Al-Mashat Asserts Importance of Gender Parity in Recovering Economy

Minister of International Cooperation Dr. Rania Al-Mashat said placing gender parity at the heart of the recovery means placing women at the heart of the economy.

Al-Mashat was speaking about the Egyptian government's approach to embedding gender equality in the new world of work through inclusivity and persity in the “Society and Future of Work” panel titled “Placing Gender Parity at the Heart of the Recovery”.

Al-Mashat explained that taking a gender lens in the immediate response and recovery policies is critical to advance economic gender parity. The pandemic did not derail Egypt’s development goals, including achieving SDG5: Gender Equality, instead, reforms were expedited implementing policies and programs to advance women's economic empowerment.

Egypt was the first country to provide a women-specific response during COVID-19 launched by the National Council For Women (NCW). The country also scored 1st place in the Middle East and West Asia regions with 21 policy measures according to the UNDP COVID-19 Global Gender Response Tracker.

As labor markets go through a period of intense change there is a unique opportunity to embed parity into the future by balancing efforts between the demand side of growing jobs and the supply side of future-ready skills.

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“When we see women working at home and for their homes, this further proves the resilience and power that women hold. Emerging from the pandemic, the value, and importance of the role women play in the economy is evident and needs to be advanced,” the minister pointed out.

In July 2020, the Ministry of International Cooperation, World Economic Forum, and the NCW launched the “Closing the Gender Gap Accelerator, the first of its kind public-private collaboration model in Africa, and the Middle East and North Africa, which aims to help governments and businesses take decisive action to close economic gender gaps. The accelerator is focused on building prosperous and inclusive economies and societies.

In addition to its work on economic growth, work, wages and job creation, and education, skills, and learning, the accelerator takes an integrated and holistic approach to persity, equity, and inclusion.

Around 34 projects in Egypt, worth $3.3 billion, are being executed to achieve the targets of gender equality, with the top targeted sectors including Health (20%), Education (14%), and Micro, Small, and Medium-sized Enterprises (MSMEs) (15%).

The ministry’s current portfolio of projects that exclusively target SDG 5 includes 13 projects amounting to $82 million.

This is in addition to the other projects in the portfolio that achieve the same goal as a collateral effect to their development. In 2020, the ministry also secured additional financing dedicated to SDG 5, with a total of $7 million through bilateral cooperation with Spain and Canada.