day 27 - gender equality: closer through education

I’m sorry I haven’t updated in the past few days… I’ve had a lot going on with papers for school and hearing back from colleges. I’m trying to catch up on the blog, so this will be the post for Tuesday. Thank you for your patience! :)

I’d like to discuss gender equality – or lack thereof – in developing nations. Let’s look at some statistics from the World Bank and consider their implication for women:

• “Nearly 4 million women go ‘missing’ each year in developing countries.”

Missing? That seems a bit drastic, no? But this is a real phenomenon in developing nations. Consider: According to the World Bank, “2/5 of girls are never born due to a preference for sons”. Add to that the number of girls who may die of preventable childhood illnesses because her value is less than a family is willing to afford to pay to see a doctor. Add to that the number of women that are trafficked and disappear from their village, or women who die in childbirth. The number is astounding. True, some countries that are engaged in civil conflict see an excess of females because men are dying in war. But the overwhelming statistic is that women are unaccounted for, and simply disappear.

• “Women are responsible for 60 to 80 percent of all house and care work.”

Women’s roles are set, are ingrained as tradition in many developing nations: the more masculine tasks are assigned to the males, and the traditional “female” tasks are assigned to the women. I know this sounds obvious, but let’s consider something: If a woman is confined to her home to prepare meals, to care for children, and to do tasks such as laundry, there is very little time when she is outside of the house. Add societal restraints that prevent women from leaving the home, and this confines her even more so.

The implications to this statistic are that, by being automatically relegated to perform these tasks, women face a far greater disadvantage than simply “not sharing the housework”. If a woman is home almost all of the time, there is no time – nor opportunity – for her to participate in local government systems. Her voice is not heard, and thus, she is not represented.  She is unable to own or manage land, or become a strong economic presence by selling goods in the marketplace.

Let’s look at a more positive statistic:

  

• According to the World Bank, “Since 1999, South Asia has decreased its total number of out-of-school females from 23 million to 9.5 million.  This 59% decrease shows steady progress towards achieving more equitable access to education. Sub Saharan Africa has also decreased its total by 30% from 24.8 million out-of-school girls in 1999 to 17.3 million in 2008.”

Though girls (especially in the aforementioned regions) still tend to have less access to education than boys do, this is a great step towards improving gender equality. Progress is indeed possible; and we can help improve gender equality worldwide by supporting women’s education.

With an education, women obtain opportunities to further promote gender equality, such as owning a business, participating in representative government, and acting as important advocates for social issues. Equality is still a major issue, but certainly one on which we're making progress.

Janna