4

=30

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 42.9

=66

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

85.0

52

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

28.6

=80

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

26.6

89

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

73.0

=40

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

33.3

=32

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Adolescent fertility rate

49.7

94

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

Equador

Score

Rank

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Dominican Republic
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

24.0

84

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

24.0

100

Building credit histories

46.0

35

Mobile telephone subscribers

40.3

63

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Infrastructure risk

24.2

=83

Score

Rank

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Starting a business

18.0

106

OVERALL SCORE

46.5

75

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Regulatory quality

13.5

107

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

50.6

52

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

51.5

79

LABOUR POLICY

66.4

49

Literacy rate, women

77.0

79

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

46.5

83

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

85.7

=12

Tertiary education, women

42.6

47

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 42.9

=66
WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

78.1

=68

=82

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

28.6

LABOUR PRACTICE

34.9

63

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

56.1

=83

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

33.3

=32

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Adolescent fertility rate

48.7

=95

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

16.7

=60

60

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

EcuadorWorld average
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Egypt

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

45.5

44

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

47.9

55

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

75.0

=32

Starting a business

73.4

20

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Infrastructure risk

54.9

=45

Score

Rank

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Regulatory quality

40.1

70

OVERALL SCORE

50.5

62

Building credit histories

6.8

76

Mobile telephone subscribers

23.4

85

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

50.8

50

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

42.5

90

LABOUR POLICY

55.0

=72

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Literacy rate, women

46.8

100

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

Primary and secondary education, women

41.1

94

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

Tertiary education, women

22.0

80

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

86

28.6

=82

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

65.7

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 28.6

=82

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

46.6

37

Adolescent fertility rate

86.9

=52

De facto discrimination at work

86.4

11

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Property ownership rights

50.0

=79

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

33.3

=32

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

25.0

=97

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

El Salvador

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Egypt
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

36.2

61

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

46.2

60

Building credit histories

94.6

7

Mobile telephone subscribers

53.8

33

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Regulatory quality

53.3

53

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Starting a business

39.3

82

OVERALL SCORE

50.9

61

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Infrastructure risk

38.5

=64

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

40.8

81

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

53.4

73

LABOUR POLICY

55.7

71

Literacy rate, women

74.5

81

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

57.1

=48

Primary and secondary education, women

53.2

72

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

Tertiary education, women

25.8

73

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 42.9

=66

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

88.2

42

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

28.6

=80

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

25.9

90

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

53.7

85

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

75.0

=60

Adolescent fertility rate

66.0

83

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

16.7

=60

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

61

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

El Salvador
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Estonia

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

54.3

35

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

79.5

7

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Mobile telephone subscribers

90.1

2

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

85.4

18

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

17.2

62

Infrastructure risk

72.5

=26

OVERALL SCORE

70.4

27

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Starting a business

69.9

26

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

59.2

38

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

77.0

27

LABOUR POLICY

82.4

18

Literacy rate, women

100.0

1

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

Tertiary education, women

82.9

14

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

65.1

34

Differential retirement age

83.3

=63

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

71.4

=27

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

93.1

26

57.1

=48

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

36.0

58

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

77.4

29

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

33.3

=32

Adolescent fertility rate

90.6

=42

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

75.0

=60

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

Ethiopia

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Estonia
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

12.5

95

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

25.0

99

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Starting a business

47.8

66

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Infrastructure risk

30.8

=74

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

0.0 =100

Regulatory quality

21.2

103

OVERALL SCORE

31.3

107

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Mobile telephone subscribers

0.0

113

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

38.9

87

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

21.7

107

LABOUR POLICY

47.1

=88

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

23.8

105

Legal restrictions on job types

50.0

=82

Literacy rate, women

2.5

111

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

Tertiary education, women

0.7

111

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

28.6

=82

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

50.5

102

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

30.7

77

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

50.0

=78

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Adolescent fertility rate

44.0

=98

De facto discrimination at work

56.1

=83

Addressing violence against women

33.3

=95

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Property ownership rights

25.0

=94

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

62

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Ethiopia
World average
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Finland

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

53.1

37

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

79.9

6

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Infrastructure risk

96.7

=2

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

88.5

14

Building credit histories

12.3

68

Starting a business

73.1

21

0.0

=47

Mobile telephone subscribers

61.3

16

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

85.2

4

Delivering ﬁnancial services

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

93.1

1

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

92.4

4

LABOUR POLICY

97.1

=1

Tertiary education, women

100.0

1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

100.0

=1

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

70.7

19

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

99.3

=5

85.7

=3

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

89.1

1

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

100.0

=1

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

89.6

8

Adolescent fertility rate

96.3

=16

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

66.7

=16

France

Score

Rank

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

FinlandWorld average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

80.4

5

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

78.3

9

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Infrastructure risk

100.0

1

Delivering ﬁnancial services

100.0

=1

Starting a business

89.7

=7

Score

Rank

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

79.5

23

OVERALL SCORE

79.4

11

Building credit histories

21.7

55

Mobile telephone subscribers

44.1

53

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

74.6

16

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

79.0

22

LABOUR POLICY

77.1

=26

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

Primary and secondary education, women

77.0

8

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Tertiary education, women

60.0

31

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

89.4

36

Legal restrictions on job types

0.0 =109

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

72.1

14

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

83.3

=8

Adolescent fertility rate

96.9

15

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

50.0

=78

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice66.7

De facto discrimination at work

38.3 =104

63=16Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

FranceWorld average
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Georgia

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

15.6

90

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

56.3

45

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Starting a business

92.5

6

Building credit histories

12.2

69

Regulatory quality

61.2

43

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Infrastructure risk

41.8

=61

OVERALL SCORE

49.2

67

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Mobile telephone subscribers

29.8

78

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

43.4

76

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

52.0

78

LABOUR POLICY

64.3

=55

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

53.1

74

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 85.7

=23

Tertiary education, women

36.0

56

SME support/development training

20.0 =104

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

71.4

=30

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

84.7

54

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

14.3

=99

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

22.6

99

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

90.2

=6

Adolescent fertility rate

81.7

63

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

Germany

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Georgia
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

87.1

1

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

76.4

14

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Infrastructure risk

96.7

=2

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

85.1

19

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

98.3

5

Starting a business

62.5

38

OVERALL SCORE

83.9

5

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Mobile telephone subscribers

61.0

17

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

79.5

11

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

82.1

13

LABOUR POLICY

85.7

=12

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

75.0

12

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Tertiary education, women

74.5

19

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

99.2

=7

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 42.9

=66

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

73.2

13

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

100.0

=1

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

59.6

76

Adolescent fertility rate

95.8

=18

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

64

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Germany
World average
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Ghana

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

12.5

=96

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

31.5

=85

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Regulatory quality

47.1

64

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Starting a business

31.7

95

Building credit histories

0.0 =102

Infrastructure risk

24.2

=83

Mobile telephone subscribers

22.9

88

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

42.3

86

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

50.5

53

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

38.0

93

LABOUR POLICY

60.0

=65

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Literacy rate, women

47.4

99

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

41.2

93

Tertiary education, women

3.3

105

=47

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

57.1

=48

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

28.6

=80

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

70.8

81

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

40.9

48

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

80.4

=24

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Adolescent fertility rate

62.3

=84

Property ownership rights

25.0

=94

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

16.7

=60

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

GreeceLabour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Ghana
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

72.3

7

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

54.8

47

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

67.1

36

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Infrastructure risk

62.6

=37

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Mobile telephone subscribers

58.9

22

OVERALL SCORE

69.4

29

Building credit histories

39.1

41

Starting a business

30.4

98

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

57.0

41

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

76.3

29

LABOUR POLICY

81.4

=20

Literacy rate, women

95.2

47

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

100.0

=1

Tertiary education, women

85.4

11

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

64.6

35

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 71.4

=41

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

99.1

=10

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

32.5

70

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

50.0

=24

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

46.6

95

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Adolescent fertility rate

95.3

=22

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

33.3

=43

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

65

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

GreeceWorld average
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Honduras

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

33.4

66

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

30.1

89

Private sector credit

75.0

=28

Mobile telephone subscribers

40.0

64

Building credit histories

58.7

27

Regulatory quality

37.4

78
99

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Starting a business

28.8

OVERALL SCORE

48.2

72

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Infrastructure risk

14.3 =103

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

43.5

75

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

54.5

69

LABOUR POLICY

38.6

101

Literacy rate, women

79.3

77

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Primary and secondary education, women

53.2

73

Tertiary education, women

25.7

74

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

71.4

=30

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

57.1

=38

Legal restrictions on job types

50.0

=82

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

83.9

57

Differential retirement age

0.0 =103

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

48.4

33

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

60.2

75

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

50.0

=24

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

75.0

=60

Adolescent fertility rate

44.5

97

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

50.0

=24

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Hong Kong

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Honduras
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

58.7

26

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

92.4

1

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

100.0

1

Building credit histories

59.9

24

Infrastructure risk

96.7

=2

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Starting a business

93.8

5

OVERALL SCORE

72.9

23

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Mobile telephone subscribers

79.2

4

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

70.9

21

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

66.3

45

LABOUR POLICY

71.4

=39

Literacy rate, women

89.3

59

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

63.5

39

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Tertiary education, women

32.1

65

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

78.1

67

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

70.4

16

Adolescent fertility rate

99.0

=2

Access to childcare

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

De facto discrimination at work

81.6

22

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

50.0

=78

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

66.7

=16

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

33.3

=32

66

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Hong Kong
World average
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Hungary

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

77.2

6

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

69.0

25

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

79.5

22

Delivering ﬁnancial services

100.0

=1

Infrastructure risk

69.2

=31

Private sector credit

Score

Rank

100.0

=1

Starting a business

69.2

=27

OVERALL SCORE

75.3

17

Building credit histories

8.6

73

Mobile telephone subscribers

58.0

23

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

64.4

28

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

78.5

24

LABOUR POLICY

83.6

16

Literacy rate, women

98.7

36

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Tertiary education, women

73.2

20

Primary and secondary education, women

61.9

50

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 85.7

=23

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

98.1

18

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

71.4

=27

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

45.3

38

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

50.0

=24

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

47.8

91

Adolescent fertility rate

90.6

=42

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

16.7

=60

Iceland

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Hungary
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

62.5

=23

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

72.1

22

Building credit histories

100.0

=1

Infrastructure risk

90.1

=9

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

75.7

29

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Starting a business

70.9

24

OVERALL SCORE

82.9

6

Private sector credit

0.0

=96

Mobile telephone subscribers

51.5

38

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

84.2

8

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

95.4

2

LABOUR POLICY

88.6

10

SME support/development training

100.0

=1

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Tertiary education, women

93.4

6

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Primary and secondary education, women

89.3

3

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 85.7

=23

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

98.7

=14

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy=27

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

71.4

LABOUR PRACTICE

79.9

8

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

86.1

12

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Adolescent fertility rate

93.7

=30

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

83.3

=4

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

50.0

=24

67

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

IcelandWorld average
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India

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

39.2

49

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

26.0

95

Private sector credit

75.0

=28

Regulatory quality

39.1

74

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Infrastructure risk

38.5

=64

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Starting a business

13.4

108

OVERALL SCORE

42.7

84

Building credit histories

6.8

77

Mobile telephone subscribers

13.1

101

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

49.5

57

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

33.1

98

LABOUR POLICY

60.7

=63

Literacy rate, women

42.6

101

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

40.0

96

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

71.4

=27

Tertiary education, women

9.9

89

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

42.9

=68

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

58.8

89

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

Adolescent fertility rate

77.5

68

LABOUR PRACTICE

38.2

53

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

De facto discrimination at work

69.4

=47

Freedom of movement, women

50.0

=93

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

33.3

=32

Property ownership rights

50.0

=79

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

50.0

=78

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

16.7

100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

29.6

72

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

26.4

94

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Regulatory quality

37.4

77

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Mobile telephone subscribers

28.8

80

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Infrastructure risk

20.9

=91

Starting a business

18.6

105

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

43.1

82

Building credit histories

18.3

60

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

49.0

58

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

51.2

81

LABOUR POLICY

65.7

=50

Literacy rate, women

86.0

66

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

61.9

49

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Tertiary education, women

16.9

83

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

57.1

=48

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

53.2

98

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 28.6

=82

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

75.0

=60

LABOUR PRACTICE

32.3

=73

Adolescent fertility rate

74.3

=71

De facto discrimination at work

79.2

=27

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Freedom of movement, women

50.0

=93

Property ownership rights

0.0 =106

16.7

=60

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

India
World average
Best in WorldACCESS TO FINANCE

Score

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

LabourPractice

25=60

Indonesia

68

Labour Policy

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Indonesia
World average
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A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Iran

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

35.2

62

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

32.6

82

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Starting a business

64.6

33

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Infrastructure risk

38.5

=64

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Mobile telephone subscribers

27.3

81

OVERALL SCORE

33.0

103

Building credit histories

15.7

64

Regulatory quality

0.0

113

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

20.8

110

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

51.2

82

LABOUR POLICY

22.1

112

Primary and secondary education, women

76.0

10

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 42.9

=66

Literacy rate, women

71.4

85

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

28.6

=80

Tertiary education, women

37.2

53

Legal restrictions on job types

25.0

=95

SME support/development training

20.0 =104

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

14.3

=98

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

37.6

Differential retirement age

0.0 =103

Adolescent fertility rate

88.0

=48

LABOUR PRACTICE

19.5 =102

Freedom of movement, women

50.0

=93

De facto discrimination at work

44.5

=96

Property ownership rights

50.0

=79

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Addressing violence against women

0.0 =109

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

0.0 =111

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

IrelandAccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Iran
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

79.0

8

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

97.7

3

Delivering ﬁnancial services

100.0

=1

Starting a business

88.5

9

Building credit histories

83.3

=9

Infrastructure risk

72.5

=26

=96

Mobile telephone subscribers

57.4

25

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

69.3

22

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

81.5

15

LABOUR POLICY

86.4

11

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

84.7

4

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 85.7

=23

Tertiary education, women

62.4

29

Legal restrictions on job types=54
WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

88.4

41

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

71.4

=30

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

52.3

29

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

83.3

=8

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

75.7

=32

Adolescent fertility rate

92.1

=36

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

50.0

=78

69

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

0.0

=91

0

=10

Private sector credit

0.0

25

Rank

16

Access to childcare

LabourPractice

70.8

76.4

=24

50

Score

OVERALL SCORE

50.0

75

ACCESS TO FINANCE

Rank

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

111

Score

75.0

Labour Policy

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

IrelandWorld average
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Country pages

Israel

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

58.7

27

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

70.1

23

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

77.9

25

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

75.0

=32

Infrastructure risk

72.5

=26

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

59.9

25

Starting a business

69.2

=27

OVERALL SCORE

70.2

28

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Mobile telephone subscribers

60.6

18

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

66.3

24

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

76.2

30

LABOUR POLICY

73.6

=34

Literacy rate, women

85.9

67

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Tertiary education, women

71.5

22

Primary and secondary education, women

67.5

26

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

57.1

=38

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

83.6

59

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

59.0

20

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

69.4

=47

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

66.7

=16

Adolescent fertility rate

93.2

=33

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

25.0

=97

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

33.3

=32

Italy

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

IsraelWorld average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

66.2

17

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

67.0

28

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Mobile telephone subscribers

72.3

5

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

71.1

33

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

64.6

21

Infrastructure risk

69.2

=31

OVERALL SCORE

68.3

31

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Starting a business

55.4

=53

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

52.9

44

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

81.0

16

LABOUR POLICY

70.0

43

Literacy rate, women

98.5

38

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 85.7

=23

Primary and secondary education, women

74.7

13

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

57.1

=38

Tertiary education, women

70.8

23

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

57.1

=48

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

89.5

35

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

35.8

61

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Adolescent fertility rate

97.4

=13

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

50.0

=78

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

50.0

=24

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

33.3

=32

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

De facto discrimination at work

26.7

110

70

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Italy
World average
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Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Japan

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

81.6

4

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

65.0

29

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Infrastructure risk

82.4

=16

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

78.7

24

Building credit histories

76.2

17

Starting a business

58.2

47

=8

Mobile telephone subscribers

40.9

61

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

68.2

32

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

52.4

45

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

69.5

39

LABOUR POLICY

72.1

=36

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

66.5

31

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Tertiary education, women

52.7

39

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

71.4

=30

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

57.1

=38

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

88.0

43

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 57.1

=51

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

32.6

68

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

47.2

=92

Adolescent fertility rate

98.4

=6

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

33.3

=32

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

75.0

=60

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

16.7

Score

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training=60

JordanRank

Japan
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

37.7

53

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

45.1

63

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

54.2

50

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Infrastructure risk

48.4

=55

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

0.7

93

Mobile telephone subscribers

40.8

62

OVERALL SCORE

43.5

81

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Starting a business

37.0

88

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

29.0

106

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

64.8

48

LABOUR POLICY

39.3

100

Literacy rate, women

83.8

70

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

Primary and secondary education, women

56.9

64

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

28.6

=80

Tertiary education, women

38.5

52

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

28.6

=82

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

55.6

93

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

Adolescent fertility rate

86.4

=54

LABOUR PRACTICE

18.7

104

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

De facto discrimination at work

74.8

35

Freedom of movement, women

50.0

=93

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Property ownership rights

50.0

=79

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

25.0

=97

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

71

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

JordanWorld average
Best in World© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Kazakhstan

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

44.9

45

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

35.5

79

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

75.0

=32

Starting a business

50.8

61

Private sector credit

75.0

=28

Mobile telephone subscribers

45.4

50

Building credit histories

29.5

48

Regulatory quality

34.7

87

Infrastructure risk

11.0

106

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

52.1

56

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

40.1

86

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

66.4

44

LABOUR POLICY

41.4

=96

Literacy rate, women

99.6

6

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

Primary and secondary education, women

57.0

63

Tertiary education, women

49.2

45

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

28.6

=82

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

14.3

=99

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

85.7

49

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

38.7

51

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

71.5

44

Adolescent fertility rate

86.9

=52

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

16.7

=60

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Kenya

100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Kazakhstan
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

19.1

89

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

25.3

98

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Regulatory quality

42.8

68

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Starting a business

39.1

83

Building credit histories

1.5

86

Mobile telephone subscribers

19.2

92

Infrastructure risk

0.0

113

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

41.3

90

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

43.5

73

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

43.4

89

LABOUR POLICY

52.1

=82

Literacy rate, women

62.5

87

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

Primary and secondary education, women

49.5

79

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

Tertiary education, women

1.5

108

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

28.6

=82

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

73.1

78

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

34.9

62

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

73.0

=40

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

75.0

=60

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

33.3

=43

Property ownership rights

50.0

=79

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Adolescent fertility rate

40.3

103

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

72

Labour Policy

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Kenya
World average
Best in World© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Korea, Republic of

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

63.3

21

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

Score
61.4

Rank
39

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Infrastructure risk

75.8

=22

Building credit histories

78.2

15

Regulatory quality

65.0

39

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

75.0

=32

Starting a business

60.0

42

35

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Mobile telephone subscribers

44.8

52

60.2

33

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

73.9

33

65.0

53

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Tertiary education, women

72.6

21

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

71.4

=27

Primary and secondary education, women

64.0

38

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

66.2

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICELABOUR POLICY

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

71.4

=30

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 57.1

=51

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

78.3

66

Legal restrictions on job types

25.0

=95

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

55.4

25

Adolescent fertility rate

100.0

1

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

50.0

=78

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

83.3

=4

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

De facto discrimination at work

38.3 =104

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

33.3

100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75

LabourPractice50
25
0Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training=32

KuwaitKorea, Republic ofWorld average
Best in World

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

36.3

59

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

46.0

62

Private sector credit

75.0

=28

Infrastructure risk

58.2

=41

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Mobile telephone subscribers

47.1

46

Building credit histories

20.3

56

Regulatory quality

45.8

65

Starting a business

32.7

93

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

46.4

76

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

43.8

72

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

53.4

74

LABOUR POLICY

54.3

=77

Literacy rate, women

91.5

53

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

57.5

60

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

Tertiary education, women

24.4

77

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

14.3

=98

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

55.4

94

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

Adolescent fertility rate

93.7

=30

LABOUR PRACTICE

33.3

67

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Freedom of movement, women

50.0

=93

De facto discrimination at work

66.5

60

Addressing violence against women

33.3

=95

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

25.0

=97

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

73

Labour Policy

Score

Rank

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

KuwaitWorld average
Best in World© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Kyrgyz Republic

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

13.5

91

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

40.8

69

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Starting a business

83.7

13

Building credit histories

3.9

83

Regulatory quality

35.9

83
79

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Mobile telephone subscribers

29.2

OVERALL SCORE

42.2

87

Private sector credit

0.0

=96

Infrastructure risk

14.3 =103

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

29.6

105

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

54.2

71

LABOUR POLICY

42.9

95

Literacy rate, women

99.1

10

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 57.1

=51

Tertiary education, women

51.6

42

Legal restrictions on job types

50.0

=82

Primary and secondary education, women

46.2

85

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

SME support/development training

20.0 =104

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

42.9

=68

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

85.6

50

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

14.3

=99

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

16.3

108

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

65.3

64

Adolescent fertility rate

86.4

=54

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Score

Rank

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

Laos

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Kyrgyz Republic
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

6.3 =105

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

20.4

107

Private sector credit

25.0

Starting a business

48.7

62

Building credit histories

0.0 =102

Mobile telephone subscribers

14.6

98
109

=66

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Regulatory quality

10.5

OVERALL SCORE

35.7

100

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Infrastructure risk

7.7 =107

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

41.1

79

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

33.0

99

LABOUR POLICY

44.3

=92

Literacy rate, women

53.7

96

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Legal restrictions on job types

50.0

=82

Primary and secondary education, women

26.8

103

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 42.9

=66

Tertiary education, women

11.6

86

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy=99
WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

72.0

79

=98

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

14.3

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

14.3

LABOUR PRACTICE

37.9

54

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

De facto discrimination at work

68.2

=52

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

75.0

=60

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Adolescent fertility rate

43.5

100

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

16.7

=60

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

74

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Laos
World average
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Latvia

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

64.0

19

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

61.6

35

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

74.4

31

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

75.0

=32

Infrastructure risk

62.6

=37

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Starting a business

62.6

37

OVERALL SCORE

68.5

30

Building credit histories

31.0

47

Mobile telephone subscribers

46.8

47

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

59.7

35

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

79.1

21

LABOUR POLICY

77.1

=26

Literacy rate, women

100.0

2

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

Tertiary education, women

95.7

3

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

60.9

55

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

57.1

=48

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

86.8

46

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

28.6

=80

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

42.3

40

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

85.8

13

Adolescent fertility rate

92.1

=36

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

50.0

=24

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

33.3

=32

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

Lebanon

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

75.0

=60

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

LatviaWorld average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

38.9

50

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

36.4

77

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Starting a business

45.8

72

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Infrastructure risk

45.1

=57

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

5.5

79

Regulatory quality

39.3

71

OVERALL SCORE

41.9

88

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Mobile telephone subscribers

15.3

96

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

34.4

100

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

58.9

58

LABOUR POLICY

41.4

=96

Literacy rate, women

82.5

74

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

57.5

62

Legal restrictions on job types

50.0

=82

Tertiary education, women

55.6

35

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

28.6

=80

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

14.3

=98

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

48.3

106

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

Adolescent fertility rate

91.6

=39

LABOUR PRACTICE

27.3

85

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

De facto discrimination at work

59.3

=77

Freedom of movement, women

50.0

=93
=97

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

25.0

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

16.7

=48

Addressing violence against women

0.0 =109

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

75

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

LebanonWorld average
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Lithuania

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

54.6

34

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

64.5

31

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

75.0

=32

Regulatory quality

76.4

26

Private sector credit

75.0

=28

Mobile telephone subscribers

72.2

6

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Infrastructure risk

62.6

=37

Starting a business

46.7

68

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

71.6

25

Building credit histories

18.4

59

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

66.5

23

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

79.3

20

LABOUR POLICY

76.7

28

Literacy rate, women

99.9

3

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

Tertiary education, women

94.5

4

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

62.9

43

Differential retirement age

83.3

=63

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

57.1

=38

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

98.2

17

42.9

=68

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

56.4

23

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

75.7

=32

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

50.0

=24

Adolescent fertility rate

91.1

41

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

33.3

=43

Luxembourg

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Lithuania
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

37.5

54

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

77.1

12

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

92.2

9

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Infrastructure risk

90.1

=9

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

0.0 =102

Mobile telephone subscribers

70.2

7

OVERALL SCORE

71.9

24

Private sector credit

0.0

=96

Starting a business

56.1

51

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

73.6

19

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

70.2

37

LABOUR POLICY

82.9

17

SME support/development training

100.0

=1

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

72.7

16

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 85.7

=23

Tertiary education, women

9.0

90

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

71.4

=30

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

99.2

=7

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

57.1

=38

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

64.3

19

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

73.9

38

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

66.7

=18

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Adolescent fertility rate

95.8

=18

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

50.0

=24

76

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Luxembourg
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Country pages

Madagascar

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

0.0

112

Score

Rank

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

39.7

Building credit histories

72

0.0 =100

Starting a business

84.4

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

11

0.0

=92

Regulatory quality

35.7

84

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Infrastructure risk

27.5

=79

OVERALL SCORE

35.2

101

Private sector credit

0.0

=96

Mobile telephone subscribers

11.1

107

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

33.1

101

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

36.1

94

LABOUR POLICY

33.6

106

Literacy rate, women

56.3

93

Primary and secondary education, women

45.5

86

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Tertiary education, women

2.7

106

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

57.1

=48

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 42.9

=66

Legal restrictions on job types

25.0

=95

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

69.1

84

Differential retirement age

0.0 =103

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

32.6

69

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

80.4

=24

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

33.3

=43

Property ownership rights

25.0

=94

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

16.7

=48

Adolescent fertility rate

20.4

110

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

Malawi

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Madagascar
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

23.1

104

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Starting a business

36.1

89

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Regulatory quality

34.1

89

=66

Infrastructure risk

17.6

=96

Mobile telephone subscribers

4.6

112

25.0

Building credit histories

0.0 =102LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

45.1

69

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

35.7

96

LABOUR POLICY

62.9

=60

Literacy rate, women

55.4

94

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

40.2

95

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

57.1

=48

Tertiary education, women

7.3

93

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

49.9

103

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

27.3

86

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

De facto discrimination at work

76.0

31

Freedom of movement, women

50.0

=93

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

16.7

=48

Property ownership rights

25.0

=94

Adolescent fertility rate

7.9

112

77

0

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

Private sector credit

=91

25

=80

95

0.0

LabourPractice

Rank

Rank

Access to childcare

50

25.0

37.3

=60

75

Score

Score

16.7

100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

ACCESS TO FINANCEOVERALL SCORE

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

Labour Policy

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

MalawiWorld average
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A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Malaysia

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

70.5

12

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

Score
57.0

Rank
43

Delivering ﬁnancial services

100.0

=1

Infrastructure risk

65.9

=34

Building credit histories

82.0

14

Starting a business

61.4

40

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Regulatory quality

52.3

54

49

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Mobile telephone subscribers

48.6

41

38.1

90

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

59.2

57

55.0

=72

Literacy rate, women

87.0

63

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

Primary and secondary education, women

56.5

68

Tertiary education, women

33.2

63

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

55.3

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICELABOUR POLICY

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

57.1

=48

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

28.6

=80

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

68.9

85

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

21.2

101

Adolescent fertility rate

94.2

=26

De facto discrimination at work

84.9

16

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Freedom of movement, women

50.0

=93

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

25.0

=97

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

Mauritius

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Malaysia
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

53.1

36

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

64.6

30

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Starting a business

86.5

10

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Regulatory quality

71.2

32

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Infrastructure risk

62.6

=37

OVERALL SCORE

64.0

37

Building credit histories

12.3

67

Mobile telephone subscribers

38.0

66

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

59.6

36

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

60.8

53

LABOUR POLICY

71.4

=39

Literacy rate, women

80.9

75

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

66.0

32

Tertiary education, women

16.4

84

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

71.4

=30

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

57.1

=38

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

86.5

48

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 28.6

=82

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

47.7

35

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Adolescent fertility rate

82.7

=60

De facto discrimination at work

57.6

82

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

75.0

=60

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

50.0

=24

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

16.7

=48

78

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Mauritius
World average
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Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Mexico

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

44.4

46

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

48.3

54

Building credit histories

77.5

16

Regulatory quality

57.2

49

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Infrastructure risk

54.9

=45

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Starting a business

48.5

=63

OVERALL SCORE

60.4

41

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Mobile telephone subscribers

32.5

75

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

63.9

29

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

55.3

68

LABOUR POLICY

85.7

=12

Literacy rate, women

89.3

60

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

66.6

30

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Tertiary education, women

25.4

75

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

71.4

=27

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

86.6

47

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 71.4

=41

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

42.0

42

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

66.7

=18

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

34.7

108

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Adolescent fertility rate

58.1

88

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

33.3

=43

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Moldova

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

MexicoWorld average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

25.0

=80

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

36.8

76

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Starting a business

52.7

60

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Regulatory quality

39.3

72

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

0.0 =102

Mobile telephone subscribers

31.2

76

OVERALL SCORE

51.0

60

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Infrastructure risk

24.2

=83

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

47.9

61

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

57.5

60

LABOUR POLICY

64.3

=55

Literacy rate, women

98.8

35

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

Tertiary education, women

48.8

46

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

42.4

91

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

42.9

=68

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

90.9

30

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

28.6

=80

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

31.5

76

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

59.3

=77

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

33.3

=43

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

79

Adolescent fertility rate

88.0

=48

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Moldova
World average
Best in World© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Morocco

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

52.9

38

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

41.6

68

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Starting a business

53.6

58

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Regulatory quality

43.9

66

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Infrastructure risk

35.2

=69

OVERALL SCORE

44.1

78

Building credit histories

11.7

71

Mobile telephone subscribers

33.8

74

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

31.9

103

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

34.6

97

LABOUR POLICY

48.6

=85

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

39.5

97

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 57.1

=51

Literacy rate, women

28.3

104

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

Tertiary education, women

10.6

88

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

42.9

=68

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

71.7

80

Legal restrictions on job types

0.0 =109

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

15.3

109

Adolescent fertility rate

91.6

=39

De facto discrimination at work

61.1

73

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

25.0

=97

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

Namibia0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

MoroccoWorld average
Best in World

42.1

66

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Infrastructure risk

58.2

=41

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Regulatory quality

48.4

61

Building credit histories

48.1

31

Starting a business

38.9

=84

Mobile telephone subscribers

22.8

89

0.0

=47

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

50.4

54

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

48.8

84

LABOUR POLICY

68.6

=44

Literacy rate, women

84.2

68

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

59.7

58

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

57.1

=48

Tertiary education, women

11.2

87

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

77.5

72

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 42.9

=66

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

32.3

=73

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

79.2

=27

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Adolescent fertility rate

62.3

=84

Property ownership rights

25.0

=94

80

25

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

Delivering ﬁnancial services=61

LabourPractice

55

59

0.0

50

Rank

51.0

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

75

37.0

OVERALL SCORE=60

GeneralBusiness
Environment

Score

Rank

16.7

100

ACCESS TO FINANCE

Score

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

Labour Policy

Score

Rank

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Namibia
World average
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A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Netherlands

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

54.9

32

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

76.4

13

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Infrastructure risk

96.7

=2

Building credit histories

69.6

18

Regulatory quality

93.2

7

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Mobile telephone subscribers

59.3

21

0.0

=96

Starting a business

56.6

50

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

82.5

7

Private sector credit

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

90.0

4

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

84.2

10

LABOUR POLICY

97.1

=1

SME support/development training

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

100.0

=1

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

Primary and secondary education, women

78.0

6

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Tertiary education, women

60.0

32

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

99.8

1

85.7

=3

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

82.8

7

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

83.3

=8

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Adolescent fertility rate

99.0

=2

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

83.3

=4

De facto discrimination at work

64.4

65

New Zealand

100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Netherlands
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

52.1

41

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

81.6

3

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Starting a business

100.0

1

Building credit histories

83.3

=9

Regulatory quality

92.3

8

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Infrastructure risk

82.4

=16

0.0

=47

Mobile telephone subscribers

51.8

37

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

81.2

8

Delivering ﬁnancial services

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

85.5

7

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

95.4

1

LABOUR POLICY

94.3

=4

SME support/development training

100.0

=1

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Tertiary education, women

93.3

7

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

89.5

2

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

85.7

=12
WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

87.2

45

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

76.7

10

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

90.2

=6

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

83.3

=4

Adolescent fertility rate

85.9

58

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

66.7

=18

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

50.0

=78

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

81

Labour Policy

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

New ZealandWorld average
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A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Nicaragua

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

19.6

86

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

31.5

=85

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Starting a business

48.1

65

Building credit histories

28.4

52

Regulatory quality

34.8

86

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Mobile telephone subscribers

25.4

83

OVERALL SCORE

45.6

77

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Infrastructure risk

17.6

=96

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

49.0

59

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

45.7

86

LABOUR POLICY

72.1

=36

Literacy rate, women

72.3

83

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

52.8

75

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Tertiary education, women

17.6

82

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 71.4

=41

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

78.8

65

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

28.6

=80

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

25.8

91

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

53.1

86

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

75.0

=60

Adolescent fertility rate

44.0

=98

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

16.7

=60

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Nigeria

100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Nicaragua
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

25.0

=80

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

23.7

102

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Starting a business

44.9

=73

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Regulatory quality

27.7

97

Building credit histories

0.0 =102

Mobile telephone subscribers

19.0

94

Infrastructure risk

3.3 =111

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

35.7

99

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

38.1

91

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

30.7

102

LABOUR POLICY

46.4

=90

Literacy rate, women

54.8

95

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

Primary and secondary education, women

20.9

106

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

28.6

=80

Tertiary education, women

7.2

94

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

14.3

=98

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

58.7

90

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

29.7

79

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

De facto discrimination at work

85.5

=14

Freedom of movement, women

50.0

=93

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Adolescent fertility rate

35.1

104

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Addressing violence against women

33.3

=95

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

82

Labour Policy

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Nigeria
World average
Best in World© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

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A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Norway

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

66.7

16

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

73.7

20

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Infrastructure risk

90.1

=9

Building credit histories

66.7

20

Regulatory quality

81.8

20

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Starting a business

70.4

25

OVERALL SCORE

85.3

3

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Mobile telephone subscribers

52.2

36

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

90.5

3

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

91.2

5

LABOUR POLICY

94.3

=4

SME support/development training

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

100.0

=1

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

Tertiary education, women

86.1

10

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

79.9

5

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

99.3

=5

71.4

=30

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

86.6

3

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

100.0

=1

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

96.4

=3

Adolescent fertility rate

96.3

=16

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

50.0

=24

Oman

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

NorwayWorld average
Best in World

Score

Rank

27.1

75

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

63.0

34

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Infrastructure risk

75.8

=22

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Regulatory quality

62.9

40

Building credit histories

8.5

74

Starting a business

58.4

46

=47

Mobile telephone subscribers

54.9

29

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

43.7

80

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

32.8

102

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

56.0

66

LABOUR POLICY

31.4 =108

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Legal restrictions on job types

50.0

=82

Literacy rate, women

71.7

84

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

Primary and secondary education, women

44.9

88

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 28.6

=82

Tertiary education, women

27.2

69

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy=99
WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

50.7

101

=98

Adolescent fertility rate

95.3

21

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

14.3

LABOUR PRACTICE

34.1

64

Freedom of movement, women

50.0

=93

De facto discrimination at work

69.7

=45

Property ownership rights

50.0

=79

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Addressing violence against women

33.3

=95

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

25.0

=97

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

83

100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

ACCESS TO FINANCE

Score

14.3

Labour Policy

Score

Rank

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Oman
World average
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Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Pakistan

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

26.2

77

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

34.2

80

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Starting a business

57.7

49

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Regulatory quality

31.8

92

Score

Rank

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Infrastructure risk

24.2

=83

OVERALL SCORE

29.9

108

Building credit histories

4.7

80

Mobile telephone subscribers

22.9

87

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

27.4

108

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

14.4

111

LABOUR POLICY

36.4 =102

Literacy rate, women

23.8

106

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

SME support/development training

20.0 =104

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

Primary and secondary education, women

10.0

110

Tertiary education, women

3.7

104

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

28.6

=82

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

14.3

=99

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

49.8

104

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

Adolescent fertility rate

90.6

=42

LABOUR PRACTICE

18.4

106

Freedom of movement, women

50.0

=93

De facto discrimination at work

40.1

101

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

50.0

=78

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Addressing violence against women

33.3

=95

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Property ownership rights

25.0

=94

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

Panama100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Pakistan
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

36.5

57

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

61.0

40

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Starting a business

72.0

=22

Building credit histories

45.9

36

Regulatory quality

62.2

42

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Infrastructure risk

54.9

=45

Mobile telephone subscribers

54.7

31

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

58.2

46

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

47.4

64

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

65.5

47

LABOUR POLICY

54.3

=77

Literacy rate, women

91.1

55

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

71.4

=30

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 71.4

=41

Primary and secondary education, women

56.6

67

Legal restrictions on job types

50.0

=82

Tertiary education, women

54.2

37

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

91.3

29

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

28.6

=80

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

40.6

49

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

62.3

70

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

50.0

=24

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Adolescent fertility rate

56.5

89

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

16.7

=48

84

Labour Policy

Score

Rank

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

PanamaWorld average
Best in World© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Paraguay

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

24.4

83

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

36.0

78

Building credit histories

47.4

32

Starting a business

46.7

=69

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Mobile telephone subscribers

45.1

51

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Regulatory quality

31.4

94

Infrastructure risk

20.9

=91

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

49.0

69

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

43.9

71

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

52.3

76

LABOUR POLICY

63.6

=58

Literacy rate, women

91.9

51

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

51.4

76

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Tertiary education, women

25.9

72

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

57.1

=48

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

93.4

25

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 42.9

=66

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

96

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Adolescent fertility rate

67.0

82

24.2

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

50.0

=24

De facto discrimination at work

46.9

94

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

Peru

Rank

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Paraguay
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

20.5

85

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

42.3

65

Building credit histories

31.8

46

Regulatory quality

54.1

51

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Starting a business

42.8

75

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Infrastructure risk

38.5

=64

Mobile telephone subscribers

34.1

72

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

53.0

54

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

53.3

43

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

59.5

56

LABOUR POLICY

74.3

=30

Literacy rate, women

80.8

76

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

63.0

42

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 71.4

=41

Tertiary education, women

34.3

60

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

57.1

=48

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

89.0

38

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

32.4

71

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

62.9

68

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

33.3

=43

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Adolescent fertility rate

70.2

78

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

85

Score

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Peru
World average
Best in World© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Philippines

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

19.5

88

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

32.5

83

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Regulatory quality

43.4

67

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Mobile telephone subscribers

35.4

70

Building credit histories

3.1

85

Infrastructure risk

30.8

=74

Starting a business

20.5

104

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

50.4

63

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

59.3

37

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

57.1

62

LABOUR POLICY

74.3

=30

Literacy rate, women

92.2

50

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

46.6

82

Tertiary education, women

29.6

67

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

71.4

=30

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 57.1

=51

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

74.5

76

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

44.4

39

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

94.1

5

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

33.3

=32

Adolescent fertility rate

72.3

76

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Property ownership rights

0.0 =106

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

16.7

=60

PolandLabour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Philippines
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

55.1

31

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

56.9

44

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

66.1

37

Private sector credit

75.0

=28

Infrastructure risk

65.9

=34

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

45.5

37

Mobile telephone subscribers

54.7

30

OVERALL SCORE

68.0

33

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Starting a business

40.7

79

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

61.9

30

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

79.8

18

LABOUR POLICY

73.6

=34

Literacy rate, women

99.0

11

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

85.7

=12

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Tertiary education, women

77.6

18

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

Primary and secondary education, women

62.7

45

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 71.4

=41

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

92.2

27

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

50.2

31

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

50.7

=89

Adolescent fertility rate

94.2

=26

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

50.0

=24

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

33.3

=32

86

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

PolandWorld average
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Portugal

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

66.9

15

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

69.5

24

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

75.8

28

Delivering ﬁnancial services

100.0

=1

Infrastructure risk

75.8

=22

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

67.8

19

Mobile telephone subscribers

66.5

10

OVERALL SCORE

78.3

12

Private sector credit

0.0

=96

Starting a business

59.6

43

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

77.4

13

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

80.2

17

LABOUR POLICY

97.1

=1

SME support/development training

100.0

=1

Literacy rate, women

91.8

52

Primary and secondary education, women

73.4

14

Tertiary education, women

55.5

36

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

100.0

=1

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

98.4

16

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

85.7

=12

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

57.6

22

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Adolescent fertility rate

92.1

=36

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

83.3

=8

De facto discrimination at work

47.2

=92

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

Romania

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Portugal
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

36.3

60

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

59.5

41

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

75.0

=32

Starting a business

69.0

29

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Regulatory quality

59.6

45

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

20.1

57

Infrastructure risk

54.9

=45

OVERALL SCORE

61.0

39

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Mobile telephone subscribers

54.4

32

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

52.1

46

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

69.7

38

LABOUR POLICY

78.6

25

Literacy rate, women

96.3

44

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

Tertiary education, women

62.5

28

Legal restrictions on job types=1

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Primary and secondary education, women

59.9

57

100.0

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

57.1

=38

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

96.5

20

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

25.7

92

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

69.4

=47

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

33.3

=43

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Adolescent fertility rate

82.7

=60

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

87

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Romania
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Russia

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

34.2

64

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

47.2

58

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Mobile telephone subscribers

67.3

9

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Starting a business

46.9

67

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Infrastructure risk

45.1

=57

OVERALL SCORE

50.3

64

Building credit histories

11.9

70

Regulatory quality

29.5

96

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

34.5

99

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

67.7

42

LABOUR POLICY

43.6

94

Literacy rate, women

99.4

7

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 57.1

=51

Tertiary education, women

84.9

12

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

Primary and secondary education, women

46.4

84

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

42.9

=68

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

83.9

=55

Legal restrictions on job types

25.0

=95

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

25.4

94

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

68.2

=52

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Adolescent fertility rate

86.4

=54

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Addressing violence against women

33.3

=95

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice0.0

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50
25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Rank

Score

Rank

35.0

63

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

64.1

32

Private sector credit

75.0

=28

Starting a business

83.9

12

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Mobile telephone subscribers

68.1

8

Building credit histories

14.9

65

Infrastructure risk

54.9

=45

Regulatory quality

49.5

59

35.9

98

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

9.3

113

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

56.7

63

LABOUR POLICY

16.4

113

Literacy rate, women

74.2

82

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Legal restrictions on job types

25.0

=95

Primary and secondary education, women

57.7

59

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

Tertiary education, women

34.8

57

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

0.0 =111

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

41.1

110

Differential retirement age

0.0 =103

Adolescent fertility rate

97.4

=13

LABOUR PRACTICE

2.2

112

Property ownership rights

50.0

=79

De facto discrimination at work

8.9

112

Addressing violence against women

33.3

=95

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

25.0

=97

Freedom of movement, women

0.0 =112

0.0=75

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

RussiaWorld average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

LabourPractice

ACCESS TO FINANCE

Score

88

100

=75

Saudi Arabia
OVERALL SCORE

Labour Policy

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Saudi Arabia
World average
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Senegal

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

12.9

93

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

30.3

88

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Starting a business

46.4

71

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Regulatory quality

36.8

80

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

1.5

88

Mobile telephone subscribers

20.2

91

OVERALL SCORE

38.0

94

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Infrastructure risk

17.6

=96

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

40.7

82

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

25.1

104

LABOUR POLICY

52.1

=82

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

20.2

107

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

Literacy rate, women

15.4

109

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 57.1

=51

Tertiary education, women

4.6

98

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

14.3

=99

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

78.1

=68

14.3

=98

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

29.3

=80

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

84.0

=17

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Adolescent fertility rate

48.7

=95

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

SerbiaLabour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

SenegalWorld average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

54.8

33

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

47.8

56

Building credit histories

94.2

8

Starting a business

54.3

56

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Infrastructure risk

51.6

=52

Score

Rank

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Mobile telephone subscribers

46.2

48

OVERALL SCORE

52.7

55

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Regulatory quality

39.1

73

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

30.1

104

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

55.7

67

LABOUR POLICY

40.7

99

Literacy rate, women

92.8

49

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

Primary and secondary education, women

57.5

61

Differential retirement age=71

Tertiary education, women

52.7

40

SME support/development training

20.0 =104

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

97.7

19

50.0

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

28.6

=82

Legal restrictions on job types

25.0

=95

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

0.0 =111

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

19.5 =102

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

44.5

=96

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Adolescent fertility rate

88.5

47

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

89

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

SerbiaWorld average
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Singapore

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

70.9

9

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

89.5

2

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

97.8

2

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Starting a business

97.7

=3

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Infrastructure risk

96.7

=2

OVERALL SCORE

66.7

34

Building credit histories

33.6

45

Mobile telephone subscribers

65.8

12

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

43.2

77

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

75.3

32

LABOUR POLICY

36.4 =102

Literacy rate, women

89.6

57

Differential retirement age

100.0

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Primary and secondary education, women

69.7

22

Tertiary education, women

62.0

30

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

28.6

=82

Legal restrictions on job types

25.0

=95

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

14.3

=99

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

77.9

71

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

50.0

32

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

100.0

1

Adolescent fertility rate

97.9

=9

Access to childcare

100.0

=1

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

25.0

=97

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

Slovak Republic

100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Singapore
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

63.6

20

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

58.6

42

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

76.3

27

Private sector credit

75.0

=28

Starting a business

58.0

48

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Infrastructure risk

51.6

=52

49

Mobile telephone subscribers

48.4

42

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

65.2

36

Building credit histories

29.3

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

50.8

51

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

76.3

28

LABOUR POLICY

60.0

=65

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

57.1

=38

Primary and secondary education, women

67.0

29

Legal restrictions on job types

50.0

=82

Tertiary education, women

59.2

33

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71
WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

91.3

28

=68

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

42.9

LABOUR PRACTICE

41.5

46

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

66.2

61

Adolescent fertility rate

90.1

45

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

16.7

=48

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

16.7

=60

90

Labour Policy

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Slovak Republic
World average
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Slovenia

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

62.8

22

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

67.7

27

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Infrastructure risk

79.1

21

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Starting a business

76.1

18

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Regulatory quality

67.3

35

Mobile telephone subscribers

48.3

43

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

73.2

21

Building credit histories

1.4

89

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

61.2

32

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

86.5

7

LABOUR POLICY

67.9

47

Literacy rate, women

99.8

4

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

Tertiary education, women

96.7

2

Legal restrictions on job types=54

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Primary and secondary education, women

69.7

23

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

75.0
71.4

=30

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

99.7

2

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

54.5

28

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

68.0

=56

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

66.7

=16

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Adolescent fertility rate

98.4

=6

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

16.7

=48

South Africa

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Slovenia
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

57.4

29

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

51.1

51

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Starting a business

68.5

30

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

75.0

=32

Regulatory quality

62.4

41

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

54.7

29

Mobile telephone subscribers

42.8

57

OVERALL SCORE

60.3

42

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Infrastructure risk

30.8

=74

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

55.5

42

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

62.9

49

LABOUR POLICY

63.8

57

Literacy rate, women

84.0

69

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 71.4

=41

Primary and secondary education, women

65.3

33

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

57.1

=38

Tertiary education, women

22.2

79

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

57.1

=48

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

79.6

63

Differential retirement age

33.3 =101

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

47.2

36

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

72.1

42

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

66.7

=16

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

16.7

=48

91

Adolescent fertility rate

72.8

75

Freedom of movement, women

50.0

=93

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

South Africa
World average
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A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Spain

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

36.3

58

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

61.5

38

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Infrastructure risk

85.7

=13

Building credit histories

45.3

38

Regulatory quality

80.0

21

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Mobile telephone subscribers

53.0

34

Starting a business

27.1

100

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

70.5

26

Private sector credit

0.0

=96

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

73.4

20

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

79.6

19

LABOUR POLICY

91.4

=7

Literacy rate, women

96.8

43

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

76.6

9

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Tertiary education, women

65.2

26

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

85.7

=12

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

99.0

12

71.4

=30

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

55.3

26

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

83.3

=8

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

66.7

=16

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

38.0 =106

Adolescent fertility rate

94.8

=24

Access to childcare

33.3

Score

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training=42

Sri Lanka

Rank

Spain
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

33.6

65

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

42.0

67

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Starting a business

66.9

32

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Infrastructure risk

38.5

=64

Score

Rank

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Regulatory quality

37.1

79

OVERALL SCORE

47.5

73

Building credit histories

9.5

72

Mobile telephone subscribers

25.6

82

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

38.0

92

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

56.3

64

LABOUR POLICY

34.3 =104

Literacy rate, women

86.4

65

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

70.7

20

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

42.9

=68

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

14.3

=99

Tertiary education, women

28.2

68

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

77.3

73

Differential retirement age

0.0 =103

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

41.7

45

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

83.4

21

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

50.0

=24

Adolescent fertility rate

86.4

=54

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Property ownership rights

0.0 =106

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

92

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Sri Lanka
World average
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Country pages

Sudan

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

0.0

113

Score

Rank

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

17.2

Building credit histories

111

0.0 =102

Starting a business

40.9

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

78

0.0

=92

Mobile telephone subscribers

12.9

103

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Infrastructure risk

7.7 =107OVERALL SCORE

14.5

113

Private sector credit

0.0

=96

Regulatory quality

7.3

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

15.1

112

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

18.9

109

LABOUR POLICY

22.9

111

Literacy rate, women

39.2

102

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

20.0 =104

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

Primary and secondary education, women

11.6

109

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

0.0 =111

Tertiary education, women

4.6

97

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

0.0 =111

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

20.6

113

Legal restrictions on job types

0.0 =109

Adolescent fertility rate

78.1

66

LABOUR PRACTICE

7.4

111

Property ownership rights

25.0

=94

De facto discrimination at work

29.7

109

Addressing violence against women

0.0 =109

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Freedom of movement, women

0.0 =112

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

0.0 =111

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

Sweden111

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Sudan
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

83.3

3

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

78.0

11

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Infrastructure risk

96.7

=2

Delivering ﬁnancial services

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

91.4

10

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

83.3

=9

Starting a business

67.6

31

OVERALL SCORE

88.2

1

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Mobile telephone subscribers

56.2

26

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

90.6

2

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

87.1

6

LABOUR POLICY

94.3

=4

SME support/development training

100.0

=1

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 100.0=1

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Tertiary education, women

86.1

9

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

63.5

40

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

85.7

=12
WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

99.6

=3

=3

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

LABOUR PRACTICE

86.9

2

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

83.3

=8

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Adolescent fertility rate

97.9

=9

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

83.3

=4

De facto discrimination at work

81.0

23

93

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

SwedenWorld average
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Switzerland

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

48.4

42

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

73.9

19

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Infrastructure risk

93.4

8

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Regulatory quality

90.6

12

Score

Rank

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Mobile telephone subscribers

56.0

27

OVERALL SCORE

75.0

18

Building credit histories

18.8

58

Starting a business

55.7

52

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

80.0

10

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

78.0

25

LABOUR POLICY

80.2

23

SME support/development training

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

100.0

=1

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Primary and secondary education, women

71.1

18

Tertiary education, women

41.7

49

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Differential retirement age

83.3

=63

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

89.8

32

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 57.1

=51

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

79.7

9

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

83.3

=4

Adolescent fertility rate

99.0

=2

De facto discrimination at work

68.8

51

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

50.0

=78

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Score

Rank

Syria

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Switzerland
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

6.3 =105

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

23.5

103

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Infrastructure risk

35.2

=69

Building credit histories

0.0 =102

Starting a business

31.5

=97

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Mobile telephone subscribers

14.9

97

OVERALL SCORE

31.7

106

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Regulatory quality

12.5

108

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

27.0

109

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

52.1

77

LABOUR POLICY

29.3

110

Literacy rate, women

70.5

86

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

Primary and secondary education, women

53.5

71

Legal restrictions on job types

25.0

=95

Tertiary education, women

24.4

76

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

14.3

=98

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

54.0

97

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

24.7

95

Adolescent fertility rate

61.8

86

De facto discrimination at work

65.6

=62

Property ownership rights

50.0

=79

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Addressing violence against women

33.3

=95

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

25.0

=97

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

94

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Syria
World average
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A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Tanzania

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

12.5

=96

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

28.1

92

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Starting a business

40.7

=81

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Regulatory quality

34.0

90

Building credit histories

0.0 =102

Infrastructure risk

24.2

=83

Mobile telephone subscribers

13.7

100

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

42.7

83

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

59.7

34

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

32.0

100

LABOUR POLICY

80.0

24

Literacy rate, women

57.0

91

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

31.2

100

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 85.7

=23

Tertiary education, women

0.0

113

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

57.1

=38

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

64.0

88

57.1

=48

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

39.5

50

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

74.5

=36

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

50.0

=24

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Thailand

Adolescent fertility rate

28.3

107

Property ownership rights

25.0

=94

Score

Rank

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Tanzania
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

56.9

30

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

47.6

57

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Starting a business

59.6

44

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Regulatory quality

52.0

55

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Mobile telephone subscribers

43.4

55

OVERALL SCORE

56.8

48

Building credit histories

27.4

54

Infrastructure risk

35.2

=69

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

49.8

56

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

56.1

65

LABOUR POLICY

57.9

=68

Literacy rate, women

90.8

56

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

61.0

54

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

57.1

=38

Tertiary education, women

32.7

64

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 42.9

=66
WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

80.4

61

=98

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

14.3

LABOUR PRACTICE

41.8

44

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

83.7

=19

Adolescent fertility rate

77.0

69

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

16.7

=48

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

50.0

=78

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

95

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

ThailandWorld average
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Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Score

Togo

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

6.5 =100

Rank
GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

14.2

112

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Infrastructure risk

17.6

=96

Building credit histories

0.9

=90

Regulatory quality

15.8

106

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Starting a business

13.1

109

OVERALL SCORE

29.2

109

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Mobile telephone subscribers

10.5

108

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

38.7

88

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

24.5

105

LABOUR POLICY

54.3

=77

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

28.8

102

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Literacy rate, women

22.3

108

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 42.9

=66

Tertiary education, women

6.9

95

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

14.3

=99

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

52.6

100

14.3

=98

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

23.2

98

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

75.0

=60

De facto discrimination at work

59.3

=77

Adolescent fertility rate

54.7

91

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Addressing violence against women

33.3

=95

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Property ownership rights

0.0 =106

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

Tunisia

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Togo
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

29.2

74

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

51.8

48

Private sector credit

75.0

=28

Starting a business

64.6

34

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Infrastructure risk

54.9

=45

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

16.6

63

Regulatory quality

47.8

62

OVERALL SCORE

59.7

44

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Mobile telephone subscribers

39.8

65

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

65.1

26

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

57.6

59

LABOUR POLICY

75.0

29

Primary and secondary education, women

72.8

15

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Literacy rate, women

61.0

88

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 85.7

=23

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

Tertiary education, women

36.7

54

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

71.4

=30

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

89.6

34

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

55.1

27

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

87.2

9

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Adolescent fertility rate

97.9

=9

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

33.3

=32

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

50.0

=78

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

33.3

=43

96

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Tunisia
World average
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Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Turkey

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

32.2

70

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

50.6

52

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Starting a business

61.2

41

Private sector credit

50.0

=41

Regulatory quality

50.8

57

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

28.6

51

Infrastructure risk

48.4

=55

OVERALL SCORE

49.2

68

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Mobile telephone subscribers

42.0

58

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

40.2

84

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

52.4

75

LABOUR POLICY

58.8

67

Literacy rate, women

76.5

80

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 85.7

=23

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Legal restrictions on job types

75.0

=54

Primary and secondary education, women

42.0

92

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

57.1

=38

Tertiary education, women

30.9

66

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

42.9

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

79.9

62

Differential retirement age

33.3 =101

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

21.5

100

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

52.8

87

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

75.0

=60

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Adolescent fertility rate

74.3

=71

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Property ownership rights

50.0

=79

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

Score

Rank

=68

Uganda100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

TurkeyWorld average
Best in World

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

6.3 =105

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

27.7

93

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Regulatory quality

42.8

69

Building credit histories

0.0 =102

Starting a business

35.4

90

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Infrastructure risk

20.9

=91

Mobile telephone subscribers

11.9

106

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

36.8

97

Private sector credit

0.0

=96

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

52.0

47

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

35.8

95

LABOUR POLICY

62.9

=60

Literacy rate, women

56.6

92

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

45.1

87

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

57.1

=38

Tertiary education, women

1.6

107

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

28.6

=82

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

46.9

107

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 28.6

=82

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

75.0

=60

LABOUR PRACTICE

41.1

47

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

De facto discrimination at work

97.6

2

Freedom of movement, women

50.0

=93

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

33.3

=43

Property ownership rights

25.0

=94

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Adolescent fertility rate

17.8

111

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

97

Labour Policy

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

UgandaWorld average
Best in World© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Ukraine

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

37.9

52

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

37.8

75

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Mobile telephone subscribers

57.5

24

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Regulatory quality

34.1

88

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

1.5

87

Starting a business

32.2

94

OVERALL SCORE

53.7

53

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Infrastructure risk

27.5

=79

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

43.5

74

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

69.3

41

LABOUR POLICY

55.0

=72

Literacy rate, women

99.7

5

Tertiary education, women

86.8

8

Primary and secondary education, women

50.6

77

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 85.7

=23

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

28.6

=80

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

90.4

31

Legal restrictions on job types

25.0

=95

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

32.0

75

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

61.4

72

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

33.3

=43

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Unites Arab Emirates

Adolescent fertility rate

85.3

59

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

UkraineWorld average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

33.4

67

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

74.5

17

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Mobile telephone subscribers

100.0

1

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Infrastructure risk

72.5

=26

Score

Rank

Building credit histories

8.4

75

Starting a business

64.4

35

OVERALL SCORE

48.6

70

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Regulatory quality

60.9

44

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

34.5

98

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

62.0

52

LABOUR POLICY

41.4

=96

Literacy rate, women

89.4

58

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

Primary and secondary education, women

64.1

37

Legal restrictions on job types

50.0

=82

SME support/development training

60.0

=40

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

Tertiary education, women

34.4

59

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87
WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

52.8

99

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

0.0 =111

Property ownership rights

LABOUR PRACTICE

27.6

84

Adolescent fertility rate

89.0

46

De facto discrimination at work

76.9

30

Freedom of movement, women

50.0

=93

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

25.0

=97

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Addressing violence against women

0.0 =109

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

98

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

United Arab Emirates
World average
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Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

United Kingdom

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

62.5

=23

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

78.3

10

Building credit histories

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

94.3

5

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Starting a business

83.0

14

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

50.0

=8

Infrastructure risk

75.8

=22

OVERALL SCORE

76.8

14

Private sector credit

0.0

=96

Mobile telephone subscribers

60.1

19

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

73.9

17

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

84.8

8

LABOUR POLICY

81.4

=20

SME support/development training

100.0

=1

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

85.7

=12

Primary and secondary education, women

75.3

11

Tertiary education, women

64.8

27

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 85.7

=23

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

87.5

44

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

66.4

18

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

83.3

=8

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

83.3

=4

Adolescent fertility rate

87.5

51

De facto discrimination at work

65.6

=62

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

50.0

=78

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

United States

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

United Kingdom
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

68.8

=13

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

75.4

16

Building credit histories

100.0

=1

Starting a business

89.7

=8

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

100.0

=1

Regulatory quality

88.4

15

Score

Rank

Private sector credit

75.0

=28

Infrastructure risk

82.4

=16

OVERALL SCORE

76.7

15

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Mobile telephone subscribers

40.9

60

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

78.4

12

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

83.6

12

LABOUR POLICY

71.4

=39

Literacy rate, women

99.0

=12

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Tertiary education, women

94.3

5

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

85.7

=12

Primary and secondary education, women

61.0

53

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

71.4

=30

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

75.9

74

Maternity and paternity leave and provision

0.0 =112

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

85.3

4

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

100.0

=1

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

100.0

=1

Adolescent fertility rate

79.6

65

De facto discrimination at work

74.5

=36

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

0.0 =111

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

99

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

United States
World average
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Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Uruguay

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

36.8

56

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

46.4

59

Building credit histories

97.2

6

Infrastructure risk

54.9

=45

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Mobile telephone subscribers

49.6

40

Private sector credit

25.0

=66

Regulatory quality

47.1

63

Starting a business

33.8

91

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

59.2

45

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

48.2

60

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

81.9

14

LABOUR POLICY

65.7

=50

Literacy rate, women

98.0

39

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Tertiary education, women

82.4

15

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Primary and secondary education, women

67.2

27

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

57.1

=48

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 42.9

=66

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

93.6

=23

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

28.6

=80

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

30.6

78

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Property ownership rights

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

39.2

102

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

Adolescent fertility rate

68.1

=80

Score

Rank

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

16.7

=60

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Venezuela

Score

Rank

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Uruguay
World average
Best in World

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

6.3 =105

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

28.2

91

Private sector credit

25.0

Mobile telephone subscribers

45.5

49

Building credit histories

0.0 =102

Starting a business

31.5

=96

=66

Score

Rank

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Infrastructure risk

30.8

=74

OVERALL SCORE

47.4

74

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Regulatory quality

5.1

112

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

51.7

48

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

66.0

46

LABOUR POLICY

67.1

48

Literacy rate, women

93.8

48

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

80.0

=13

Primary and secondary education, women

50.5

78

Tertiary education, women

39.4

51

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

85.7

=3

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 57.1

=51

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

80.7

60

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

42.9

=55

Addressing violence against women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

36.3

57

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

61.7

71

Property ownership rights

75.0

=50

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

50.0

=24

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

75.0

=60

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Adolescent fertility rate

53.4

92

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

100

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Venezuela
World average
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Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Vietnam

Score

Rank

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

40.7

48

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

31.8

84

Private sector credit

100.0

=1

Starting a business

41.4

77

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

50.0

=42

Mobile telephone subscribers

37.8

67

Building credit histories

12.7

66

Regulatory quality

30.3

95

Infrastructure risk

17.6

=96

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

43.7

79

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

38.2

89

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

43.8

87

LABOUR POLICY

34.3 =104

Literacy rate, women

83.7

71

Primary and secondary education, women

43.9

89

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Tertiary education, women

7.5

92

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 85.7

=23

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

57.1

=48

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

28.6

=80

Legal restrictions on job types

0.0 =109WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

69.9

82

Differential retirement age

0.0 =103

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

42.1

41

Adolescent fertility rate

82.7

=60

De facto discrimination at work

68.2

=52

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Access to childcare

66.7

=13

Property ownership rights

50.0

=79

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

50.0

=78

Score

Rank

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

33.3

=43

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Yemen

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

VietnamWorld average
Best in World

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

0.0 =110

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

25.5

96

Building credit histories

0.1

=98

Starting a business

62.1

39

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

0.0

=92

Regulatory quality

25.5

100

Score

Rank

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Infrastructure risk

7.7 =107OVERALL SCORE

19.2

112

Private sector credit

0.0

=96

Mobile telephone subscribers

6.7

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

16.1

111

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

20.9

108

LABOUR POLICY

32.1

107

SME support/development training

40.0

=76

Differential retirement age

50.0

=71

Literacy rate, women

24.9

105

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

42.9

=68

Primary and secondary education, women

14.7

108

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

28.6

=80

Tertiary education, women

4.0

102

Legal restrictions on job types

25.0

=95

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

36.8

112

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

Adolescent fertility rate

59.2

87

LABOUR PRACTICE

0.0

113

Freedom of movement, women

50.0

=93

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

50.0

=78

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

Property ownership rights

25.0

=94

De facto discrimination at work

0.0

113

Addressing violence against women

0.0 =109

Access to childcare

0.0

=91

101

111

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

Yemen
World average© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking
Country pages

Zambia

Score

Rank

ACCESS TO FINANCE

6.3

103

GENERAL BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT

31.0

87

Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

25.0

=66

Starting a business

48.5

=63

Building credit histories

0.3

96

Regulatory quality

35.6

85

Delivering ﬁnancial services

0.0

=47

Infrastructure risk

27.5

=79

Mobile telephone subscribers

12.4

104

Score

Rank

OVERALL SCORE

36.9

96

Private sector credit

0.0

=96

LABOUR POLICY AND PRACTICE

47.0

65

EDUCATION AND TRAINING

31.5

101

LABOUR POLICY

65.7

=50

Primary and secondary education, women

55.1

70

Legal restrictions on job types

100.0

=1

Literacy rate, women

50.5

97

Differential retirement age

100.0

=1

SME support/development training

20.0 =104

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Policy

57.1

=38

Tertiary education, women

0.5

112

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Policy

57.1

=48

WOMEN’S LEGAL AND SOCIAL STATUS

58.3

91

Maternity and paternity leave and provision 14.3

=87

Freedom of movement, women

100.0

=1

LABOUR PRACTICE

28.3

83

CEDAW ratiﬁcation

100.0

=1

De facto discrimination at work

79.8

26

Addressing violence against women

66.7

=62

Access to childcare

33.3

=42

Adolescent fertility rate

24.6

109

Equal pay; ILO Convention 100, Practice

0.0

=61

Property ownership rights

0.0 =106

Non-discrimination,
ILO Convention 111, Practice

0.0

=75

102

Score

Rank

Labour Policy
100

GeneralBusiness
Environment

75
50

LabourPractice

25
0

Women’s
Legal andSocial status

AccesstoFinance
Education
and Training

ZambiaWorld average
Best in World© Economist Intelligence Unit Limited 2010

Appendix I

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Appendix I
Empirical evidence for selected indicators in
the Women’s Economic Opportunity Index
Prepared by June-wei Sum, Independent Gender & Economic Development Expert
Note: Appendix I focuses on the economic research behind selected indicators, and includes an
explanation for the scoring schemes behind several of the more complex indicators created by the
Economist Intelligence Unit. Scoring criteria for all of the indicators are included in Appendix II.

1) Labour Policy and PracticeILO Convention 100–Equal Pay for Equal Work
1. See the ILO’s International
Labour Standards: http://www.
ilo.org/ilolex/english/index.
htm
2. Global Wage Report
2008/09, International Labour
Organisation: Geneva, 2008.
3 A Kolev and P Suarez-Robles,“Exploring the Gender Pay Gap
Through Different Age Cohorts:
The Case of Ethiopia”, 2009,
upcoming in Gender Disparities inAfrica: Methods and Techniques(working title), World Bank:
Washington DC.
4 R Akeel, “Genderbased Differences Among
Entrepreneurs and Workers in
Lebanon”, MENA Knowledge andLearning Fast Brief, World Bank:
Washington DC, April 2009.

103

The principle of equal pay for equal work is straightforward and easily understood. Its application is laidout in the International Labour Organisation’s (ILO’s) Convention 100, which reads: “Each Member shall,by means appropriate to the methods in operation for determining rates of remuneration, promote and,in so far as is consistent with such methods, ensure the application to all workers of the principle of equal
remuneration for men and women workers for work of equal value” (Article 2, [1]). However, there isoften a gap between policy and practice. Hence, the ILO considers both policy and enforcement to better
capture this gap.1 This is also the approach taken by the Women’s Economic Opportunity Index, whichscores countries on both labour policy and labour practice.
According to the ILO, there is strong national evidence that wage gaps persist around the world.
Throughout most regions and many occupations, women are paid less than men for the same job. In mostcountries, women’s wages represent 70-90% of men’s wages, with even lower ratios in some Asian and
Latin American countries.2
One example of where equal remuneration policy and practice diverge is in Ethiopia. There, up to halfof the wage gap between men and women in the formal labour force cannot be explained by individual
characteristics, signalling the possibility of gender-based discrimination in wage allocations.3 There aresimilar ﬁndings on gender-based wage discrimination in Lebanon. Close to 27% of the wage difference
Economist Intelligence Unit 2010

Appendix I

5. Gender Brief, OECD Social
Policy Division: Paris, March2010.
6. See for example J Albrecht,
A Bjorklund and S Vroman, “Isthere a Glass Ceiling in Sweden?”
Journal of Labour Economics, Vol.
21, No. 1, University of Chicago,
2003.
W Arulampalam, A L Booth and
M L Bryan, “Is there are glassceiling over Europe? Exploring
the Gender Wage Gap across theWage Distribution”, Industrial
and Labour Relations Review, Vol.
60, No. 2, January 2007, Cornell
University: Ithaca NY.
7. C Dolan, M Opondo andS Smith, “Gender, Rights &Participation in the Kenya Cut
Flower Industry”, National
Resources Institute Report No.
2768, SSR Project No. R8077
2002-4, 2002
8. F D Blau and L M Kahn,“The Gender Earnings Gap:
Learning from International
Comparisons”, American
Economic Review Papers andProceedings, Vol. 82, No. 2,
1992, pages 533-38.
— “Wage structure and genderearnings differentials: Aninternational comparison”,
Economica, Vol. 63, Issue 250,
1996, Suppl. S29-62.
9. F D Blau and L M Kahn,“Understanding International
Differences in the Gender
Pay Gap”, Journal of Labour
Economics, Vol. 21, No. 1, 2003,
pages 106-144.
10. International Labour
Organisation Employment
Trends, “Women in labour
markets: Measuring progress
and identifying challenges”,
978-92-2-123319-0 (web print)(ISBN), International Labour
Organisation: Geneva, 2010.

104

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

between male and female employees was shown by statistical analysis to be plausibly attributable
to discrimination. Wage gaps exist within the same sector and occupation even after controlling fordifferent levels of education. However, wage discrimination varies by age and is non-existent foryounger female workers.4
Even across OECD countries, median earnings for men are on average about 18% higher than for women.
The largest differences are in Japan and South Korea, where the gap is more than 30%. The OECD cites
gender discrimination as one of the factors behind this gap. Separately, women are more likely to be in lowpaid occupations, with fewer chances for promotion. Childcare responsibilities mean women are also more
likely to work part-time.5 (The Index addresses the issue of access to childcare in a separate indicator).
Further Reading
International Labour Organisation Employment Trends, “Women in labour markets: Measuring progress
and identifying challenges”, 978-92-2-123319-0 (web print) (ISBN). ILO: Geneva, 2010

ILO Convention 111–Non-discrimination in Employment
The elimination of discrimination in employment or occupation, based on race, colour, sex, religion,
political opinion, national extraction or social origin, is the basis of ILO Convention 111. Scoring of theIndex’s indicator is based on the ILO’s monitoring efforts of this Convention, and covers both policy andpractice.
In many countries, women are clustered in lower-paying jobs, whether lower-skilled work or part-timework chosen by women to balance household responsibilities. Even in countries in which women havebeen able to enter professional ﬁelds, there remains the well-documented “glass ceiling” phenomenon(the inability to rise within an organisation beyond a certain responsibility level, irrespective of individual
performance or credentials).6 Employers often hold gendered notions of what these jobs are worth, andthis bias often leads to lower pay for women. For example, in Ethiopia and Kenya, women looking forjobs in cut-ﬂower processing plants are mostly hired for lower-paid post-harvest seasonal handling of
ﬂowers, whereas men usually ﬁll permanent, better-paying jobs that require workers to operate machines
or manage others in the plant.7 Blau and Khan have demonstrated that the general wage inequality in acountry has a large effect on the gender wage gap, since women are typically on the lower end of the wage
distribution scale. Therefore, the higher the inequality of wages in a country, the larger the gender wage
gap will typically be.8 In further research in 2003, Blau and Khan ﬁnd that a narrower male wage structure
and lower female labour supply results in a smaller gender pay gap. Moreover, they ﬁnd that collective
bargaining reduces the wage differential.9
Recent research shows gender disparity in terms of both opportunities and quality of employment for
women versus men.10 Encouragingly, supranational legal measures that are meant to address this—such
as ILO Convention 111—have been shown to have a positive effect in reducing the gap. Weichselbaumer
and Rudolf (2007) constructed a dataset of published values of gender wage gaps in different countries,
and made them comparable by the use of meta-regression analysis. These data were later supplemented
with information on the business environment and equal treatment laws, which allowed them toinvestigate the impacts of these two factors. Meta-analysis of the data shows that increased adoption of
Economist Intelligence Unit 2010

Appendix I

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

11. D Weichselbaumer and R
Winter-Ebmer, “The Effectsof Competition and Equal
Treatment Laws on Gender Wage
Differentials”, Economic Policy,
Vol. 22, No. 50, April 2007, pages
235-287.

international conventions supporting equal treatment of women and men has a strong and signiﬁcant
impact on the gender wage residual, that is, ratiﬁcation of equality laws narrows the gender wage gap.
(The impact of ratifying the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against
Women, as well as ILO Convention 111, were analysed in the paper). Conversely, legislation thatprevents women from performing strenuous or dangerous jobs (ILO Conventions 89 and 45 on night andunderground work) is found to increase the gender wage gap in countries that have such laws.11
These positive ﬁndings support the inclusion of this indicator in the pilot Women’s Economic
Opportunity Index.

12. OECD Family database.
http://www.oecd.org/els/social/family/database. Last updated July
29th 2009.
13. Malaysia 1955 Employment
Act (Sec. 37). Source: Women,
Business and the Law database.
http://wbl.worldbank.org.
14. J Heymann, A Earle and J Hayes,
The Work, Family and Equity Index.
How Does the United States Measure
Up?, Institute for Health and Social
Policy, McGill University: Montreal,
2007. http://www.mcgill.ca/ﬁles/
ihsp/WFEI2007.pdf
15. See for example J De Henau, D
Meulders and S O’Dorchai, “Parents’
Care and Career. Comparing
Parental Leave Policies across EU15”, in Daniela Del Boca and Cécile
Wetzels (eds.), Social Policies,
Labour Markets and Motherhood: aComparative Analysis of European
Countries, Cambridge University
Press, 2007, pages 63-106.
D Del Boca, S Pasqua, C Pronzato
and C Wetzels, “An empiricalanalysis of the effects of social
policies on fertility, labour market
participation and hourly wagesof European women”, in Social
Policies, Labour Markets andMotherhood: a Comparative Analysis
of European Countries, pages
269-270.
16. See for example C J Ruhm,“Parental Leave and Child Health”,
Journal of Health Economics, Vol.
19, Issue 6, November 2000, pages
931-960.
De Heanau, Meulders and O’Dorchai(2007)J Galtry and P Callister, “Assessing
the Optimal Length of Parental
Leave for Child and Parental
Well-Being”, Journal of Family
Issues, Vol. 26, No. 2, 2005, pages
219-246.
17. F Jaumotte, “Female labour
force participation: Past trends
and main determinants in OECD
countries”, OECD Economics
Department Working Papers No.
376, 2003.
18. See for example, J Gruber, “TheIncidence of Mandated Maternity
Beneﬁts”, American Economic
Review, Vol. 84, No. 3, 1994.
J E Zveglich and Y Rodgers, “TheImpact of Protective Measures for
Female Workers”, Journal of Labour
Economics, Vol. 21, No. 3, 2003.
Ruhm, op.cit.
19. I Oun and G P Trujillo, Maternity
at work: A review of national
legislation. Findings from the ILO’s
Conditions of Work and Employment
Database (ILO, TRAVAIL: Geneva).

105

Further Reading
International Labour Organisation Employment Trends, “Women in labour markets: Measuring progress
and identifying challenges”, http://www.ilo.org/empelm/units/lang--en/WCMS_DOC_ELM_DPT_TRD_
EN/index.htm, 978-92-2-123319-0 (web print) (ISBN). ILO: Geneva, 2010
Jill Rubery, “Gender Mainstreaming and Gender Equality in the EU: the Impact of the EU Employment
Strategy”, Industrial Relations Journal, Vol. 33, Issue 5, 2002.

Maternity and Paternity Leave Provision
Maternity leave provisions vary enormously from country to country, from 63 weeks of paid leave in
Bulgaria12 to 60 days of leave with pay in Malaysia13 to no paid leave at all in countries such as the US,
Papua New Guinea and Swaziland.14 Research indicates that the guarantee of maternity leave, particularly
paid leave, will increase women’s labour force participation before giving birth and increases thelikelihood that women will return to the labour market at the end of leave.15
The design of parental leave schemes, including the optimal length of leave, is a complex issue,
because it may affect health outcomes for mother and child, women’s employment outcomes, children’s
cognitive development, and other factors. Research on all of these issues supports paid leave, although
there is no agreement on the optimal length.16 Hence, the baseline standard for this indicator follows
the ILO’s Maternity Protection Convention, 2000 (No. 183), which provides for leave of at least 14 weeks.
For example, a study that evaluated changes in female labour force participation in 17 OECD countries
between 1985 and 1999 concluded that paid parental leave has a positive impact on female participation.
However, as found by other researchers, the marginal effect becomes negative for very long parental
leaves (in excess of the equivalent of 20 weeks of full pay, according to the paper’s estimates).17 Studies
have also found varying effects of maternity beneﬁts on women’s wages.18 Overall, there is considerable
evidence that short to medium-length maternity leave time (between three and six months) has no or
negligible impact on women’s wages.
Who pays for maternity and paternity beneﬁts is a second element of this indicator—the government,
the employer, or both parties? The ILO has found that an increasing number of countries are shifting
away from ﬁnancing mechanisms that place the direct costs of maternity leave on employers, which is apotential burden to employers and a possible source of discrimination against women. Instead, countries
are gravitating to greater reliance on compulsory social insurance or public funds, or a mixed system
dividing responsibility between employers and social security systems.19 Having government or the social
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Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

security system shoulder at least part of the cash beneﬁts during the maternity leave period reduces
the perceived cost to an organisation of hiring women of child-bearing age. In the Women’s Economic
Opportunity Index, countries were given more points for mandating a mixed ﬁnancing scheme (between
employers and public funds) and the most points for a fully publicly ﬁnanced scheme.
In addition, the Index’s scoring system awards a bonus point to countries that have maternity
and paternity leave schemes that cover the self-employed. The self-employed (such as businessowners and freelance workers) are often not speciﬁcally covered by parental leave agreements orlegislation. In effect, the self-employed fully ﬁnance any period of parental leave and determine its
duration. Government-funded maternity leave schemes that cover self-employed workers encourage
entrepreneurship as a work option for women; thus these schemes are scored more highly in the Index.
The Index does not score the value of paid leave, because there is no universal agreement on theappropriate level of wage replacement. This debate is especially strong in developing countries, where
the size of the formal sector is small. The ILO advocates a two-thirds wage replacement rate for maternity
cash beneﬁts, but anecdotal evidence suggests that such high levels of paid leave may be a disincentive toemployers hiring women. Globally, countries have adopted a wide range of complex systems that provide
unpaid, partially paid or fully paid maternity beneﬁts. Within the OECD, some countries offer ﬂat-rate
beneﬁts (for example, Belgium, Germany, New Zealand, Sweden), whereas others grant different levels ofleave and payments based on industry or sector (as in Denmark and Greece).20
The Index awards one bonus point to countries that mandate paid paternity leave. Due to the alreadycomplex and multi-dimensional nature of this indicator, the Index does not take into consideration policy
incentives that encourage men to take or not take their available leave, an aspect stressed by Ray et al,21
and which the Index authors acknowledge as important. Nor does the Index take into consideration the
duration and compensation of paternity leave. This may be explored in detail in future editions. For now,the goal is to acknowledge the existence of paid paternity leave, as such provisions are becoming morecommon and reﬂect policies that support the family as a whole.

20. R Ray, G Gornick and J
Schmitt, Parental leave policies
in 21 countries: Assessing
generosity and gender equality,
Centre for Economic and Policy
Research: Washington DC,
September 2008.
21. ibid.

106

Further Reading
J M Evans, “Firms’ Contribution to the Reconciliation between Work and Family Life”, Labour Market andSocial Policy Occasional Papers, No. 48, Paris: OCED, 2001.
C Hein, Reconciling Work and Family Responsibilities: Practical Ideas from Global Experience,
International Labour Organisation: Geneva, 2005.
S L Hofferth and S C Curtin, “The Impact of Parental Leave on Maternal Return to Work after Childbirthin the United States”, Social, Employment and Migration Working Papers, No. 7, OECD: Paris, 2003. http://
www.sourceoecd.org/10.1787/826588878522.
J M Joesch, “Paid Leave and the Timing of Women’s Employment Before and After Birth”, Journal of
Marriage and the Family Vol. 59, No. 4 (November), 1997, pages 1008-1021.
R Lalive and J Zweimüller, “Does parental leave affect fertility and return-to-work? Evidence from a true
natural experiment” (Discussion paper No. 1613), Institute for the Study of Labour: Bonn, 2005. http://
ssrn.com/abstract=731766.
K Morgan and K Zippel, “Paid to Care: The Origins and Effects of Care Leave Policies in Western Europe”,
Economist Intelligence Unit 2010

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Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Social Politics, Vol. 10 (Spring), 2003, pages 49-85.
J Waldfogel, “The Family Gap for Young Women in the United States and Britain: Can Maternity Leave
Make a Difference?”, Journal of Labour Economics, Vol. 16, No. 3 (July), 1998, pages 505-545.
C R Winegarden and P M Bracy, “Demographic consequences of maternal leave programs in industrial
countries: evidence from ﬁxed-effects models”, Southern Economic Journal, Vol. 61, No. 4 (April), 1995,
pages 1020-1035.
M Ronsen and M Sundstrom, “Family Policy and After-Birth Employment Among New Mothers - A
Comparison of Finland, Norway and Sweden”, European Journal of Population Vol. 18 (June), 2002, pages
121-152.

Restrictions on Job Types

22. Rio Tinto presentation,
March 9th 2010 at the UN
Development Fund for Women,
Women’s Empowerment
Principles launch. Notes
available at http://www.
riotinto.com/documents/
Media-Speeches/Why_gender_
matters_9_March_2010.PDF.
Mongolia 1999 Labour Code(Sec. 104). Source: Women,
Business and the Law database.
http://wbl.worldbank.org.
23. V Forastieri, “Information
Note on Women Workers
and Gender Issues on
Occupational Safety and
Health”, International Labour
Organisation: Geneva, 2000.
24. Report of the 11th Session of
the Joint International Labour
Organisation/World HealthOrganisation Committee on
Occupational Health (Geneva,
April 27th-29th 1992), Ref:
JCOH/XI/92.
25. “Gender and Development in
the Middle East and North Africa:
Women in the Public Sphere”,
MENA Development Report, World
Bank: Washington DC, 2004.
26. I Titova, “Female student
denied right to drive metro
trains”, St. Petersburg Times,
March 10th 2009.
A Bronstein, “The new labour
law of the Russian Federation”,
International Labour
Organisation International
Labour Review, Vol. 144, No. 3,
2005, pages 291-318.

107

More than half the countries included in the Index have at least one legal restriction on the types of jobs
for which women can be employed. Some of these restrictions were initially established with good intent,
in most cases to protect women from so-called hazardous jobs. Out of a sense of concern for working
women, many countries adopted special measures that included prohibition of night work, undergroundwork and other activities considered dangerous to women and their reproductive health, including
exposure to certain agents. Other measures limited the weekly number of hours of work and overtime
work, and were intended to protect women’s roles as mothers and wives.
However, international labour policy is increasingly recognising that any type of employment restriction
on women limits their opportunities. For example, women in Mongolia are prohibited from working
underground, which reduces the types of employment that they can obtain at Rio Tinto’s gold and copper
mining project in southern Mongolia.22 Instead of reducing the workplace risk for all workers, women as agroup have been excluded from hazardous occupations. An example of this approach is the prohibition of
women from working with lead at the beginning of the twentieth century. Although there is no signiﬁcantdifference in the toxicological response between sexes, women were more exposed because of the type ofwork they undertook. With this measure, women were excluded and men remained unprotected.23
The 11th session of the Committee on Occupational Health of the ILO and the World HealthOrganisation (WHO), in 1992, recognised that there are speciﬁc occupational risks based on factors suchas gender and age, and encouraged addressing these issues in such a way so as to not lead to further,
inadvertent discrimination.24
Where there is no scientiﬁc evidence that certain jobs have a direct, negative impact on women’s healthand safety, job restrictions pose a constraint on women’s employment opportunities. For example, womenin Morocco cannot hold posts in certain ministries (the Ministries of Interior, Civil Protection, National
Defence, and National Security),25 and in Russia women are not allowed to drive a metro train, but can be
an announcer (the Russian labour code lists about 460 jobs that women cannot hold).26
Further Reading
Adriana Eftimie, Katherine Heller and John Strongman, “Gender Dimensions of the Extractive Industries:
Mining for Equity” (Extractive Industries and Development Series #8), August 2009, World Bank:
Washington DC, 2009.
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Appendix I

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking“Integrating Gender Issues into Mining Sector Operations: Guidance Note”, International FinanceCorporation: Washington DC, 2008.
“Building gender equality into OSH governance: The right of women to safe work - Concept note”,
Programme on Safety and Health at Work and the Environment (SAFEWORK), XVIII World Congress on
Occupational Safety and Health, Seoul, June 29th-July 2nd 2008.
K Messing and P Ostlin, Gender Equality, Work and Health: A Review of the Evidence, World HealthOrganisation: Geneva, 2006.

De facto Discrimination at Work

27. Data for the 2010 pilot
Women’s Economic Opportunity
Index is from the World
Economic Forum’s 2009
Executive Opinion Survey. The
2010 Executive Opinion Survey
is ongoing at the time of writing.
https://wefsurvey.org/index.
php?sid=28226&lang=en&intro=
0 (accessed May 18th 2010).
28. The Female FTSE Board Report
2009, Cranﬁeld University Schoolof Management, 2009.
29. ibid.
30. National Statistics
Institute, Spain, 2008. Cited in
Cranﬁeld University School ofManagement, op. cit.
31. Cranﬁeld University School ofManagement, op. cit.
32. European Professional
Women’s Network, Third
Bi-annual EuropeanPWN
BoardWomen Monitor 2008, June2008.
33. 2008 Catalyst Census of
Women Corporate Ofﬁcers and
Top Earners of the Fortune 500.
Catalyst: New York, 2008.
34. The category “legislatorsand managers” refers to majorgroup 1 of the 1988 revisionof the International Standard
Classiﬁcation of Occupations(ISCO-88) and includes thefollowing sub-groups: (a)legislators and senior ofﬁcials;(b) corporate managers; and (c)general managers.

108

Women continue to face various forms of explicit and implicit discrimination in the workplace, fromthe “glass ceiling” that keeps women from senior executive jobs to the “sticky ﬂoor” that keeps womenat the bottom of the economic ladder. Discrimination can also manifest itself in the form of wage gaps
between women and men, where differences in pay for the same job cannot be explained by factors suchas occupation, age, education, work experience and seniority in job, job tenure, training or occupationalsegregation. This form of discrimination is addressed in the “ILO Convention 100—Equal Pay for Equal
Work” indicator of the Index.
The “De facto Discrimination at Work” indicator focuses on the perceived opportunities for women torise to senior management positions, based on survey data from the World Economic Forum’s Executive
Opinion Survey.27 Data on women as executive heads of organisations are not directly comparable
across countries and organisations, owing to differences in terminology, but data collected from several
countries point to a general gap between the number of women and men in leadership positions.
In the UK, the Cranﬁeld University School of Management has collected data on top female managers
in FTSE 100 companies since 1999. The most recent (2009) survey shows that one in four UK blue-chipcompanies have no female director at all; overall, women hold only 12.2% of boardroom posts.28 Norway
was the ﬁrst country to introduce a quota law to increase the number of women on boards; the law was
introduced in November 2003 and required boards to be comprised of a minimum of 40% of each sex.
At the time, female board directors accounted for 6.8% of the total; by 2008 it was 31.3%. Without such
legislation, Sweden has 21.9% female board members and Finland has 16.8%.29 Spain introduced similar
legislation to balance male-female representation on company boards in 2007, together with incentives
and support for private initiatives, as well as increasing public awareness. As a result of these initiatives,in 2008 women made up 42.9% of the workforce and held 32.5% of managerial positions.30 However, atthe board level, women make up only 7.6% of directors in Spanish listed companies.31 Italy and Portugal
have even lower proportions of women on corporate boards, with 2.1% and 0.8%, respectively.32 In theUS, women hold 15.2% of Fortune 500 board seats.33
Global data on women in senior management positions are also clouded by broad or differingdeﬁnitions. Given that limitation, UN Statistics Division ﬁgures show that the percentage of women who
are legislators, senior ofﬁcials and managers varies widely between countries.34 A sample of these data ispresented in the graph below; in very few economies does the share of women holding senior positions
approach or reach half.
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Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Women’s share of legislators, senior officials and managers
(%)
60
50
40
30
20
10

Algeria

Argentina

Australia

Bahrain

Bangladesh

China

Croatia

Denmark

GreeceJapan

Kyrgyz Republic

LebanonMauritius

Philippines

South Africa

Ukraine0

Source: Calculated by the UN Statistics Division based on data published by the International Labour Organisation in Table
2C Total employment, by occupation, available from the ILO LABOURSTA website, http://laboursta.ilo.org.
Available at http://unstats.un.org/unsd/demographic/products/indwm/tab5d.htm#tech.

35. G Psacharopoulos and H
Patrinos, “Family size, schoolingand child labour in Peru - An
empirical analysis”, Journal of
Population Economics, Vol. 10,
Issue 4, 1997, pages 387-405.
36. S B Kamerman, “Early
childhood education and care:an overview of developmentsin the OECD countries”,
International Journal of
Educational Research, Vol. 33,
Issue 1, 2000, pages 7-29.
37. S B Kamerman, Early
childhood care and educationand other family policies andprograms in South-East Asia,
UN Educational, Scientiﬁc andCultural Organisation, 2002.
C Hein, Reconciling Workand Family Responsibilities:
Practical Ideas from Global
Experience, International Labour
Organisation: Geneva, 2005.
38. M Lokshin, E Glinskaya
and M Garcia, “The effect ofearly childhood development
Programs on women’s labour
force participation and older
children’s schooling in Kenya”,
Journal of African Economies,
Vol. 13, No. 2, 2004.

109

Further Reading
Breaking through the Glass Ceiling; Women in Management, Update, International Labour Organisation:
Geneva, 2004.

Access to ChildcareChildcare, for both younger and older children, is a key component in enabling women to take part inpaid employment in the formal sector. Support for caregiving is crucial for gender equality, because
in most societies women take on a disproportionate share of childcare in a household. The indicatormeasuring childcare in the pilot Index focuses on three main elements: the availability of childcare, bothprofessional and informal (provided by family); affordability of childcare; and quality of childcare. In
assessing childcare availability, we were careful to exclude childcare provided by older siblings, as theirschool performance can suffer when they are required to take care of younger brothers and sisters.35 Theavailability of early childhood education (pre-school) was also considered as childcare for the purposes ofthis indicator.36
Affordability is another important factor that inﬂuences the extent to which formal childcare services
are used. As family structures are changing, with extended family networks declining and the number ofsingle-parent households rising, there is a growing need for extra-family support.37 A 2004 study in Kenya
found that high childcare costs discourage households from using formal childcare facilities and has anegative effect on mothers’ participation in market work. Higher childcare costs were found to have no
Economist Intelligence Unit 2010

Appendix I

39. J M Love, L Harrison, A SagiSchwartz, M H van Ijzendoorn,
C Ross, J A Ungerer, H Raikes, C
Brady-Smith, K Boiler, J BrooksGunn, J Constantine, E Eliason
Kisker, D Paulsell and R ChazanCohen, “Child Care Quality Matters:
How Conclusions May Vary with
Context”, Child Development, Vol.
74, No. 4, July/August 2003, pages
1021-1033.
J Belsky, “Early child care andearly child development: Major
ﬁndings of the NICHD study of earlychild care”, European Journal of
Developmental Psychology, Vol. 3,
Issue 1, March 2006, pages 95-110.
40. D Blau, The Child Care Problem,
Russell Sage Foundation: New
York, 2001.
41. A Chevalier and T K Viitanen,“The causality between female
labour force participation and theavailability of childcare”, Applied
Economics Letters, Vol. 9, Issue 14,
2002, pages 915-918.
C M Herbs, B S Barnow, “Close to
Home: A Simultaneous Equations
Model of the Relationship Between
Child Care Accessibility and Female
Labour Force Participation”,
Journal of Family and Economic
Issues, Vol. 29, No. 1, March 2008.
42. F Jaumotte, Labour force
participation of women: Empiricalevidence on the role of policy
and other determinants in OECD
countries. OECD Economic Studies,No. 37, 2003/2.
43. Hein, op. cit.
44. J Heymann, How are workers
with family responsibilities faring
in the work place?, International
Labour Organisation: Geneva,
2004. Also Kamerman (2002),
op. cit.
45. R Deutsch, “Does Child Care
Pay?: Labour Force Participationand Earnings Effects of Accessto Child Care in the Favelas of
Rio de Janeiro”, Inter-American
Development Bank. Working Paper
No. 384, 1998.
46. R P de Barros, P Olinto, T Lunde
and M Carvalho, “The Impact ofFree Childcare on Women’s Labor
Force Participation: Evidence from
low-income neighborhoods in Riode Janeiro”, background paper for
World Bank Regional Study: Genderin Latin America and the Caribbean:
Linking Labor Market Outcomesand Intra-Household Dynamics,
forthcoming.
47. M Bruhn, “Female-owned ﬁrms
in Latin America: characteristics,
performance, and obstacles
to growth”, Policy ResearchWorking Paper Series, World Bank:
Washington DC, 2009.

110

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

signiﬁcant effect on boys’ schooling, but signiﬁcantly lowered the number of girls in school.38
Finally, the average quality of childcare available was assessed qualitatively for the countries in the
Index sample. The quality of childcare has been found to inﬂuence young children’s developmental
outcomes,39 although research in the US suggests that price drives demand for childcare services morethan quality.40
Lack of affordable, good-quality childcare might not prevent women from obtaining paid employment
altogether, but it will restrict them from competing for jobs on an equal basis to men. Further, because
women are often the secondary earner, they are more likely than men to reduce employment whenchildcare needs arise. This creates a negatively self-reinforcing cycle. Recent research shows that womenparticipate more in the labour market if childcare is available, making it important to policymakers
to think about how to increase the supply of quality childcare.41 There is also empirical evidence thatchildcare subsidies raise female labour supply levels,42 although this speciﬁc policy tool is not assessed in
the Index.
In the absence of access to childcare, many women are forced to take their children to work with them.
Hein cites survey data for Peru, Pakistan and ten African countries that suggest that 40% of mothers
take young children with them while they work.43 Apart from the potential danger to the health of thechild, having to provide their own childcare while working restricts the range of jobs that mothers may
seek. Alternatively, children are left in the care of older female siblings, limiting girls’ opportunities toattend school, and thus restricting their opportunities in the future.44 Heymann—based on extensive casestudies in Botswana, Guatemala, Mexico, Vietnam and the US—ﬁnds that lack of childcare is an importantfactor that pushes mothers from formal into informal employment.
One of the few studies directly estimating the impact of childcare on women’s labour force participationand earnings, in Rio de Janeiro, conﬁrms that “increased earnings are consistently associated with useof childcare outside the home”.45 Deutsch’s ﬁndings suggest, however, that lack of ﬂexibility and thelimited opening hours of publicly provided childcare signiﬁcantly restricts the impact on women’s earning
capacity. Another recent randomised impact evaluation of public child day care on women’s labour market
behaviour in Rio de Janeiro found that access to public childcare seems to increase signiﬁcantly female
labour force participation, especially for women not previously working.46
In terms of female entrepreneurship, a recent paper ﬁnds a negative correlation in Latin America
between childcare and household obligations on the one hand, and female-owned ﬁrm size andperformance on the other.47 Data from Mexico and Bolivia also indicate that women are two to three times
more likely than men to operate a business from their home. This suggests that household obligations
could be restricting the location, size and industry choices of female entrepreneurs.
Further reading
Pierre Lefebvre, Philip Merrigan and Matthieu Verstraete, “Dynamic Labour Supply Effects of Childcare
Subsidies: Evidence from a Canadian Natural Experiment on Low-Fee Universal Childcare”, Working
Paper 08-24, Centre interuniversitaire sur le risque, les politiques économiques et l’emploi: Montreal,
September 2008.

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Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

M T Ruel, A R Quisumbing, K Hallman, B de la Briere, N Coj de Salazar, The Guatemala Community
Day Care Program: an example of effective programming, International Food Policy Research Institute:
Washington DC, 2006.

Differential Retirement Age

48. Gender Brief, OECD Social
Policy Division: Paris, March
2010.
49. E James, A Cox Edwards and
R Wong, “The Gender Impactof Pension Reform”, Journal of
Pension Economics and Finance,
Vol. 2, No. 2, 2003.
50. D Mitchell, “Income security
for old age: evidence from eight
OECD countries”, Australian
National University, Research
School of Social Sciences
Working Paper, 1993.
51. E James, “Retirement Age
Differentials and Other Gender
Issues in Old Age Security
Systems”, commissioned by theWorld Bank Gender Action Plan,
forthcoming.

111

Legislation in several countries speciﬁes that women and men either must retire (mandatory retirement)or may choose to retire (statutory retirement) at different ages. The statutory retirement age is usually,
but not always, the age when workers can begin receiving their pensions. The relevant indicator in the
Women’s Economic Opportunity Index measures the difference in statutory pensionable retirement age
for women and men, and accounts for both mandatory and non-mandatory retirement legislation. The
Index penalises any economy that has differing retirement ages for women and men, although it scores
economies that have mandatory retirement ages worse than economies where retirement at a certain age
is a choice.
Differential retirement age is a gender-speciﬁc social security rule. More commonly, rules do notdifferentiate between the sexes explicitly, but the same rule may affect women and men differently. Thisis because of their different demographic characteristics and employment histories. Women live longer
than men on average, but often have had fewer years in the formal labour force because of time away fromwork to bear and raise children, and to care for elderly members of the family. In addition, there remains agender wage gap in all countries.48 Lower wages, less labour force participation and higher life expectancy
adds up to lower pensions for women, which affects their ﬁnancial security in later life.49 For example, inAustralia, where the public age pension is means-tested, it is received by 85% of older women, comparedwith 65% of older men.50
Different retirement ages for women and men exacerbate these problems, and further lower thepension sums that women can expect to receive. Differences in pension amounts for women and men canalso vary greatly between deﬁned beneﬁt and deﬁned contribution plans. Deﬁned beneﬁt plans provide amonthly pension that is based on the participant’s wages and length of service. Although such plans tend
to protect women’s interests more (because they are guaranteed for life), the actual monthly amount thatwomen receive is usually smaller than for men, because women have fewer contributory years and a lower
reference age than men. In a deﬁned contribution plan, the employer also makes a contribution during
a worker’s employment, but does not provide a guaranteed retirement beneﬁt. Again, women are at a
disadvantage because they have often worked fewer years than men, and have had lower wages during
their working lifetime. Economic simulations show that if a woman is required to postpone her pension for
ﬁve years in a deﬁned contribution plan, her monthly pension will be 40-50% larger.51
Lower retirement ages for women can also inadvertently reduce their opportunities for access to skills
training and promotions at work. Knowing that women have shorter careers, it may be less proﬁtable forthem to invest in themselves via schooling, or for employers to provide on-the-job training. This in turnmay reduce the chance of a woman being promoted to a better job or to a management position, further
exacerbating the cycle of lower wages and lower pensions compared with men.
For example, women in China can retire ﬁve years earlier than men. This policy inadvertently
discriminated against women during a restructuring of the public sector in the 1990s. During thisEconomist Intelligence Unit 2010

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Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

downsizing, mandatory early retirements were widely applied to employees who were within ﬁve yearsof the legal retirement age. This resulted in large numbers of women in their late 40s being laid off, andsubsequently having a much more difﬁcult time than men in becoming re-employed.52 Analysis showedthat on average women were unemployed for nearly 22 months longer than male workers laid off at thesame time. When researchers estimated the extent to which the predicted gender gap in unemployment
duration could be attributed to either differences in observable characteristics or differences in regression
coefﬁcients,53 it was found that given the same market structure, women’s predicted mean unemployment
period would be 7.7 months shorter than men’s. In other words, women’s search efforts were hampered
by a lack of access to social networks, higher costs of job separation (in terms of decreased earnings),
unequal entitlement to re-employment services and unfair treatment with respect to mandatory
retirement.
Further Reading
J Falkingham and K Rake, “Modelling the Gender Impact of British Pension Reforms”, in J Ginn, D Street
and S Arber (eds.), Women, Work and Pensions—International Issues and Prospects, Buckingham: Open
University Press, 2001.
E James, A Cox Edwards and R Wong, “The gender impact of pension reform: a cross-country analysis”,
World Bank Policy Research Working Paper Series 3074, World Bank: Washington DC, 2003. http://ideas.
repec.org/s/wbk/wbrwps.html
A Munnell and N Jivan, “What Makes Older Women Work?”, Issue Brief, Series 1, Boston College, Centre
for Retirement Research: Boston MA, 2005.

2) Access to Finance
52. F Du and X Dong, “Why Do
Women Have Longer Durationsof Unemployment than Men
in Post-Restructuring Urban
China?”, Cambridge Journal of
Economics, Vol. 33, Issue 2, 2009
pages 233-252.
53. ibid. The regression
coefﬁcients included humancapital characteristics,
marital status and household
demographics, re-employment
incentives, ownership of the
ﬁrm employed before lay-off,access to social networks, andmacroeconomic indicators.
54. J F Houston, C Lin, P Lin
and Y Ma, “Creditor Rights,
Information Sharing, andBank Risk Taking”, Journal of
Financial Economics, Vol. 96,
Issue 3, 2010. doi:10.1016/
j.jﬁneco.2010.02.008

112

Building credit histories
The Index looks at two basic building blocks of women’s access to ﬁnance: credit and savings. The
ability to deposit savings safely in a ﬁnancial institution and to take loans out to ﬁnance businesses
is particularly important for women entrepreneurs. It is important to note that there are no globally
available sex-disaggregated data on women’s access to ﬁnance. Hence, the following indicators are notbased on gender-disaggregated quantitative data, but were selected because of the potential impact thatreform in these areas may have on women’s employment and business opportunities. We hope that thisindexing effort will spur further research in this important area.
Building credit histories measures the coverage, scope, quality and accessibility of credit informationthat is available through public and private credit registries. It is disaggregated from data collected by theWorld Bank Group’s Doing Business project. Although a credit history is not a substitute for risk analysis,banks that share credit information make it easier for loan ofﬁcers to assess borrowers’ creditworthinessusing objective measures. If lenders are also reassured by strong creditors’ rights, it allows them to takegreater, better-informed risks.54
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For an entrepreneur, access to credit can be key to starting or growing a business. A study in 2007
found that banks are more likely to extend loans in countries that have strong collateral laws and where
credit registries exist.55 This study looked at credit institutions across 129 countries over 25 years. Overall,both strengthened legal creditor rights and more effective sharing of credit information are associatedwith higher ratios of private credit to GDP.56
Most credit registries record historical credit information on individuals’ or companies’ bank loans, anda growing number also record credit from utilities and retailers. This may be especially important for new
women business owners who may not have a credit history of existing business or property loans. Further
research suggests that establishing strong legal rights and new credit registries may also reduce income
inequality.57 As women in most countries have lower incomes than men, this suggests again that women
may beneﬁt disproportionately from better credit information.
A forthcoming paper on credit and women-owned businesses tests the hypothesis of whether credit
reporting improves access to ﬁnance for women-owned businesses.58 The two appear to be directly
related. In addition, the paper ﬁnds that women tend to have superior payment performance to men,
especially when they are credit rationed and underrepresented in the loan market. Therefore, reporting
this type of information would give them a positive edge in applying for credit and would help women togain increased access to ﬁnance.

55. S Djankov, C McLiesh and A
Shleifer, “Private Credit in 129
Countries”, Journal of Financial
Economics, Vol. 84, No. 2, 2007,
pages 299-329.
56. ibid.
57. S Claessens, and E Perotti,“Finance and Inequality:
Channels and Evidence”, Journalof Comparative Economics, Vol.
35, No. 4, 2007, pages 748-773.
58. M Miller, Credit reporting
and women-owned businesses(working title), paper
commissioned by the World Bank
Group’s Gender Action Plan,
forthcoming.
59. Consultative Group to Assist
the Poor, “Financial Access 2009:
Measuring Financial Inclusion
Around the World”, World Bank:
Washington DC, 2009.
60. Banking the Poor: Measuring
Banking Access in 54 Economies,
World Bank: Washington DC,
2008.

113

Further Reading
S Coleman, “Constraints faced by women small business owners: evidence from the data”, Journal of
Developmental entrepreneurship, Vol. 7, No. 2 (August), 2002, pages 151-174.
D Karlan and J Zinman, “Expanding Credit Access: Improving Microﬁnance Operations and Measuring
Impact with Credit Scoring”, 2007, Basis Briefs, November 2009, Department of Agricultural and Applied
Economics, University of Wisconsin: Madison.

Financial Services ProvisionThis indicator is based on two data points collected by the Consultative Group to Assist the Poor (CGAP), a
policy and research centre dedicated to advancing ﬁnancial access for the world’s poor.59 They are:i) Provision of basic, low-fee accounts for low-income clients;ii) Provision by private operators of ﬁnancial services at post ofﬁces.
For many people, access to savings institutions and instruments are not readily available. The elementsof this indicator cover some of the factors that may inﬂuence access to savings, in particular those that are
relevant to women.
i) Provision of basic, low-fee accounts for low-income clients
Opening a bank account often involves initial charges and recurring maintenance costs. In Rwanda, thetypical monthly maintenance fee for a bank account is equivalent to 3% of the average monthly wage;
at some banks the minimum balance can be a multiple of local per-head income.60 Of the banks in 54
countries sampled for a 2008 World Bank report, half charged monthly fees, and 20% reported charging
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Appendix I

61. ibid.
62. Consultative Group to Assist
the Poor (2009), op. cit.
63. P Dupas and J Robinson,“Savings Constraints andMicroenterprise Development:
Evidence from a Field Experimentin Kenya”, MIT Poverty Action
Lab: Cambridge MA, 2009.
64. M Bruhn and I Love, “TheEconomic Impact of Banking
the Unbanked: Evidence from
Mexico”, World Bank Policy
Research Working Paper No.
4981, World Bank: Washington
DC, 2009.
65. “The Role of Postal Networks
in Expanding Access toFinancial Services”, Discussion
Paper, World Bank Global
Information and Communication
Technologies Department:
Washington DC, 2006.

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Women’s economic opportunity
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for services such as cheque books or automatic teller machine (ATM) use. Average charges across theboard were much higher in Africa than in East Asia (US$4 versus 50 US cents).61 The report found that suchcosts were a factor in the number of bank accounts opened in a country.
Only 20 of 139 countries surveyed in 2009 by CGAP had banking regulations in place that madeprovision of basic, low-fee accounts to low-income clients compulsory. Among developing countries,
these include India, Pakistan, Malaysia, Argentina, Chile, Colombia and Mexico. So far, survey data do notshow a signiﬁcant difference in the number of accounts per person in countries with and without basic
banking.62 However, country-level studies show some positive economic results in providing basic savings
programmes to women.
For example, a recent randomised evaluation in Kenya tested the impact of formal savings accounts
on how small-scale entrepreneurs save and use their money.63 Anecdotally, many individuals in poor
countries say that they ﬁnd it hard to save, given the many demands on their income. The researchers
for this project tested whether savings constraints prevent microentrepreneurs from expanding the sizeof their businesses. The researchers opened interest-free savings accounts in a local village bank for arandomly selected sample of 185 poor daily income earners (such as market vendors, bicycle taxi drivers
and self-employed artisans) and collected a unique dataset from self-reported logbooks that respondents
ﬁlled out daily.
What they found, if applicable to other countries, is relevant to policies to improve women’s economic
opportunity. Despite the fact that the savings accounts paid no interest and featured substantial
withdrawal fees, take-up and usage was high among women. After about six months, access to a savings
account led to a 39% increase in productive investment and a 13% increase in food expenditure among
women microentrepreneurs in Kenya, suggesting that higher investment levels led to higher income
levels. They also found evidence suggesting that women in the control group draw down their working
capital in response to health shocks, and that the accounts enabled the treatment group to cope withthese shocks without having to liquidate their inventories.
In Mexico, a unique event—the opening of multiple branches of a new bank targeting lower-income
individuals—allowed researchers to evaluate the effect of increased access to ﬁnancial services onentrepreneurial activity, employment and income for low-income people.64 Banco Azteca opened
branches in all of the existing stores of its parent company, Grupo Elektra, a large consumer goods
retailer. Almost overnight, Banco Azteca established more than 800 branches. Results showed that
informal business ownership increased signiﬁcantly for men in municipalities where the new bankopened, and that there was also an increase in women being employed as wage-earners (more so thanmen). Total employment, including informal business owners and wage earners, rose by 1.4% for theoverall sample, and income levels for both women and men rose by about 7%.
ii) Provision by private operators of ﬁnancial services at post ofﬁces
The world’s vast postal network can be leveraged to provide access to ﬁnancial services to underserved
markets. The World Bank reports that there are 500,000 post ofﬁces in the developing world—twice thenumber of bank branches in the same countries—and that they have a greater reach into rural and poor
areas than banks.65 In Brazil, for example, this reach has allowed Banco Postal to open more than 5m new
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Appendix I

66. “UK Government: Next
Steps for Post Ofﬁce Banking
Announced”, M2 Presswire,
March 29th 2010.
67. J Toledano and J Ansón(eds.), Postal Economics in
Developing Countries: Posts,
Infrastructure of the 21stCentury?, Universal Postal Union:
Berne, 2009.
68. World Bank. (2006), op. cit.
69. “Egypt Post Remittances
Volume Reaches 2.5 Billions”,
http://www.egyptpost.org/en/
NewsDetails.asp?NewsID=164(accessed May 5th 2010).
70. Egypt Enhancing Accessto Finance for Micro and SmallEnterprises, World Bank
Project Appraisal Document,
February 9th 2010. http://web.
worldbank.org/external/
projects/main?pagePK=64283
627&piPK=73230&theSitePK=
40941&menuPK=228424&Pro
jectid=P116011 (accessed May
5th 2010).

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accounts in less than ﬁve years (see below for more details). The interest in post-ofﬁce banking is notjust from developing countries. The UK recently announced an expansion of the ﬁnancial services offeredby its Post Ofﬁce to improve the supply of credit to low-income households, to serve small and mediumsized enterprises (SMEs) better, and to make the Post Ofﬁce network of 11,500 branches more ﬁnanciallysustainable.66
Although post ofﬁces have been offering ﬁnancial services for many years, the concept of using abricks-and-mortar network to increase access to savings and loans has been sidelined in recent years by
the microﬁnance movement, and the use of new technology such as mobile banking. However, several
success stories show that the post ofﬁce may be an effective tool to bring ﬁnancial services to the poor.
The Brazil example is instructive. Starting in 2002, Brazil set up a special postal ﬁnancial service
through the Brazilian post that acts as a correspondent for a private bank (Bradesco). Taking advantage ofthe experimental conditions provided by the gradual opening of postal bank branches in Brazil, an impact
evaluation was done. It revealed clear and positive effects between the opening of postal bank branches
and new-ﬁrm creation and employment.67 In a four-year period (2002-05), the involved municipalities
saw an average of 20 additional new ﬁrms per municipality compared with peers without Banco Postal(after controlling for regional differences and speciﬁc levels of ﬁnancial access). Interestingly, thepresence of Banco Postal also had positive effects on formalisation of the labour market. On average,municipalities that were initially unbanked experienced relatively more growth in the proportion ofsalaried workers than the municipalities that did not beneﬁt from a Banco Postal launch in 2002.
In Egypt in 2002, 50% of savings accounts were held at post ofﬁces—although these accounts held
only 3% of total national deposits—and handled 22m payment transactions (compared with 8m by banksin Egypt).68 In terms of potential for increasing ﬁnancial inclusion, however, the post ofﬁce has wide
coverage in many of Egypt’s poorest villages, through its more than 3,000 outlets, and is accessible tolow-income households. When Egypt Post introduced remittance services in 2007, this service saw large
customer take-up, as remittances are a main source of income for rural villages with relatives working
abroad.69 A new World Bank project aims to use the country’s network of post ofﬁces to expand theavailability of credit to micro and small enterprises across Egypt.70 An innovative element of this projectwill be a new ﬁnancial product line designed and targeted at disadvantaged women in the country’s
poorest 1,000 villages. This will operate through the new post-ofﬁce-facilitated expansion of credit
services.
Most ﬁnancial services delivered at post ofﬁces are not speciﬁcally targeted at women, but the fact thatthese services are being offered in locations relatively close to their home may make it easier for women,
especially women in rural areas, to access, as they may have more limited geographic mobility than men,owing to greater household and childcare responsibilities, less cash available for transportation needs,
and less knowledge of ﬁnancial institutions and services.
Further Reading
A Demirguc-Kunt, T Beck and P Honohan, Finance for all? A World Bank Policy Research Report: Policies andpitfalls in expanding access, World Bank: Washington DC, 2008.

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Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Women’s Access to Finance Programmes
71. A Muravyev, D Schäfer andO Talavera, “Entrepreneurs’
Gender and Financial Constraints:
Evidence from International Data”,
Discussion Paper No. 706, DIW,
German Institute for Economic
Research: Berlin, 2007.
A Demirguc-Kunt, T Beck and P
Honohan, Finance for all? A WorldBank Policy Research Report:
Policies and pitfalls in expanding
access, World Bank: Washington
DC, 2008.
72. See for example N A Goheer,
Women Entrepreneurs in Pakistan:
How to Improve Their Bargaining
Power, International Labour
Organisation: Geneva, 2003.
73. Demirguc-Kunt, op. cit.
A Diagne, M Zeller and M Sharma,“Empirical measurements ofhouseholds’ access to credit andcredit constraints in developing
countries: Methodological Issues
and Evidence”, Food Consumption
and Nutrition Division Discussion
Paper No. 90, International Foodand Policy Research Institute:
Washington DC, 2000.
A Faisel, Impact Assessment of
Kashf’s Microﬁnance and KarvaanEnterprise Development Programme,
Arjumand and Associates:
Islamabad, 2004.
L Stevenson and A St-Onge,
Support for growth-oriented women
entrepreneurs in Ethiopia, Kenya
and Tanzania. An overview report.
International Labour Organisation:
Geneva, 2005.
E Bardasi, C M Blackden,
J C Guzman, “Gender,
Entrepreneurship, andCompetitiveness in Africa”, Africa
Competitiveness Report 2007, World
Economic Forum: Geneva, 2007.
A Ellis, M Blackden, J Cutura, F
MacCulloch and H Seebens, Genderand Economic Growth in Tanzania:
Creating Opportunities for Women,
Directions in Development Series,
World Bank: Washington DC, 2007.
74. “Women Entrepreneurs
and Access to Finance: Global
Proﬁles from Around the World”,
International Finance Corporation:
Washington DC, 2006.
75. Global Banking Alliance for
Women website: http://www.
gbaforwomen.org
76. Capital Access for Women:
Proﬁle and Analysis of U.S. Best
Practice Programs, Urban Institute:
Washington DC, 2006.
77. Wells Fargo website, “WomenBusiness Services”. https://www.
wellsfargo.com/biz/women_
diverse_business/women/index.

116

Access to ﬁnance is an obstacle for many women entrepreneurs around the world. Studies have shownthat women in both developed and developing countries are still less likely to receive funding from formal
ﬁnancial institutions or are charged a higher interest rate than men.71 There are a range of reasons for
this: women are less likely to be in formal sector jobs, they are less likely to own title to land or a house(which in turn may be because of unequal inheritance and property laws), or they are often less ﬁnanciallyliterate and lack business skills or access to business development training.72 The Women’s Economic
Opportunity Index has attempted to highlight these interrelated factors by including them as indicators
within the “Access to Finance” category and other indicator categories.
In many developing countries (including Bangladesh, Malawi, India, Pakistan, Ethiopia, Kenya,
Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia), women entrepreneurs report facing greater and more systemic accessbarriers to formal ﬁnancial services and cite ﬁnance as a challenge in starting and growing theirbusinesses.73
Although women business owners are potentially a large market for the commercial loan industry, few
retail banks are directly targeting women-owned businesses as clients. Why is this so?
●

Women-owned businesses in developing countries are underrepresented in the formal sector. This isoften owing to a range of legal, regulatory, and socio-cultural barriers.

●

Limited market data makes it difﬁcult for banks in emerging markets to assess market needs and size,
owing to inadequate quantitative data about the women’s market or the micro, small and medium
enterprise segment.

●

Perceived credit risk. Relatively few banks in emerging markets have access to credit bureau data; newwomen entrepreneurs generally have limited credit history, and they have constraints on access tocollateral (for more on this issue, please read section on “Equal Property Ownership” in this appendix).

●

Lack of technical expertise. Few banks are familiar with the obstacles facing women-owned businesses
and how to meet their speciﬁc needs.74

Some banks have successfully been focusing on lending to women business owners. For example,
the Global Banking Alliance for Women (GBA) is a membership organisation of banks and private-sector
ﬁnancial institutions that are committed to the growth of women’s businesses.75 The GBA member banks
do not all evaluate the impact of the loans that they make on individual women-owned businesses (interms of the effect of loans on business revenue, proﬁt or growth), but they see positive returns for theirown operations by focusing on this market.
For example, Wells Fargo, one of the largest ﬁnancial services providers in the US, was the ﬁrst ﬁnancial
services company in the country to create a national programme dedicated to supporting women-owned
businesses. When Wells Fargo set up its women’s loan programme in 1995, it had a goal to lend US$1bn
over three years to qualiﬁed women-owned small businesses. Due to overwhelming response, it lent over
US$1bn in the ﬁrst year alone.76 Since 1995, Wells Fargo has lent US$34bn to hundreds of thousands ofwomen business owners, supporting one of the country’s fastest-growing segments.77

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Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Further Reading
Capital Access for Women: Proﬁle and Analysis of U.S. Best Practice Programs. Urban Institute: Washington
DC, 2006. http://www.kauffman.org/entrepreneurship/capital-access-for-women.aspx
Women Entrepreneurs and Access to Finance: Global Proﬁles from Around the World, International
Finance Corporation: Washington DC, 2006. http://www.ifc.org/ifcext/enviro.nsf/AttachmentsByTitle/
p_GEM_WomenEntrepreneursFinance/$FILE/Women+Entrepreneurs+and+Access+to+Finance.pdf

3) Education and Training
78. See D Dollar and R Gatti(1999). The World Bank
Development Research Group/
PREM Network. Also, for latest
trends see: UNESCO, Education
For All - Global Monitoring Report
2009, available at www.unesco.
org.
79. G Psacharopoulos and H A
Patrinos, “Returns to Investment
in Education: A Further Update”,
Education Economics, Vol. 12,
No. 2, 2004, pages 111-134.
80. ibid.
81. T P Schultz, “WhyGovernments Should Invest
More To Educate Girls”, World
Development, Vol. 30, Issue 2,
February 2002, pages 207-225.
82. H Patrinos and G
Psacharopoulos, “Returns to
Education: An International
Update”, Human Development
Network, World Bank:
Washington, DC, 2007
(unpublished).
83. H Patrinos, Returns
to Education: The Gender
Perspective, 2008. Also,
Christopher Dougherty, “Why Are
the Returns to Schooling Higher
for Women Than for Men?”
Journal of Human Resources, Vol.
40, No. 4, 2005, pages 969-988.
84. C Dougherty (2005), op. cit.
85. T Kurosaki and H Khan,“Human Capital, Productivity,
and Stratiﬁcation in Rural
Pakistan”, Review of Development
Economics, Vol. 10, No. 1,
February 2006, pages 116-134.

Primary and secondary Education, women
The literature on the impact of human capital on individual economic returns shows unequivocally that
there is a positive effect of education on individual productivity and wages. Dollar and Gatti (“Gender
Inequality, Income, and Growth: Are Good Times Good for Women?”, 1999) found that an extra year of
schooling could increase individual earnings by 10%.78 In estimates of Mincer earnings functions for 98
countries, average returns for additional years of schooling were found to be above 17% worldwide, andare systematically higher in developing countries.79 For girls, one extra year of schooling results in an
average return of 9.8% in wages down the road, compared with 8.7% for men, although results vary bycountry.80 Overall, empirical evidence from around the world shows that the social returns to the years ofschooling of females are greater than the return to males.81
Although returns on girls’ primary education in developing countries appear to be lower than forboys’, women get a greater return on secondary education than men.82 The lower return to girls’ primaryschooling in developing countries is puzzling for researchers, as the opposite is found in most transition
countries. Patrinos and others posit that discrimination and other factors could cause women to accept
lower wages.83 Better-educated women (with secondary education) may be more able and willing toovercome discrimination and compete with men in the labour market, or there could be male-female
differences in the quality of schooling.
In more developed economies such as the US, it has been found that more education for women has adual effect on women’s earnings.84 It increases women’s skills and productivity, and it reduces the gap inmale and female earnings attributable to discrimination. Dougherty ﬁnds that discrimination accounts forabout half of the differential in the returns to schooling.
Education also positively affects self-employment and entrepreneurship. One study in Pakistan showsthat returns to non-farm enterprises grow by 30-35% when household members working at the enterprise
have secondary education attainment.85 The inﬂuence of education is different across countries, sectors
and education levels, but its positive effects are generally conﬁrmed by virtually all cross-country
comparisons.86

86. UN Educational, Scientiﬁcand Cultural Organisation
website: http://www.unesco.
org.

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Further Reading
M Tembon and L Fort (eds.), Girls’ Education in the 21st Century: Gender Equality, Empowerment and Growth(Directions in Development), World Bank: Washington DC, 2008.
D Abu-Ghaida and S Klasen, “The Economic and Human Development Costs of Missing the Millennium
Development Goal on Gender Equity”, World Development , Vol. 32, Issue 7, July 2004, pages 1075-1107.

Tertiary Education, women

87. Based on internal rates ofreturn analysis. R Boarini and
H Strauss, “The Private Internal
Rates of Return to Tertiary
Education: New Estimates for
21 OECD Countries”, OECD
Economics Department Working
Paper No. 591, OECD Publishing,2007. http://dx.doi.org/10.178
7/031008650733.
88. G Psacharopoulos and H A
Patrinos, “Returns to Investment
in Education: A Further Update”,
Education Economics, Vol. 12,
No. 2, 2004.
89. T Kurosaki and H Khan,“Human Capital, Productivity,
and Stratiﬁcation in Rural
Pakistan”, Review of Development
Economics, Vol. 10, No. 1,
February 2006, pages 116-134.
90. “Key Indicators 2007:
Inequality in Asia”, AsianDevelopment Bank: Manila,
2007.
91. J R Behrman, N Birdsall and
M Szekely, “Economic Policy
and Wage Differentials in Latin
America”, Centre for Global
Development Working Paper 29,
Washington DC, 2003.
92. S Blondal, S Field and N
Girouard, “Investment in Human
Capital through Upper Secondary
and Tertiary Education”, OECD
Economic Studies, No. 34, 2002/
I, OECD: Paris.

Beyond primary and secondary education, higher learning has a large impact on earnings and job
progression, especially for individuals employed in the non-farm sector. For OECD countries, the average
individual returns of an additional year of tertiary education are 8-11%,87 and this is even higher for many
developing countries where studies have been conducted.88 For example, in rural Pakistan, non-farmwages of those with tertiary education are 49% higher than those of the uneducated, and 30% higher
even when comparing between individuals with the same kind of job.89 Furthermore, in India, Indonesia,
the Philippines and Vietnam, the wage gap between those with a tertiary education and those without
is rising signiﬁcantly.90 Evidence from Latin America suggests that returns from secondary and tertiary
education are going up more rapidly than those from primary education.91
An OECD study shows that workers with tertiary education are more likely to participate in the labour
market, and have longer active working lives. This is especially true for women, where the gap in labour
force participation between women with upper secondary and tertiary education is wider than for men.
The effects of education on female labour force participation are relatively wide in all age groups studied(25-64 years).92
In Pakistan, women get far more economic returns on education (deﬁned as earning increment from an
extra year of schooling) than for men in all occupations except agriculture. Therefore, education reduces
gender gaps in earnings. However, women’s participation in the labour market increases only after ten
years of education—and only about 10% of Pakistani women have had ten or more years of education (asof the early 2000s).93
Further Reading
Stephen Machin and Sandra McNally, “Tertiary Education Systems and Labour Markets”, commissioned by
the OECD Education and Training Policy Division for the Thematic Review of Tertiary Education, OECD: Paris,
2007.
Education For All - Global Monitoring Report, published annually by UNESCO since 2002. http://www.
unesco.org/en/efareport/reports

93. M Aslam, G Kingdon and
M Soderbom, “Is Education a
Path to Gender Equality in the
Labour Market? Evidence from
Pakistan”, in M Tembon and L
Fort (eds.), Educating Girls forthe 21st Century: Gender Equality,
Empowerment and Economic
Growth, World Bank: Washington
DC, 2008.

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Literacy Rate, women
An estimated 776m adults—or 16% of the world’s adult population—lack basic literacy skills. About twothirds of these are women. Gender disparities in adult literacy are widespread, especially in the countries
with the lowest literacy rates. Gender and poverty often interact: in The Gambia, literacy rates ranged
from 12% among extremely poor women to 53% for richer men. In seven Sub-Saharan African countries
with particularly low adult literacy rates, the literacy gap between the poorest and wealthiest households
is more than 40 percentage points. In India, literacy levels are lowest in the poorest states. Literacy
rates are almost always lower in rural communities and regions than in urban ones. In Ethiopia, regional
disparities in literacy rates range from 83% in the Addis Ababa region to 25% in the rural Amhara region.94
The ability to read and write has direct impact on the amount of information that a person can access ortransmit for any purpose. The ability to absorb, manipulate and disseminate written information is crucial
for anyone seeking to maximise the economic returns of their chosen activity, or even to be able to choose
activities in the ﬁrst place. A large portion of jobs in the formal sector—including virtually all those above
the most basic level of responsibility—require workers to be proﬁcient in reading and writing.95
The hindrance of illiteracy also bears upon entrepreneurs, especially those wishing to grow beyond themost basic small and informal businesses. For example, as in many countries, summaries of new businessregulations in Cambodia are only offered to the public through newspapers or the Internet. Those who
cannot keep abreast of quickly changing laws that apply to their businesses cannot adequately competewith those who are able to do so.96
Further Reading
Education for All - Global Monitoring Report: Literacy for Life, UNESCO Publishing: Paris, 2006.

Existence of SME Support/Development Training
94. Education For All - Global
Monitoring Report, UNESCO,2009.
95. International Labour
Organisation website: http://
www.ilo.org).
96. Promoting Gender Equitable
Opportunities in Agricultural
Value Chains, US Agency forInternational Development
handbook, 2009.
97. “Management Training in
SMEs”, OECD Working Party on
SMEs, OECD: Paris, 2002.
98. D S Karlan and V Martin,“Teaching Entrepreneurship:
Impact of Business Trainingon Microﬁnance Clients andInstitutions”, Yale University
Economic Growth Centre
Discussion Paper No. 941; Centre
for Global Development Working
Paper No. 108, July 2006.

119

Both developed and developing countries recognise the beneﬁt of business development services andentrepreneurship training for SMEs. For example, when a 2002 OECD study found that there was “apositive correlation between the degree of management training and the bottom-line performance of anSME”, the Singapore government promptly began looking into ways to provide management training to
SMEs.97
Entrepreneurship training appears to work for smaller enterprises in less developed business markets
as well. A randomised control trial conducted in Peru added business training to a group lending
programme for female microentrepreneurs and showed positive results.98 The training led to improved
business results for the treatment group of an average of 9% more sales a month. The treatment group
improved its business knowledge and practices, such as keeping records of business activities andimplementing innovations. The programme also improved repayment and client retention rates forthe microﬁnance institution. For example, 78% of clients in the control group already had a perfect
repayment rate, but an even higher percentage of the treatment group, 81%, were able to maintain aperfect repayment record.
Evaluations of several ILO/Start and Improve Your Business (SIYB) projects have shown positive results
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Appendix I

99. “ILO strategy on promoting
women’s entrepreneurshipdevelopment,” GB.301/ESP/4,
International Labour Organisation:
Geneva, March 2008. Figures
extrapolated from ILO/SIYB 19982003 “Global Outreach Study: A
study of the outreach and impactof the Start and Improve Your
Business Programme worldwide”,
commissioned by SIYB Global
Co-ordinator, International Labour
Organisation, Geneva, 2003; andthe SIYB China Evaluation Report
2004-07.
100. ibid.
101. S D Barwa, “Impact of StartYour Business (SYB) Training on
Women Entrepreneurs in Vietnam”,
International Labour Organisation:
Geneva, 2003.
102. S Carlsson and T T L Anh, “StartYour Own Business Programme,
Vietnam Impact Study,”International Labour Organisation:
Geneva, 2001.
J Voeten, “Management Training
Effects on Women Entrepreneurs
Who Own and Manage Micro andSmall Enterprises”, TWMSE2 ProjectWorking Paper, Maastricht Schoolof Management, 2002.
103. S Esim, “See How They Grow:
Business Development Services
for Women’s Business Growth”,
International Centre for Researchon Women: Washington DC, 2001.
104. L Stevenson, and A St-Onge,
Support for Growth-oriented
Women Entrepreneurs in Ethiopia,
Kenya and Tanzania, An Overview
Report, International Labour
Organisation: Geneva:, 2005.
105. A Morrison and M B Orlando,“The Socioeconomic Costs ofDomestic Violence: Chile andNicaragua”, in Morrison andBiehl (eds.), Too Close to Home:
Domestic Violence in the Americas,
Inter-American Development Bank:
Washington DC, 1999.
H Waters, A Hyder, Y Rajkotia, S
Basu, J A Rehwinkel, A Butchart,
The economic dimensions ofinterpersonal violence, Department
of Injuries and Violence Prevention,
World Health Organisation: Geneva,
2004.
106. S Lloyd and N Taluc, “Theeffects of male violence on female
employment”, Violence Against
Women, Vol. 5, No. 4, 1999, pages
370-392.
F Sánchez et al, “Segunda Parte:
Estudio de Mujeres”, in Los costos
de la violencia intrafamiliar en
Colombia, Universidad de losAndes, Centro de Estudios sobre
Desarrollo Económico: Bogotá,
2004.
107. “End Violence Against
Women and Girls: The Facts”, UN
Development Fund for Women: New
York, 2010.

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in terms of creating female employment and improvement in business performance. As of 2008, the SIYB
programme is estimated to have trained 940,000 potential micro and small entrepreneurs, and created
1.2m jobs.99
Impact analysis from the SIYB programme in Sri Lanka indicates that women entrepreneurs trainedin SIYB are more likely to have created new jobs than male participants in the programme. One-quarterof the women entrepreneurs increased employment in their businesses after SIYB training, comparedwith 8% of men.100 In Vietnam, nearly 97% of the participants of the programme stated that theirbusiness performance had improved considerably, and nearly 49% said that their personal income forprivate consumption had increased. After participating in the programme, 56 business owners (out of
258 surveyed) had hired new employees, creating a total of 185 new jobs.101 Impact studies of the same
project showed that women who receive training are more ready to adopt business practices that increase
proﬁts, grow businesses and create jobs.102
Despite these successes, others have argued that some business development services training
and support programmes to strengthen micro- and small enterprises have been of limited quality,
accessibility, and effectiveness,103 and that few programmes have focused explicitly on building women’s
entrepreneurship skills.104
Overall, in constructing this Index, the presence of training programs for SMEs was seen as positive.
The indicator measures not only the availability of training (the extent to which training is geographicallyavailable), but also its cost (whether it is affordable to the majority of intended beneﬁciaries), women’s
access to such programmes, timing (to take into account women’s time shared between work, household
and children), and if training is culturally appropriate.
Further Reading
One Woman = One Business. Why Business and Management Education for Women Is Essential to Economic
Development, International Centre for Research on Women: Washington DC, September 2008.

4) Women’s Legal and Social Status
Addressing Violence Against Women
Beyond constituting a human rights violation and causing harm and suffering, violence against womenand girls is associated with measurable losses in economic terms, both on an individual and on an
aggregate level.105 It has a demonstrable negative effect on female earnings and on women’s ability toremain employed, in terms of longer unemployment periods, higher job turnover, lower income, and more
health issues that negatively affect their job productivity.106
This in turn negatively affects economic growth. Violence against women has enormous direct andindirect costs for survivors, employers and the public sector in terms of health, police, legal and related
expenditures, as well as lost wages and productivity.107 According to a study in Uganda, about 9% of
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108. Intimate Partner Violence:High Costs to Households andCommunities, International Centre
for Research on Women: Washington
DC, 2009.
109. Costs of Intimate Partner
Violence against Women in the UnitedStates, Centres for Disease Control
and Prevention: Atlanta, 2003.
110. T Day, The health-related
costs of violence against womenin Canada: The tip of the iceberg,
Centre for Research on Violence
Against Women and Children:
London ON, 1995. Cited in Measuring
Violence Against Women, Statistical
Trends 2006, Statistics Canada:
Ottawa, 2006.
111. The Cost of Domestic Violence
to the Australian Economy: Part I,
Access Economics, 2004. Cited in“The National Council to Reduce
Violence against Women and theirChildren”, March 2009.
The Cost of Violence against Womenand their Children, Commonwealth ofAustralia: Canberra.
112. S Narube, Economic Costs ofViolence Against Women, Reserve
Bank of Fiji: Suva.
113. H Waters, A Hyder, Y Rajkotia,
S Basu, J A Rehwinkel, A Butchart,
The economic dimensions ofinterpersonal violence, Department
of Injuries and Violence Prevention,
World Health Organisation: Geneva,
2004.
114. WHO Multi-country Study on
Women’s Health and Domestic
Violence against Women, World
Health Organisation: Geneva, 2005.
115. A Morrison, M Ellsberg and S
Bott, “Addressing Gender-Based
Violence: A Critical Review ofInterventions”, The World Bank
Observer, Vol. 22, No. 1, 2007, pages
25-51.
116. L Dugan, “Domestic Violence
Legislation: Exploring Its Impact on
the Likelihood of Domestic Violence,
Police Involvement, and Arrest”,
Criminology and Public Policy, Vol. 2,
Issue 2, 2003, pages 283-311.
A P Worden, “The Changing
Boundaries of the Criminal Justice
System: Redeﬁning the Problem andthe Response in Domestic Violence”,
in C M Friel (ed.), Boundary Changes
in Criminal Justice Organisations
Volume 2, National Institute ofJustice: Washington DC, 2000, pages
215-266.

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

violent incidents forced women to lose time from paid work, amounting to around 11 days a year.108
Annual costs of intimate partner violence were calculated at US$5.8bn in the US109 and US$1.4bn in
Canada.110 In Australia, in terms of productivity losses alone, violence against women and children isestimated at US$433m per year. When combined with costs in six other categories, the cost of such
violence reaches US$7bn.111 In Fiji, the annual estimated cost was US$135.8m, or 7% of GDP in 2002.112
The aggregate negative effect of female productivity loss due to violence has been estimated to beequivalent to 1.6% of Nicaragua’s GDP and 2% of Chile’s GDP.113 It should be noted that the economic
costs of violence against women cannot be directly compared between economies, owing to differing
methodologies and assumptions in research.
Some progress has been made in measuring gender-based violence—most notably through a WHO
multi-country study (2005),114 demographic and health surveys, and international violence against
women surveys—but it is difﬁcult to ascertain accurately the full extent of violence against women, owing
to frequent underreporting and differences in how violence is measured between countries, including
intimate partner violence.115 However, the presence of clear and speciﬁc legislation against it can help todetermine the degree of political will and how societies view and address the problem.116
The Women’s Economic Opportunity Index bases this indicator on the existence of legislation on
violence against women captured in the UN Secretary-General’s database on violence against women,117
which is a ﬁrst step towards capturing comparable cross-country information on such issues.
Further reading
S Bott, A Morrison and M Ellsberg, “Preventing and Responding to Gender-Based Violence in Middle- and
Low-Income Countries: a Global Review and Analysis”, World Bank Policy Research Working Paper No.
3618, 2005.
R Carrillo et al, Not a Minute More: Ending Violence Against Women, UN Development Fund for Women:
New York, 2003.
Intimate Partner Violence, High Costs to Households and Communities, International Centre for Researchon Women and UN Population Fund: Washington DC, 2009.
Virtual Knowledge Centre to End Violence against Women and Girls, UN Development Fund for Women,
2010. http://www.endvawnow.org (A comprehensive online resource to guide policy, legislation, andimplementation.)
In-Depth Study on All Forms of Violence against Women: Report of the Secretary General, A/61/122/
Add.1, UN General Assembly, 6th July 2006.

117. The UN Secretary-General’s
Database on Violence against Womenis maintained by The Division for the
Advancement of Women/Departmentof Economic and Social Affairs(DAW/DESA), which functions as
the secretariat of the database.
The primary source of information
for the database is the responses
received from member states to thequestionnaire on violence against
women, of September 2008, andsubsequent updates. http://
webapps01.un.org/vawdatabase/home.action

121

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118. Promoting Gender Equitable
Opportunities in Agricultural Value
Chains: A Handbook, US Agency forInternational Development Greater
Access to Trade Expansion (GATE)
Project: Washington DC, 2009.
119. E Katungi, S Edmeades andM Smale, “Gender, Social Capitaland Information Exchange in
Rural Uganda”, Collective Action
and Property Rights Working
Paper No. 59, Consultative Groupon International Agricultural
Research: Washington DC, October
2006. http://www.capri.cgiar.
org/pdf/capriwp59.pdf
120. One Woman = One Business.
Why Business and Management
Education for Women Is Essential
to Economic Development,International Centre for Researchon Women: Washington DC,
September 2008.
121. P Richardson, R Howarth and
G Finnegan, “The Challenges ofGrowing Small Businesses: Insightsfrom Women Entrepreneurs in
Africa”, SEED Working Paper No.
47, International Labour Ofﬁce:
Geneva, 2004.
122. See P Fernando, and G Porter(eds.), Balancing the Load. Women,
Gender and Transport, Zed Books
in association with International
Forum for Rural Transport andDevelopment: London, 2002.
R Law, “Beyond ‘women andtransport’: towards newgeographies of gender and daily
mobility”, Progress in Human
Geography, Vol. 23, No. 4, 1999,
pages 567-588.
123. http://www.genderindex.org
124. See R Jeffery and A M Basu(eds.), Girls’ Schooling, Women’s
Autonomy and Fertility Change inSouth Asia, Sage Publications: New
Delhi, 1996.
Z Mumtaz and S Salway, “‘I Never
Go Anywhere’: Extricating theLinks between Women’s Mobility
and Uptake of Reproductive HealthServices in Pakistan”, Social Science& Medicine, Vol. 60, Issue 8, 2005,
pages 1751–1765.
125. N Kabeer, “Women, Wages andIntra-Household Power Relations in
Urban Bangladesh”, Development
and Change, Vol. 28, No. 2, 1997,
pages 261-302.
126. S Amin, “The PovertyPurdah Trap in Rural Bangladesh:
Implications for Women’s Rolesin the Family”, Working Paper
75, Population Council Research
Division: New York, 1995. Cited in
S Salway, S Jesmin and S Rahman,
Development and Change, Vol. 36
Issue 2, 2005, pages 317-349.

122

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Women’s Freedom of Movement
Mobility is a signiﬁcant factor in access to economic resources, education, health and other central
elements inﬂuencing women’s empowerment. Increasingly, it is recognised that a woman’s ability totravel easily is an important factor in accessing economic opportunities. Restrictions on a woman’s
mobility may limit travel to markets, and reduce her networking opportunities. This also affects her accessto business information and networks. It is useful to note that spaces where information is exchanged are
not necessarily gender-neutral.118 For example, in Albania, market information is often received throughnetworking with colleagues in local coffee shops. These coffee shops are considered male spaces, andwomen do not comfortably congregate there. Similarly, in rural Uganda, men network in drinking clubs,
spaces women are restricted from entering.119
The International Centre for Research on Women (ICRW) has recognised that access to non-ﬁnancial
services is as important as ﬁnancial services to women to access economic opportunities.120 Such services
include market information and access, management and ﬁnancial training, peer networks and leadershipskills. Women entrepreneurs in developing countries have themselves identiﬁed a need for education andskills, including specialised training, ﬁnancial advice, business counselling and marketing support for
their products and services.121 However, if women’s mobility is limited, access to such support will also be
reduced.
Limited mobility could stem from economic constraints. For example, women may not own or haveaccess to private means of transport, and hence are reliant on public transport or walking.122 Mobility
could be constrained by legal and cultural factors. The Women’s Economic Opportunity Index does notlook directly at the issues of women and transport, in part because there is little sex-disaggregated dataon the subject; the index considers infrastructure risk broadly under the “General Business Environment”
category.
Legal and cultural restrictions on travel that apply only to women are, however, a gender-speciﬁc
constraint that the Index attempts to address. The indicator is sourced from the OECD Development
Centre, which constructed a “Women’s Freedom of Movement” indicator for its Social Institutions andGender Index.123 The indicator is a qualitative assessment made by the OECD Development Centre, basedon country analyses done by the team.
It is acknowledged that in certain contexts—notably in South Asia, and the Middle East and North
Africa—individual identity is subordinated to relationships and transactions with others, and a woman’s
wellbeing is bound to that of the larger household.124 As one study notes, in such a context, women’slong-term interests may be better served by preserving household solidarity and co-operation rather thanmeeting one’s personal needs, and the system penalises any attempt at autonomous or individualistic
forms of behaviour.125 It is also recognised that observed mobility cannot be uncritically equated with anotion of “freedom of movement”, as it may reﬂect economic necessity rather than preference.126
Further Reading
L Aljounaidi, “Gender and Transport in MENA - Case Studies form West Bank, Gaza and Yemen”, MENA
Knowledge and Learning, Quick Notes Series, Number 21, World Bank: Washington DC, March 2010.
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Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Rural Poverty Assessment: Near East and North Africa, International Fund for Agricultural Development:
Rome, August 1999.

Adolescent Fertility Rate
127. D Klepinger, S Lundberg
and R Plotnick, “How Does
Adolescent Fertility Affect the
Human Capital and Wages ofYoung Women?”, Journal of
Human Resources, Vol. 34, No. 3,
summer 1999, pages 421-448.
128. A T Geronimus and S
Korenman, “The Socioeconomic
Consequences of TeenChildbearing Reconsidered”, PSC
Research Report No. 90-190,
September 1990.
129. M Buvinic, “The Costsof Adolescent Childbearing:
Evidence from Chile, Barbados,
Guatemala and Mexico”, Studies
in Family Planning, Vol. 29, No.
2, The Population Council, 1998.
130. Adolescent Girls’
Livelihoods, Population Council
and International Centre for
Research on Women: New Yorkand Washington DC, 2000.
131. S Mathur, M Greene and A
Malhotra, Too Young to Wed: The
Lives, Rights, and Health of Young
Married Girls, International
Centre for Research on Women:
Washington DC, 2003.
132. 2009 World Survey on theRole of Women in Development:
Women’s Control over Economic
Resources and Access toFinancial Resources, including
Microﬁnance, UN Departmentof Economic and Social Affairs
Division for the Advancement of
Women, ST/ESA/326, UN: New
York, 2009.
133. C Grown, G Rao Gupta andA Kes, Taking Action: Achieving
Gender Equality and Empowering
Women. Report of the Millennium
Project Task Force on Education
and Gender Equality, Earthscan
for the UN Task Force on
Education and Gender Equality:
London, 2005.
134. A Ellis, C Manuel and C MBlackden, Gender and Economic
Growth in Uganda: Unleashing
the Power of Women, Directionsin Development, World Bank:
Washington DC: 2006.

123

The literature suggests that there is a negative correlation between adolescent motherhood and economic
opportunity for young women. For example, Klepinger et al (1999) analysed data from a sample of womenin the US National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, and found that adolescent fertility substantially reduces
years of formal education and work experience. These reductions in human capital resulted in a signiﬁcanteffect on wages at the age of 25.127 Other studies in the US attribute a large part of the negative economic
consequences to prior social and economic disadvantages, and not to teenage child-bearing.128 The
main empirical challenge in assessing the impact of early childbearing is to isolate the causal impact of
becoming a young mother from the mother’s socio-economic background.
In developing countries, there is empirical evidence that suggests a negative correlation between
adolescent motherhood and decreased economic opportunity for young women. A four-country study
in Chile, Barbados, Guatemala and Mexico shows evidence from all four countries that adolescentmotherhood is associated with adverse socio-economic conditions and poor earning opportunities forthe teenage mother.129 After controlling for the mother’s schooling and her wealth as a child, both the
Guatemala and the Mexico studies found that adolescent child-bearing was positively associated withpoverty indicators (measured by an index of housing quality in Guatemala, and an index of housing
quality and socio-economic standing in Mexico. The Chile study suggests that early childbearing andclosely associated factors can have signiﬁcant economic costs, especially for poor mothers who needthose earnings most. Early childbearing seems to entrench the poverty trajectory of poor women.
Research shows that most very young mothers work in the informal sector or perform unpaid economic
activity in the home.130 Young married mothers in developing countries tend to be primarily responsible
for household-related tasks, and they have limited access to productive resources such as land, housing,credit, water and agricultural technical assistance.131 All these constraints add up to limit a young
woman’s opportunities to access jobs, earn an income and improve her livelihood.
Further Reading
Giving Girls Today and Tomorrow: Breaking the Cycle of Adolescent Pregnancy, UN Population Fund: New
York, 2007.

Property Ownership Rights
Property ownership is still very unequal between women and men in many countries. This is due to a
combination of discriminatory inheritance practices, unequal access to land markets and gender-biased
land reform.132 For women, this is a double blow in terms of not having sufﬁcient control over resources
to increase agricultural productivity and food security,133 and reducing their ability to access incomegenerating opportunities through non-farm business, especially through the use of immovable assets as
collateral for business loans.134
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Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

135. E Katz and J S Chamorro,“Gender, Land Rights, and theHousehold Economy in Rural
Nicaragua and Honduras”,
presented at the annual
conference of the Latin American
and Caribbean Economics
Association, Puebla, Mexico,
October 9th-11th 2003.

Comparative analysis of data from Honduras and Nicaragua suggests that women gain greater control
over agricultural income, gain higher shares of business and labour market earnings, and more frequently
receive credit if they secure more land rights.135 There is evidence that women’s employment andproductivity increases as a result of more secure property rights;136 in addition, their children’s health andeducation improves.137
For a female entrepreneur, not having full legal ownership rights to land and property is an obstacle
when she seeks to borrow capital from banks. This is because in most developing countries, only land andother immovable property is accepted as bank collateral. One way around this is for movable property,
such as inventory, equipment or even jewellery to become accepted as collateral. Such collateral reform
may be disproportionately beneﬁcial to women, as without being able to use movable property as
collateral for loans, borrowers end up paying higher unsecured interest rates.138
Separately, innovative land reform programmes around the world, for example in Vietnam andEthiopia, are helping women to gain more control over the use and disposal of land.139 Similar land titling
exercises took place in Peru in the 1990s, which mandated that married couples receive joint land titles.
More than 50% of the beneﬁciaries of this policy were women, who then gained access to governmentprovided credit, and saw an improvement of employment prospects.140
However, legal rights alone are not enough, if long-established customs prevent them from taking
control of land and other productive assets.141 Therefore, the Women’s Economic Opportunity Index
indicator on women’s right to property ownership looks not only at the legal codes, but also customary
practice in each country. Such a qualitative assessment may not be fully accurate, but neither does only
looking at the law tell us the full picture. By combining the two types of information, the Index seeks
to provide a global overview on the extent of women’s property rights, and we hope that this will be astarting point for further empirical research.

136. K Mason and H Carlsson,“The impact of gender equality
in land rights on development”,
presented at the conference on“Human rights and development:
towards mutual reinforcement”,
hosted by the New York
University School of Law, New
York, March 1st 2004.
137. A Quisumbing and B De laBrière, “The impact of PROGRESA
on intra-household decisionmaking and relative schoolingachievements of boys andgirls, part I”, in The Impact of
PROGRESA on Women’s Status
and Intra-household Relations,
M Adato et al, International
Food Policy Research Institute:
Washington DC, 2000.
138. H Fleisig, M Safavian and N
de la Peña, Reforming Collateral
Laws to Expand Access to Finance,
World Bank: Washington DC,
2006.
139. K Deininger and S Jin,
“Land Sales and Rental Markets
in Transition: Evidence from
Rural Vietnam”, American
Agricultural Economics
Association (new name from2008: Agricultural and Applied
Economics Association) Annual
meeting, July 24th-27th 2005,
Providence RI 19359.
K Deininger, D A Ali and T Alemu,“Assessing the Functioningof Land Rental Markets inEthiopia”, Economic Development
and Cultural Change, Vol. 57, No.
1, University of Chicago Press,
October 2008, pages 67-100.
140. Innovation for Women’s
Empowerment and Gender
Equality, International Centre for
Research on Women: Washington
DC, 2009.
141. C Deere and M Leon,
Empowering Women: Land andProperty Rights in Latin America,
University of Pittsburgh, 2001.
B Argawal, A Field of One’s Own.
Gender and Land Rights in SouthAsia, Cambridge University Press,
1994.

124

Further Reading
Gender and Land Rights Database, UN Food and Agriculture Organisation, 2010. http://www.fao.org/
gender/landrights
E Field and M Torero, “Do property titles increase credit access among the urban poor? Evidence from anationwide titling program”, Harvard University Department of Economics, 2006.

Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination
Against Women (CEDAW) Ratiﬁcation
The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) was ﬁrst
adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1979. It is the only international instrument that comprehensively
addresses women’s rights within political, civil, cultural, economic and social life. Consisting of apreamble and 30 articles, it deﬁnes discrimination against women and sets up an agenda for national
action to end such discrimination. Of 192 UN member countries, 186 have ratiﬁed the convention as of
May 2010. Among those that have not signed the convention are the US, Iran, Sudan and Somalia.
The convention deﬁnes discrimination against women as “any distinction, exclusion or restriction
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Appendix I

142. UN Development Fund for
Women website: http://www.
unifem.org/cedaw30/about_cedaw (accessed May 7th 2010).
143. For a critique of CEDAW’s
reservation system, see J Riddle,“Making CEDAW Universal: A
Critique of CEDAW’s Reservation
Regime under Article 28 and the
Effectiveness of the Reporting
Process”, The George Washington
International Law Review,Vol. 34, No. 3, 2002, George
Washington University Law
School: Washington DC.
144. ibid.
145. Amnesty International
USA website: http://www.
amnestyusa.org/violenceagainst-women/ratify-thetreaty-for-the-rights-of-womencedaw/page.do?id=1108216(accessed May 7th 2010).

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

made on the basis of sex which has the effect or purpose of impairing or nullifying the recognition,
enjoyment or exercise by women, irrespective of their marital status, on a basis of equality of men andwomen, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural, civil or
any other ﬁeld.” It requires all states parties to take “all appropriate measures, including legislation,
to ensure the full development and advancement of women, for the purpose of guaranteeing them theexercise and enjoyment of human rights and fundamental freedoms on a basis of equality with men”
(Article 3).142 This includes not just overturning discriminatory laws, but also introducing new gendersensitive laws and policies, changing the attitudes, practices and procedures within governments,
ensuring that private organisations and individual citizens do not discriminate against women, andchanging harmful cultural stereotypes. The convention therefore takes the conditions of women’s actual
lives, rather than the wording of laws, as the true measure of whether equality has been achieved.
The reason why this indicator only looks at ratiﬁcation and not implementation is because manyof the areas covered by CEDAW are incorporated throughout the indicators of the Women’s Economic
Opportunity Index. Where possible, those indicators have not only looked at legal or operationalframeworks, but also examined the situation for women in practice. The indicator created by the
Economist Intelligence Unit with advice from the UN Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM), is on a
progressive point scale, giving more points to countries that have ratiﬁed CEDAW without reservations (asopposed to those that have signed, but with reservations),143 and the most points to a country that has
also signed CEDAW’s Optional Protocol. This obligates states parties to grant women the right to petition
or complain about rights violations under CEDAW to the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination
Against Women. It also enables the committee to conduct enquiries into grave or systematic abusesof women’s human rights in countries that become states parties to the Optional Protocol.144 This isimportant, as in states that have not signed the Optional Protocol the committee monitoring CEDAW
compliance does not have the authority to enforce its recommendations. This lack of authority, coupledwith gaps between the formal, de jure situation and the reality in practice, has led some to question theextent of CEDAW’s international impact.
However, according to human rights watch group Amnesty International, the treaty has encouraged
the development of citizenship rights in Botswana and Japan, inheritance rights in Tanzania, andproperty rights and political participation in Costa Rica. CEDAW has also fostered development of domestic
violence laws in Turkey, Nepal, South Africa, and South Korea, and anti-trafﬁcking laws in Ukraine andMoldova.145
Further, a meta-analysis of the effects of countries ratifying international gender equality treaties
and the gender wage gap reveals a signiﬁcant narrowing of the wage gap between women and men
in countries that are party to CEDAW, as well as the ILO’s Convention 111 on non-discrimination in
employment.146

146. D Weichselbaumer and
R Winter-Ebmer, “The Effectsof Competition and Equal
Treatment Laws on Gender Wage
Differentials”, Economic Policy,
Vol. 22, No. 50, April 2007,
pages 235-287.

125

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Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Further Reading
A M Goetz et al (eds.), Progress of the World’s Women 2008/2009: Who Answers to Women?, UN
Development Fund for Women: New York, 2008.
L Landsberg-Lewis (ed.), Bringing Equality Home: Implementing the Convention on the Elimination of All
Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), UN Development Fund for Women: New York, 1998.

126

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Appendix II
Sources and deﬁnitions

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Appendix II
Sources and deﬁnitions of the Women’s Economic Opportunity Index
Where the quantitative or survey data have missing values, the Economist Intelligence Unit has estimated the scores

1) Labour policy and practiceThis category comprises two subcategories: Labour policy and Labour practice1a) Labour Policy
Indicator

SourceYear

Equal pay for equal work:
ILO Equal Remuneration
Convention (No 100);country progress inaligning national policy
with the terms of theConvention

Creation of a coding
2003-09
and scoring schemeby the Economist
Intelligence Unit basedon International Labour
Organisation documents

Indicator deﬁnitions and construction
Equal pay, codified in law, is a principal step in providing a level playing field for women. This
indicator is a composite score that considers whether a country has ratified and domesticatedthe Convention, and whether it has met the Convention’s stipulations, as noted by the ILO.
This indicator therefore assesses a country’s compliance with all terms of the Convention. The
Economist Intelligence Unit has created a coding scheme based on the ILO’s annual assessments(noted in the Comments of the Committee of Experts on the Application of Conventions andRecommendations) of a country’s progress in meeting the Convention’s terms.
Indicator creation: A country receives 1 point for each step it has taken to align national policy
with the Convention, as follows:
1) Ratification of the Convention2) Establishment of government policy and an organisation/committee to promote convention
principles
3) Principle of equality of remuneration domesticated in labour law
4) Principle of equal value domesticated in labour law5) Job appraisal/evaluation mechanisms
6) Co-operation with workers and employers’ organisations to involve them in achieving wageequality7) Direct/indirect acknowledgement of inequality through government statements/studies/information supplied to the ILO
8) Law inspection/enforcement mechanisms
The scores are added to determine the number of steps governments have taken to ensure
equality of pay (a higher score implies better progress in meeting the terms of the Convention).
Countries that have not ratified the Convention have been assessed by the Economist Intelligence
Unit on the same criteria listed above.
The maximum score a country can receive is 8, where 8= most favourable.

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Sources and deﬁnitions

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Indicator

SourceYear

Non-discrimination:
ILO Discrimination(Employment andOccupation) Convention(No 111); country progressin aligning national policy
with the terms of theConvention

Creation of a coding
2003-09
and scoring schemeby the Economist
Intelligence Unit basedon International Labour
Organisation documents

Indicator deﬁnitions and construction
ILO Discrimination (Employment and Occupation) Convention (No. 111); Country progress inaligning national policy with the terms of the Convention. Equal opportunity in employment,
codiﬁed in law, is a principal step in providing a level playing ﬁeld for women. This indicator is acomposite score considering whether a country has ratiﬁed and domesticated the Convention, andwhether it has met the Convention’s stipulations, as noted by the ILO. This indicator will therefore
assess a country’s compliance with all the terms of the Convention. The Economist Intelligence Unit
has created a coding scheme based on the ILO’s annual assessments (noted in the Comments of
the Committee of Experts on the Application of Conventions and Recommendations) of a country’s
progress in meeting the Convention’s terms.
Indicator creation: A country receives 1 point for each step it has taken to align policy with theConvention, as follows:
1) Ratiﬁcation of the Convention
2) Acknowledgement of inequality and discrimination through government statements/studies/information supplied to the ILO
3) Establishment of government policy and organisations/committees aimed at achieving equality
and promoting convention principles
4) Principles of the Convention domesticated in labour or other laws
5) Neutrality of national laws (that is, national laws are in accordance with the principles of theconvention)/Special Protective Measures are not in violation of the Convention6) Legal provisions on sexual harassment7) All categories of workers protected under law8) Co-operation with workers and employers’ organisations to promote and accept principles of theConvention using all means, including education and training
9) Inspection/enforcement mechanisms
The scores are then added to determine the number of steps governments have taken to ensure
equality of opportunity (a higher score implies better progress in meeting the terms of theConvention). Countries that have not ratiﬁed the Convention have been assessed by the Economist
Intelligence Unit on the same criteria listed above.
The maximum score a country can receive is 9, where 9= most favourable.

Maternity and paternity
leave and provision

Creation of a coding and 2009 (current
scoring scheme by thelegislation)
Economist Intelligence
Unit based on documentsfrom the International
Labour Organisation andSocial Security Online

This is a composite maternity and paternity leave and maternity beneﬁts coverage indicator that isbased on information from the listed sources. The scoring is as follows:
0= No paid maternity leave (regardless of length of maternity leave)
1= Employer-funded beneﬁts (regardless of length of maternity leave)
2= Mixed systems (contributions from both employers and public funds) and less than 14 weeks
maternity leave
3= Mixed systems (contributions from both employers and public funds) and at least 14 weeks
maternity leave; or less than 14 weeks maternity leave, with maternity leave beneﬁts covered bysocial insurance or public funds
4= At least 14 weeks maternity leave, with maternity leave beneﬁts covered by social insurance or
public funds
Countries score bonus points if they have schemes in place for entrepreneurs. That is, if countries
have mixed systems for entrepreneurs, an additional 1 point is added to the scoring system above.
If they have public funding of maternity leave for entrepreneurs (social insurance or public funds)
an additional 2 points are added to the scoring system above.
Countries will score one extra bonus point if a country’s government mandates paternity leave.
The maximum score a country can receive is 7, where 7= most favourable.

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Sources and deﬁnitions

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Indicator

SourceYear

Legal restrictions on job
types for women

Creation of a coding and 2009 (current
scoring scheme by thelegislation)
Economist Intelligence
Unit based on documentsfrom the International
Labour Organisation andthe World Bank Group’s
Women, Business and the
Law Database

Indicator deﬁnitions and construction
Any limitation on a woman’s ability to work in any economic sector affects economic opportunity.
This indicator considers formal restrictions, as noted in black-letter law.
Indicator creation: A country receives 1 point for each of the following types of job restrictions it
imposes on women in its legislation:
1) Restrictions on the lifting of heavy weights, arduous work or labour beyond a woman’s strength2) Restrictions on work with hazardous materials (chemicals, lead gases, etc.)
3) Restrictions on work that threatens a woman’s future maternity/reproductive functions
4) Restrictions on work that threatens a woman’s general mental and physical health (dangerous,
harmful or injurious work)
5) Restrictions on work that is against a woman’s morals
6) Restrictions on manual work in mines, quarries, underground or in water
7) Restrictions on operating or utilising certain machinery
8) There are no explicit restrictions on women in the labour code, but the possibility of a restriction
is implied
The scores are then added to determine the number of job restrictions a country may impose on
women (a higher score implies a greater number of restrictions). If no restrictions are imposed, acountry receives a score of 0.
The maximum score a country can receive is 8, where 8= least favourable.

Differential between thestatutory pensionable(retirement) age between
men and women

Creation of a coding and 2009 (current
scoring scheme by thelegislation)
Economist Intelligence
Unit based on documentsfrom the International
Labour Organisation andSocial Security Online

Certain countries have legislated a differentiated retirement age for men and women (that is, thestatutory pensionable age may be different for men and women). In some countries, it is necessary(mandatory) to retire at the statutory pensionable age. Differentiated retirement ages are
sometimes conceived as a social protection measure for women. However, if there is a difference
in retirement ages between men and women, women’s economic opportunities may be affected.
This is especially so since women have a longer life expectancy than men but typically have lower
retirement savings and/or pensions because of lower lifetime earnings.
The scoring for this indicator is as follows:
1= Difference of 5 or more years in the statutory pensionable (retirement) age between men andwomen (mandatory)
2= Difference of 3 to 4.9 years in the statutory pensionable (retirement) age between men andwomen (mandatory)
3= Difference of up to 3 years in the statutory pensionable (retirement) age between men andwomen (mandatory)
4= Difference of 5 or more years in the statutory pensionable (retirement) age between men andwomen (not mandatory)
5= Difference of 3 to 4.9 years in the statutory pensionable (retirement) age between men andwomen (not mandatory)
6= Difference of up to 3 years in the statutory pensionable (retirement) age between men andwomen (not mandatory)
7= No difference in statutory pensionable (retirement) age between men and women (regardless ofwhether it is mandatory or not to retire)
The maximum score a country can receive is 7, where 7= most favourable.

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Appendix II
Sources and deﬁnitions

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

1b) Labour Practice
Indicator

SourceYear

Equal pay for equal work:
ILO Equal Remuneration
Convention (No 100);country progress inenforcing the provisions of
the Convention

Creation of a coding
2003-09
and scoring schemeby the Economist
Intelligence Unit basedon International Labour
Organisation documents

Indicator deﬁnitions and construction
Equal pay, codiﬁed in law, is a principal step in providing a level playing ﬁeld for women. This
indicator is a composite score that considers whether a country is enforcing the Convention’s
stipulations, as noted by the ILO. This indicator therefore assesses a country’s compliancewith all terms of the Convention. The Economist Intelligence Unit has created a coding scheme
based on the ILO’s annual assessments (noted in the Comments of the Committee of Experts on
the Application of Conventions and Recommendations) of a country’s progress in meeting theConvention’s terms.
Indicator creation: A country receives 2 points if the ILO “Notes with satisfaction” each step (seebelow) the country has taken to enforce the terms of the Convention; a country receives 1 point
if the ILO “Notes, Notes with interest, Welcomes, or Looks forward to” each step the country hastaken to enforce the terms of the Convention; or a country receives no points if the ILO “Notes withconcern, Regrets, Urges, Asks, Reminds, Reiterates, Repeats the request, Requests, Drew attention
to” each of the following issues:
1) Government policy and organisation/committee to promote Convention principles
2) Principle of equality in remuneration in practice3) Principle of equal values in practice4) Job appraisal/evaluation mechanisms5) Co-operation with workers and employers’ organisations to involve them in achieving wageequality6) Law inspection/enforcement mechanisms
The scores are then added to determine the number of steps governments have taken to ensure theenforcement of the principle of equality of pay (a higher score implies better progress in enforcing
the terms of the Convention). Countries that have not ratiﬁed the Convention have been assessedby the Economist Intelligence Unit on the same criteria listed above.
The maximum score a country can receive is 12, where 12= most favourable.

Non-discrimination:
ILO Discrimination(Employment andOccupation) Convention(No 111); country progressin enforcing the provisionsof the Convention

Creation of a coding
2003-09
and scoring schemeby the Economist
Intelligence Unit basedon International Labour
Organisation documents

Equal opportunity for employment, codiﬁed in law, is a principal step in providing a level playing
ﬁeld for women. This indicator is a composite score which considers if a country is enforcing
the Convention’s stipulations, as noted by the ILO. This indicator therefore assesses a country’s
compliance with all the terms of the Convention. The Economist Intelligence Unit has created acoding scheme based on the ILO’s annual assessments (noted in the Comments of the Committeeof Experts on the Application of Conventions and Recommendations) of a country’s progress inmeeting the Convention’s terms.
Indicator creation: A country receives 2 points if the ILO “Notes with satisfaction” each step thecountry has taken to enforce the terms of the Convention; a country receives 1 point if the ILO“Notes, Notes with interest, Welcomes, or Looks forward to” each step the country has taken to
enforce the terms of the Convention; or a country receives no points if the ILO “Notes with concern,
Regrets, Urges, Asks, Reminds, Reiterates, Repeats the request, Requests, Drew attention to” eachof the following issues:
1) Establishment of government policy and organisations/committees aimed at achieving equality
and promoting Convention principles
2) Principle of the Convention domesticated in labour or other laws3) Legal provisions on sexual harassment4) Co-operation with workers and employers’ organisations to promote and accept principles of theConvention using all means including education and training
5) Inspection/enforcement mechanisms
The scores are then added to determine the number of steps governments have taken to ensure theenforcement of the principle of equality of pay (a higher score implies better progress in enforcing
the terms of the Convention). Countries that have not ratiﬁed the Convention have been assessedby the Economist Intelligence Unit on the same criteria listed above.
The maximum score a country can receive is 10, where 10= most favourable.

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Appendix II
Sources and deﬁnitions

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Indicator

SourceYear

Indicator deﬁnitions and construction

Degree of de facto
discrimination against
women in the workplace

World Economic Forum,
Executive Opinion Survey
2009

2009

Greater discrimination may discourage women from working and/or impede their career progress.
This may either encourage them to set up their own business or push them out of the workforce.
This indicator is proxied by the World Economic Forum’s “Ability of women to rise to enterpriseleadership”.
Indicator based on survey data, with responses on a 1 to 7 scale (1= worst score, 7= best score).
The survey question asks “In your country, do businesses provide women the same opportunities
as men to rise to positions of leadership?”, where 1= No, women are unable to rise to positions ofleadership, and 7= Yes, women are often in management positions.
The maximum score a country can receive is 7, where 7= most favourable.

Availability, affordability
and quality of childcare
services, as well as the roleof the extended family inproviding childcare

Economist Intelligence
Unit analyst qualitative
assessment

2010

In many societies, a disproportionate share of unpaid work falls on women. Access to childcare
therefore enhances women’s employment or entrepreneurship opportunities.
This indicator considers the availability, affordability (including the price of childcare as a percent
of average wages) and quality of childcare services. Formal childcare is used to describe thecare provided to a child by someone other than a parent or guardian. Care can be provided in alicensed childcare centre or by a licensed family child care provider (such as an au pair or nanny).
For purposes of this evaluation early childhood education (pre-school) is considered childcare.
Older children may receive child day-care services when they are not in school, generally throughbefore-school and after-school programmes or private summer school programmes. Both public
and private provision of childcare have been considered when scoring this question.
The indicator also considers the role of the extended family in providing childcare (the extended
family plays an important role in providing childcare in many emerging markets). The extended
family in this case only includes adults and not children—in some developing countries
children, especially girls, may be tasked with looking after their siblings. Family-based childcarearrangements may restrict girls’ future economic opportunities if girls (but not boys) are taken out
of school to look after their younger siblings.
The scoring for this indicator is as follows:
1= Professional childcare is expensive, available for only a small minority and of low quality; or theextended family is unwilling to provide childcare, owing to strong and widely prevalent societal/
cultural barriers to women working
2= Professional childcare has two of the three following conditions: it is expensive, difﬁcult toobtain, or of low quality; or the extended family is generally unwilling to provide childcare, owing
to societal/cultural barriers to women working. The extended family may ﬁnd it difﬁcult to provide
childcare if they themselves work or due to distance
3= Professional childcare is moderately affordable, often available and of reasonable quality; or theextended family is willing to provide childcare but may be able to do so only occasionally because
they themselves work, or due to distance
4= Professional childcare meets two of the three following conditions: it is affordable, easily
available and of high quality; or the extended family is willing to provide childcare and is able to do
so with only some difﬁculty
5= Professional childcare is affordable, easily and widely available, and of a high quality; or theextended family is willing and able to provide childcare
The maximum score a country can receive is 5, where 5= most favourable.

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Appendix II
Sources and deﬁnitions

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

2) Access to FinanceIndicator

SourceYear

Building credit histories(a composite measure of
the ability to build a credit
history)

World Bank Group, Doing 2009
Business Project

Indicator deﬁnitions and construction
This indicator combines gender-sensitive elements from two of the World Bank Group’s Doing
Business “Getting Credit” measures—Depth of credit information and Legal rights to credit—into asingle, composite indicator. This measure is not gender-disaggregated, but is useful in establishing
the credit environment in which women participate.
Indicator construction: A country receives 1 point for each of the following measures that it meets:
1) Data on both ﬁrms and individuals are distributed.
2) Both positive and negative data are distributed.
3) The registry distributes credit information from retailers, trade creditors or utility companies, aswell as ﬁnancial institutions.
4) Data on all loans below 1% of income per head are distributed.
5) A business can use moveable assets as collateral, while keeping possession of the assets; andﬁnancial institutions accept such assets as collateral.
6) Microﬁnance institutions are providers of information to private credit bureaus or public credit
registries.
The points are added and then multiplied by the percentage of the adult population covered byeither private credit bureaus or public credit registries—whichever is higher. OECD countries (withthe exception of South Korea, Mexico and Turkey), as well as Slovenia (a euro zone member), Hong
Kong and Singapore score a 1 for the Microﬁnance data in credit bureaus issue, owing to the depthof their ﬁnancial markets. Their ﬁnancial sectors function smoothly, with no market failure forpeople with low incomes, implying that microﬁnance is not required as a banking service.

Private sector credit as apercent of Gross Domestic
Product

International Monetary
Fund, International
Financial Statistics

2009

This indicator has been banded to reﬂect both risk (unsustainable levels of credit that could
result in macroeconomic instability), as well as poor ﬁnancing conditions (low levels of credit
availability).
The scoring for this indicator is as follows:
1= Private sector credit is less than 15% of GDP, or greater than 200% of GDP
2= Private sector credit is 15-29% of GDP, or 150-199% of GDP
3= Private sector credit is 30-49% of GDP, or 125-149% of GDP
4= Private sector credit is 50-69% of GDP
5= Private sector credit is 70-124% of GDP
The maximum score a country can receive is 5, where 5= most favourable.

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Appendix II
Sources and deﬁnitions

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Indicator

SourceYear

Indicator deﬁnitions and construction

Women’s access to ﬁnanceprogrammes (availabilityof outreach programmes
to women that target
the provision of ﬁnancial
services through either
government initiatives or
private lenders

Economist Intelligence
Unit analyst qualitative
assessment

2010This question assesses three types of programmes:
1) Initiatives to provide ﬁnancial accounts to women (for example, current accounts, savings
accounts and deposit accounts)
2) Outreach efforts aimed at improving women entrepreneurs’ access to credit/loans/lines ofcredit, etc.
3) Provision of ﬁnancial literacy and/or risk-management programmes to womenThis indicator assesses the ability of women employed in the formal sector, as well as women
entrepreneurs (self-employed), to access the three programmes. Provision of these programmes
is by the formal ﬁnancial sector only. Microﬁnance lending/institutions are excluded from theanalysis.
The scoring for this indicator is as follows:
1= None of the three programmes are available
2= Only one of the three programmes is available, but it is limited in scope (less than 20% of
women in the formal sector have access)
3= Two of the three programmes are available, but they are modest in scope (about 50% of womenin the formal sector have access)/or only one of the three programmes is available, but it isreasonably broad in scope (about 70% of women in the formal sector have access)
4= Two of the three programmes are available, and they are reasonably broad in scope (about 70%
of women in the formal sector have access)/or women’s access to ﬁnancial services is already verybroad, so these programmes are largely unnecessary
5= All three programmes are available, they are comprehensive in scope/or women’s access toﬁnancial services is already widespread, so these programmes are unnecessary
The maximum score a country can receive is 5, where 5= most favourable.

Delivering ﬁnancial
services

Consultative Group to2009
Assist the Poor, Financial
Access 2009This indicator combines elements from Consultative Group to Assist the Poor’s Financial Access
report for 2009.
Indicator creation: A country receives 1 point for each of the following measures that it fulﬁls:1) Provision of basic, low-fee accounts for low-income clients
2) If private operators can provide ﬁnancial services at post ofﬁces
The points are added to obtain the ﬁnal score, which ranges from 0 to 2 (a three-point scale).
Singapore and Hong Kong (China) score a 1 on whether private operators can provide ﬁnancial
services at post ofﬁces. This is because they are city-states, which obviates the geographic-basedneed for ﬁnancial service provision at post ofﬁces.
The maximum score a country can receive is 2, where 2= most favourable.

3) Education and training
Indicator

SourceYear

Indicator deﬁnitions and construction

School life expectancy(primary and secondary);
women

UN Educational,
Scientiﬁc and Cultural
Organisation

2008/2009
data unlessotherwise
indicated in
the Women’s
Economic
Opportunity
model

Education has an impact on labour market and entrepreneurship outcomes.
This indicator is the expected average years of schooling for students enrolled in primary andsecondary education. That is, it is the number of years a person of a given age can expect tospend in primary and secondary education, including years spent on repetition. For a child of acertain age a, the school life expectancy is calculated as the sum of the age speciﬁc enrolment
ratios for the reference age-range a to n, divided by 100. This indicator shows the overall level ofdevelopment of an educational system in terms of the number of years of education that a child can
expect to achieve.

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Appendix II
Sources and deﬁnitions

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Indicator

SourceYear

Indicator deﬁnitions and construction

School life expectancy(tertiary education);
women

UN Educational,
Scientiﬁc and Cultural
Organisation

2008/2009
data unlessotherwise
indicated in
the Women’s
Economic
Opportunity
model

Higher educational attainment results in improved employment/entrepreneurship opportunities.
This indicator gives the total number of years of tertiary education that a person can expect
to receive in the future, assuming that the probability of his or her being enrolled in tertiary
education at any particular age is equal to the current enrolment ratio for that age. For a personof a certain age a, the school life expectancy is calculated as the sum of the age speciﬁc enrolment
ratios for the reference age-range a to n, divided by 100.

Adult literacy rate; women

UN Educational,
Scientiﬁc and Cultural
Organisation, United
Nations Development
Programme

2006/2007
data unlessotherwise
indicated in
the Women’s
Economic
Opportunity
modelThis has an impact on labour market and entrepreneurship outcomes.
The indicator gives the percentage of the female population aged 15 years and over that can both
read and write with understanding a short, simple statement on her everyday life. Generally,“literacy” also encompasses “numeracy”, the ability to make simple arithmetic calculations. Female
adult illiteracy is deﬁned as the percentage of the population aged 15 years and over who cannot
both read and write with understanding a short simple statement on her everyday life.

Existence of government
or non-government
programmes offering
Small- and mediumenterprise (SME) support/
development training

Economist Intelligence
Unit analyst qualitative
assessment

2010

The literature suggests that training programmes for entrepreneurs encourage and support
business development. This indicator considers if training has wide geographic availability, isaccessible to women as well as men, affordable for the majority of intended beneﬁciaries, if thelength of training takes into account women’s time burdens, and if it is culturally appropriate(that is, delivery must be culturally sensitive since in some countries, such as the Middle East,
women cannot train with men). Working women, particularly working mothers, require training
programmes that do not take them away from their families for an extended period of time, or
which are suitably timed (this is what is meant by training not being overly time-consuming).
In many societies, women have a triple time burden of work-household-children. This indicatorconsiders training programmes aimed at both men and women and considers both rural and urban
areas.
The scoring for this indicator is as follows:
0= Training programmes do not meet any of the following ﬁve conditions: they have wide
geographic availability, are accessible to women as well as men, affordable for the majority ofintended beneﬁciaries, culturally appropriate, and the length of training takes into accountwomen’s time burdens
1= Training programmes meet one or of the following ﬁve conditions: they have wide geographic
availability, are accessible to women as well as men, affordable for the majority of intended
beneﬁciaries, culturally appropriate, and the length of training takes into account women’s timeburdens
2= Training programmes meet two of the following ﬁve conditions: they have wide geographic
availability, are accessible to women as well as men, affordable for the majority of beneﬁciaries,
culturally appropriate, and the length of training takes into account women’s time burdens
3= Training programmes meet three of the following ﬁve conditions: they have wide geographic
availability, are accessible to women as well as men, affordable for the majority of beneﬁciaries,
culturally appropriate, and the length of training takes into account women’s time burdens
4= Training programmes meet four of the following ﬁve conditions: they have wide geographic
availability, are accessible to women as well as men, affordable for the majority of beneﬁciaries,
culturally appropriate, and the length of training takes into account women’s time burdens
5= Training programmes have wide geographic availability, are accessible to women as well as men,affordable for the majority of beneﬁciaries, culturally appropriate, and the length of training takes
into account women’s time burdens
The maximum score a country can receive is 5, where 5= most favourable.

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Appendix II
Sources and deﬁnitions

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

4) Women’s Legal and Social Status
Indicator

SourceYear

Addressing violenceagainst women (existenceof laws protecting women
against women)

The UN Secretary2009 (current
General’s Database on
laws andViolence Against Women legislative
provisions)Indicator deﬁnitions and construction
This indicator looks at the presence of laws that protect women against violence.
Indicator construction: A point will be awarded if a country has existing laws and legislative
provisions, at the national level, that protects women against violence in the following areas:
1) Domestic violence2) Sexual assault/violence or rape3) Sexual harassment
Adding the points gives the indicator score, which ranges from 0 to 3 (a four-point scale).
For countries where there is no national-level legislation, but there is legislation or articles in legal
codes at the provincial level that covers the entire country’s jurisdiction, this is assumed to be theequivalent of having national-level laws.
Please note that this indicator only considers whether legislation exists for the three types ofviolence, and does not include an assessment of the quality of the law.
In addition, information on the existence of the relevant laws and legislative provisions was
sourced solely from the UN Secretary-General’s Database on Violence Against Women. Informationin this database is sourced from the responses to a questionnaire relating to violence against
women that was received from UN Member States. Other information included in the UN SecretaryGeneral’s Database on Violence Against Women was obtained from states parties’ reports to humanrights organisations, information provided by countries in the follow-up to the Fourth World
Conference on Women in 1995, and information from other UN entities.
The maximum score a country can receive is 3, where 3= most favourable.

Freedom of movement(opportunity to move freely
outside the house) for
women

Organisation for
Economic Co-operation
and Development,
Development Centre2009

Lack of freedom of movement constrains women’s ability to work. Freedom of movement measures
the opportunity of women to move outside the home.
The following elements were considered when scoring this indicator: freedom to travel; freedom
to join a club or association; freedom to do grocery (and other types of) shopping without a maleguardian; freedom to see one’s family and friends.
0= No restrictions on women’s movement outside the home0.5= (Some) women can leave home sometimes, but with restrictions
1= Women can never leave home without restrictions (that is, they need a male companion, etc.)
The maximum score a country can receive is 1, where 1= least favourable.

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Appendix II
Sources and deﬁnitions

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Indicator

SourceYear

Property ownership rights(this indicator considers if
men and women have equal
ownership rights overmoveable and immoveable
property both by law and inpractice)

Economist Intelligence 2010
Unit analyst qualitative
assessment based on
legal information fromthe World Bank Group’s
Women, Business and the
Law Database

Indicator deﬁnitions and construction
This indicator assesses if customary practices take precedence over legislation (statutory law) in
ways that are harmful to women, resulting in less-than-full ownership rights for women over theirproperty. Customary practices are unwritten rules and norms established by long usage (basedon customs and cultures). Customary practices may take precedence over legislation in somecountries.
The scoring for this indicator is as follows:
1= Information from the Women, Business and the Law database on ownership rights in legal codesindicate that men and women do not have equal ownership rights over moveable and immoveable
property
2= Men and women have equal ownership rights according to legal codes (Women, Business andthe Law database) but customary practices take precedence over statutory law in the vast majorityof cases in ways that are harmful to women
3= Men and women have equal ownership rights according to legal codes (Women, Business andthe Law database), but customary practices take precedence over statutory law in ways that areharmful to women in a majority of cases
4= Men and women have equal ownership rights according to legal codes (Women, Businessand the Law database), but customary practices occasionally (in up to 20% of the cases) takeprecedence over statutory law in ways that are harmful to women (for example, in minority ethnic
groups in a country)
5= Men and women have ownership rights according to legal codes (Women, Business and the Law
database) and customary practices do not take precedence over statutory law; or men and women
have equal ownership rights in the legal codes and there are no relevant customary practices in the
country under consideration
The maximum score a country can receive is 5, where 5= most favourable.

Adolescent fertility rate(age-speciﬁc fertility rate
per 1,000 women, 15-19
years of age)

UN Department for
Economic and Social
Affairs, Population
Division, World Fertility
Data 20082006

Higher adolescent fertility rates have negative implications for women’s health and labour force
participation/business creation. The adolescent fertility rate is the annual number of live births for
women aged 15 to 19 years per 1,000 women in the same age group.

Country ratiﬁcation of
the Convention on the
Elimination of All Formsof Discrimination against
Women (CEDAW)UN Treaty Collection2010 (current The scoring for this indicator is as follows:
status)0= CEDAW has not been ratiﬁed by the country under consideration
1= CEDAW has been ratiﬁed by the country under consideration, but has reservations with CEDAW
articles, other than Article 29. The country has not signed the Optional Protocol
2= CEDAW has been ratiﬁed by the country under consideration, but has reservations with CEDAWArticle 29 only. The country has not signed the Optional Protocol
3= CEDAW has been ratiﬁed by the country under consideration without reservations, but has not
signed the Optional Protocol
4= CEDAW has been ratiﬁed by the country under consideration without reservations, and has
signed the Optional Protocol
Under Article 29 of CEDAW, two or more state parties can refer disputes about the interpretationand implementation of CEDAW to arbitration, and if the dispute is not settled, it can be referredto the International Court of Justice. CEDAW’s Optional Protocol allows the Committee on the
Elimination of Discrimination against Women to hear complaints from individuals or groups
of women into violations of their rights, and to conduct inquiries into grave violations of theConvention.
The maximum score a country can receive is 4, where 4= most favourable.

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Appendix II
Sources and deﬁnitions

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

5) General business environment
Indicator

SourceYear

Indicator deﬁnitions and construction

Regulatory quality

Worldwide GovernanceIndicators

2008

Regulatory Quality measures the ability of the government to formulate and implement soundpolicies and regulations that permit and promote private-sector development. This is a generalindicator of the business environment and hence is not gender-disaggregated. If a country is
suffering from disruptions to the business environment, economic opportunities for women, andmen, will be constrained.

Starting a business

World Bank Group, Doing 2009
Business Project

The time taken (duration) to start a business may affect women adversely due to their triple timeburden of work-household-children. The high minimum paid in capital and cost of setting up abusiness, may also affect women entrepreneurs disproportionately if they have limited accessto capital relative to men. This combines four of the World Bank’s Doing Business “Starting abusiness” measures—Procedures, Duration, Cost and Paid in minimum capital—into a single
composite indicator. This indicator identiﬁes the bureaucratic and legal hurdles an entrepreneurmust overcome to incorporate and register a new ﬁrm. It examines the procedures, time and cost
involved in launching a commercial or industrial ﬁrm with up to 50 employees and start-up capitalof ten times the economy’s per-head gross national income (GNI).

Infrastructure risk

Economist Intelligence
Unit, Risk Brieﬁng

2009

This indicator assesses the risk that infrastructure deﬁciencies will cause a loss of income. It
considers the risk that port facilities, air transport, the retail and wholesale distribution networks,
the telephone network, and the ground transport network will prove inadequate to business needs;
the risk that power shortages will disrupt business activities; and that the information technology
infrastructure will prove inadequate to business needs. This is a general indicator of the businessenvironment and hence is not gender-disaggregated. If a country is suffering from disruptions tothe business environment, economic opportunities for women, and men, will be constrained.

Mobile cellular telephone
subscribers

International
Telecommunication
Union

2008

This is a proxy for connectivity, technological take-up and access to market information.
Mobile cellular telephone subscribers per 100 inhabitants

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Appendix III
Principal components
analysis

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Appendix III
Principal Components Analysis
Principal Components Analysis (PCA) is an econometric technique that assigns each element (indicator)
in an index a weight, taking into account the covariance between indicators and the importance of aparticular element in maximising the variation in the index outcome (Women’s Economic Opportunity).
In other words, it aims to minimise redundancy (covariance) between indicators and maximise variancein the outcome. The weight is calculated by taking the principal component (Eigen vector) associatedwith the highest Eigen value. This is a way of decomposing the data into independent (orthogonal)
components ordered by information content.
The ﬁrst principal component contains the most information that is common to the largest numberof variables, and according to Ram (1982) is a natural choice for an index weighting. An important
assumption for valid PCA is that the variance is meaningful and not the result of data with large
measurement error, and that the dynamics of interest are along the direction with the largest variance.
Variation within category/indicator weights is a sign of some redundancy in the elements, or that someelements are just not as relevant in explaining the variation in the overall index. The existence of moreor-less equal weights across categories/indicators is a sign of little redundancy across subgroups andnear-equal importance in explaining variation in the index, suggesting that the index was well-grouped.
The following table gives the weights generated by PCA:
Category weights
Category
1) Labour Policy and Practice138

Weight (%)N/A1.a) Labour Policy

14.001.b) Labour Practice

11.932) Access to Finance

11.77

3) Education and Training

23.29

4) Women’s Legal and Social Status

16.95

5) General Business Environment

22.06

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Appendix III
Principal components
analysis

Women’s economic opportunity
A new global index and ranking

Indicator weights
Indicator

Weight (%)1) Labour Policy and Practice1.a) Labour Policy
1.a.1) ILO Convention 100; policy

30.04

1.a.2) ILO Convention 111; policy

34.09

1.a.3) Maternity and paternity leave and provision

20.72

1.a.4) Legal Restrictions on job types

12.87

1.a.5) Differential retirement age

2.281.b) Labour Practice
1.b.1) ILO Convention 100; practice

32.90

1.b.2) ILO Convention 111; practice

34.12

1.b.3) De facto discrimination at work

8.82

1.b.4) Access to childcare

24.162) Access to Finance2.1) Building credit histories

30.03

2.2) Women’s access to ﬁnance programmes

32.442.3) Delivering ﬁnancial services

24.60

2.4) Private sector credit

12.93

3) Education and Training
3.1) Primary and secondary education; women

32.96

3.2) Tertiary education; women

20.47

3.3) Literacy rate; women

21.76

3.5) SME support/development training

24.81

4) Women’s Legal and Social Status4.1) Addressing violence against women

22.55

4.2) Freedom of movement; women

19.62

4.3) Property ownership rights

24.07

4.4) Adolescent fertility rate

29.23

4.5) CEDAW ratiﬁcation

4.53

5) General Business Environment

1395.1) Regulatory quality

27.78

5.2) Starting a business

19.07

5.3) Infrastructure risk

24.865.4) Mobile telephone subscribers

28.29

Economist Intelligence Unit 2010

Cover image: Russ Street

Whilst every effort has been taken to verify theaccuracy of this information, neither the Economist
Intelligence Unit Ltd. nor the sponsor can accept any
responsibility or liability for reliance by any personon this report or any of the information, opinions or
conclusions set out herein.

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