A New Report Says Women Won’t Get Gender Equality For Another 135 Years

Women won't achieve global gender equality with men for another 135.6 years, according to the World Economic Forum's 2021 Global Gender Gap Report.

The annual report compares gender equality in 156 countries worldwide by drilling down into four key areas: education, health, economic opportunities and political opportunities.

Unsurprisingly, the 2021 report found that Covid-19 has hit women harder across the board. In fact, last year's Global Gender Gap report found that global gender equality could be achieved in just 99.5 years.

This means the push for parity has been set back by 35 years in just 12 months. Women's career prospects have especially severely affected by the pandemic.

The report notes that "the hardest hit sectors by lockdowns and rapid digitalisation are those where women are more frequently employed".

When combined with "the additional pressures of providing care in the home", which still falls on women more than men, the pandemic has "halted progress toward gender parity in several economies and industries". 

Overall, Iceland is named the best country in the world for gender equality. The Nordic nation – which has recently been named the world's second-happiest country – is 89% of the way towards achieving full gender parity, according to the report.

Finland and Norway place second and third, with Ireland in ninth. Check out the top 10 below.

The UK places 23rd on this year's list – down two places on 2020 – with gender equality 77% achieved.

In response to the report's findings, Saadia Zahidi of the World Economic Forum urged governments across the world to place gender equality measures front and centre in the coming years.

"We hope that this report will serve as a call to action to leaders to embed gender parity as a central goal of our policies and practices to manage the post-pandemic recovery, to the benefit of our economies and our societies," she said.