The World Economic Forum (WEF) has placed Pakistan on the 145th position out of 146 in its latest Global Gender Gap Report.
Pakistan has since 2006 closed 56.4 percent of the gap. Currently it has a gender gap greater than five percent along with Qatar, Azerbaijan, China and India.
However, significant improvement across three sub-indexes with the highest positive variation has been reported in the index. Pakistan has been ranked 143rd on health and survival, 135th on education and 95th on political participation.
The report puts Pakistan just ahead of Afghanistan. Five worst countries ranked in the report from the bottom include Afghanistan, Pakistan, Congo, Iran and Chad whereas the top five include Iceland, Finland, Norway, New Zealand and Sweden.
The report has said that in 2022, the global gender gap closed by 68.1 percent, and keeping in view the current rate, it would take 132 years to full parity. In 2021, this expected full parity duration was estimated as 136 years.
According to the report, in 2022, Pakistani women’s participation declined; whereas the gender parity scores had risen for literacy, secondary and tertiary education enrollment.
In the South Asia region, Bangladesh is at top, ranked 71, followed by Nepal, Sri Lanka, Maldives, Bhutan, India, Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan. According to the report, on the basis of health and survival subindex, South Asia is the lowest region, with the gender parity score being 94.2 percent.
