UAE HAS HIGHEST RANKING IN GCC FOR GENDER EQUALITY IN DEVELOPMENT REPORT AS FEMALE WORKFORCE GROWS
Birth rates, use of water resources and health also assessed in the second part of our special series
The UAE is ranked the highest for gender equality in the GCC, with a growing female workforce and more women than men continuing higher education.
The Human Development Report 2018, compiled by UAE University in collaboration with the UN Development Programme, is the first of its kind since 1997, although more localised reports have been produced.
It uses factors such as workforce and education as indicators of a country’s development and the standard of living for its citizens and residents, as opposed to the more typical gross domestic product.
The report highlights that this development is difficult without furthering the rights of women, but in many countries they still face fewer job opportunities, gender discrimination, social restrictions or those imposed by family, and low participation in political life.
The average woman in the UAE workplace was found to be better educated than the average male, with 43 per cent holding a bachelor’s degree compared with 23 per cent of men. More women had also completed post-secondary school education.
This is regarded by the report authors as a positive indicator for the future of gender equality and human development.
The UAE’s launch of a Gender Balance Council last year played a significant role in furthering the role of Emirati women in society, but there had already been a significant improvement in female participation over the country’s history.
In 1975, about 1,000 Emirati women were in the labour market, but in 2015 that increased to 135,000. In comparison, Emirati men have had a five-fold increase from 44,000 to 207,000.
For expatriates, female participation has increased from 10,000 to 882,000. The number of men employed has grown in that time from 284,000 to more than 5.5 million.
Women were also found to be older than the average working man, with the largest group of women in the 30 to 34 age group compared with the largest for male workers being 25 to 29.
Improvements in female employment mean the number of men for every woman in the labour market has decreased from 29 to six, and in Emiratis that ratio has fallen from more than 40 to 1.5.
But for every woman in a technical or vocational job, there are still four men.
Encouraging women’s participation in the workforce will also expand the size of the economy, meaning it has positive implications for the country as a whole.
The report measures the reduction of inequality through the Gender Inequality Index, which also looks at reproductive health (maternal mortality and adolescent fertility rates) and empowerment (female participation in parliament and education).
With zero meaning full equality and one representing the highest possible level of inequality, the UAE scored 0.232, a significant drop over the past 10 years, ranking it 46th of 188 countries and the highest in the GCC, followed by Bahrain at 48 and Saudi Arabia at 50.
The UAE scored highly in reproductive health, with a maternal mortality rate about the same as developed countries such as Norway, and women’s representation in the workplace is among the highest in the Gulf.
“The UAE attained remarkable achievement and progress in the empowerment of Emirati women, narrowing the gender inequality gap compared to its regional and global scale, with a great development in women’s education at rates that exceeded those of men,” the report said.
“The ratio of woman’s representation in the labour market is still below aspirations, especially in the field of vocational and technical jobs, as well as the legislative and higher administration positions.”
The report said that women’s presence in legislative and administration positions was important to help further their visibility in politics and give them a voice in the economy and financial decisions.
But the UAE had one woman to every man in these positions, ranking fourth in the GCC.
The UAE is ranked 67th in the world and first in the Gulf for overall female political empowerment, the report showed.
The country seeks to further develop that in accordance with its Vision 2021.
Demographics
Birth rates in the UAE are dropping significantly and rapidly among Emiratis and expatriates, the report said.
The birth rate was 6.6 children for each woman in the early 1970s, then dropped consistently until it reached 5.4 in 1980, and 1.8 in 2015.
“The UN reports revealed that the UAE, which once ranked among high-birth countries, is now among the countries where births have been dropping constantly and rapidly since 2005,” the report said.
There are many reasons for the decline, the report said, including increased birth control options, rising cost of living and higher rates of education and employment among women.
Women aged 30-34 have the highest birth rates among Emiratis and expatriates, while the lowest rate is among teenagers aged 15-19, followed by women in the 45-49 age group, the report said.
Emirati women have a higher birth rate than expatriates across all age groups.
It said the government encouraged families to have more children through policies including residential plots for young couples, allowances from the Marriage Fund and a monthly subsidy for each new child.
Companies are also encouraged to provide in-house child care for working mothers.
Women account for less than half of the UAE’s population, at 2,822,873 compared with 6,298,294 men, because of the large number of foreign workers in the country, the report said.
“This category is made up of a young labour force brought from around the world to take part in building the infrastructures of the country in all sectors,” the report said.
The UAE would now like to reduce this number but it is hard to do because of the large and expanding renewable development projects in the country.
“The country’s officials are looking for a strategy that could make a population balance aiming at enabling the state to bring down the great number of foreigners without interrupting the development process,” the report said.
“The whole nation, officials and local citizens, believe strongly that it is high time to react decisively about this issue to alleviate the burden of foreign labour on the country.”
Dealing with this imbalance represents a “real challenge” to sustainable human development, the report said.
“It is only the national skilled and highly qualified labour force that can ensure the achievement of human development and avoid any unexpected recessions in development because of a foreign labour force,” it said.
Other priorities include maintaining the satisfaction and safety of UAE residents and investing in the Emirati youth.
Environment
The UAE has achieved “excellence” with its water resources compared with other Gulf countries, the report said in its rankings on environmental development.
The study tracks the proportion of wastewater from households and industrial sources that is treated before it is released into the environment. In this, the UAE was better than Norway and South Korea.
“The progress achieved in the water resources indicator supports the national agenda in the field of sustainable development and integrated infrastructure,” the report said.
To assess the strides made by the UAE, it referred to the 2016 international environmental performance index report by Columbia and Yale universities, in collaboration with the World Economic Forum, which ranked 180 countries on environmental health and ecosystems.
The UAE was ranked 92nd in 2016, with a balanced index of 69.35, coming in ahead of Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Lebanon. The latest report ranked the UAE 77th globally.
“This performance might be classed as above average,” the report said of the 2016 placing, while also noting that many countries higher up in the list suffer from a “marked imbalance”.
It gives the example of Singapore, which lost large areas of forest in the city state’s urban expansion – a fact not reflected in its high ranking.
The report also reflected on the historic performance of the UAE in these global rankings. From a score of 112 in 2008, it fell to 152 in 2010 and then surged to 92 in 2016. This fluctuating performance should be corrected, the report said.
“This unstable performance hinders achieving sustainable development and does not compete with the performance of developed countries such as Finland and Norway,” it said.
The UAE 2021 Vision, meanwhile, aims to reduce gas emissions that cause global warming. It seeks to increase clean and renewable energy, including nuclear, to 27 per cent by 2021 and cut the gas share as a source of energy from 98 per cent in 2012 to 76 per cent by 2021.
Central to this is the UAE’s first nuclear power station. The Barakah nuclear energy plant in Al Dhafra will start to generate electricity by 2019 or 2020 and this was also noted in the report.
“One of the supporting steps in this direction is the UAE’s establishment of a peaceful nuclear power plant, which represents one of the environmentally friendly energy solutions,” it said.
“It also meets a large amount of the country’s needs for clean energy, which helps improve the environmental situation of the UAE.”
In conclusion, the report said despite the progress made in some areas, the Emirates was working towards more.
“The UAE is still seeking to
strengthen its environmental abilities and efficiencies in line with the national environmental strategy.”
Health
The UAE is lagging the rest of the world in its diabetes care, despite having the highest rates of internationally accredited hospitals in the world, the report said.
The country has some of the highest rates of diabetes in the world, with 2015 figures showing 19.3 per cent of the population have the condition, putting it 13th on a World Diabetes Federation list.
About 11 per cent of total global healthcare expenditure is spent on diabetes care, according to the report, or $465 billion (Dh1.7 trillion) a year.
Average spending on diabetic patients in the US is about $8,468 (Dh31,000) and $4,267 in the UK, but in the UAE expenditure on diabetes care is only $1,775 a patient, the report said.
“Obesity and diabetes pose by far the greatest risk for the UAE and the GCC,” said Dr Shamsheer Vayalil, chairman and managing director of VPS Healthcare.
“These chronic health problems not only pose substantial problems for the patients, but also constitute a massive burden on families, communities and on the economy.
“To overcome these challenges, we need to have information-driven health care powered by quality, actionable data that will provide insights to inform health policies and programmes for the future.
“These goals are not easy but the sooner we move from reactionary to anticipatory care, the better the outcomes will be for our populations.”
Cases of diabetes are expected to rise rapidly in the next 27 years and will provide serious challenges to health authorities in the region. An estimated 39 million diabetic patients in the Eastern Mediterranean and North Africa region is forecast to soar to 67 million cases by 2045 – a 72 per cent increase.
By comparison, European countries are expected to register a rise of 16 per cent, and a worldwide increase of 48 per cent in that time.
“This large disparity in diabetes spending may reflect not only the quality of health care but also the different adequacy of policies, strategies and regulations in health expenditure,” the UAE report said. While diabetes care has some way to go to catch up with the West, more internationally accredited hospitals in the country indicates the nation’s ambitions to appeal to medical tourists by achieving globally recognised standards.
The number of hospitals with international accreditation increased from 16 in 2008 to 43 in 2013, according to the report. In 2015, 87 hospitals out of 128 were accredited, of which 23 were public hospitals and 65 privately run.
“It was announced at the beginning of 2018 that the UAE ranked first in the world in the number of medical establishments and facilities with international accreditation,” the report said.
“The Ministry of Health and Prevention planned that all hospitals and centres will receive the international accreditation certificate by 2021, in line with the vision of the state.”
The work is a national document and a key reference for decision-makers to help them in formulating best public and national policies concerned with human development, and the first since 1997.
“In my experience, the overall health of the country has been improved as the UAE provides some of the best healthcare services and caters to various requirements of the population,” said Dr Yashar Ali, chief executive of Canadian Specialist Hospital.
“However, due to unhealthy lifestyles, non-communicable diseases such as diabetes, cardiovascular diseases and cancer are still common in the country.
“The most common trend that leads to non-communicable diseases is smoking.”
Northern Emirates
The UAE has achieved quantifiable progress in health care, education and economic growth but there is disparity between emirates, says the latest UAE Human Development Report.
“The distinction of Dubai and Abu Dhabi with great achievements in areas of education, health care, and income in comparison with the other emirates in the UAE is obvious,” according to the report.
In education, the report notes the importance of the Abu Dhabi Education Council and Dubai’s Knowledge and Human Development Authority in developing the education sector in the two most populous emirates.
Likewise, it notes the importance of the Health Authority – Abu Dhabi and the Dubai Health Authority in “improving the healthcare services to meet the international standards”.
“Such efforts, in addition to the high value of the gross domestic product in Abu Dhabi and Dubai compared with the other emirates have qualified them for a higher degree of human development, reaching advanced levels in the global rankings.”
The importance of universal health insurance for human development is highlighted in the report’s chapter on health care.
It notes that while insurance is compulsory for all citizens and residents of Abu Dhabi and Dubai, this is not the case in the Northern Emirates.
One policy item that remains unchanged since the report’s data is the lack of mandatory health insurance in Sharjah and the Northern Emirates for all workers.
The successful implementation of universal coverage in Dubai and Abu Dhabi is cited as a success by health authorities in the Northern Emirates, who have long called for similar measures to be introduced.
A federal law requiring mandatory insurance for all UAE residents was drafted in 2013. Similar draft laws were considered in 2004 and 2007.
In October, the Ministry of Finance issued a statement to
The National stating that it was pursuing mandatory coverage and that a draft law for this would be raised with the Cabinet. It did not specify an expected date of implementation.
Different authorities are to be expected within a federal system, the report noted. “The multiplicity of authorities responsible for the provision of health services in the UAE is natural, being a federal state with two levels of governance, federal and local.”
The report does not identify other policy shortcomings of the Northern Emirates or suggest what measures could be taken to enhance their respective healthcare and education sectors.
The report states that the emirate of Abu Dhabi has a gross national income of $113,640 per capita, nearly five times that of the emirate of Ras al Khaimah, which has a GNI of $23,290.
Umm al Qaiwain comes in third nationally after Dubai and Abu Dhabi, with a recorded GNI of $44,241.
The report states: “We noticed that Umm Al Qaiwain has recorded a high achievement in national income per capita qualifying it to be ranked at the top of the world with a very high human development … The other emirates occupied positions among the second group countries.”
However, the 2018 report relies on data that is more than 10 years old. In many instances, there is simply a lack of any data at all. Consequently, the report’s authors note that available data is often assumed to be representative of the entire country when it is in fact representative of only two of the seven emirates.
Furthermore, the federal government has invested heavily in education, health and infrastructure since most of the data on the report was issued.
The economic, social and environmental impact of investments in electrical and water infrastructure, roadworks, health centres and the construction of tens of thousands of homes are largely absent from the report, which was compiled in the past two years when many projects were still under construction. The majority commenced following a tour of the Northern Emirates by Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Commander of the Armed Forces, in February 2011.
Future studies may find disparities in education, health and economy between Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Sharjah and the Northern Emirates have decreased after a more active role by the federal government. As the report highlighted, however, quantifiable data is needed from every emirate to measure what has been accomplished and what remains to be done.