How to close the gender gap

THE 2019 REPORT ON FATHERS OF THE WORLD REVEALS INTERESTING DETAILS ON THE GENDER GAP. WHAT DO FATHERS IN UAE SAY?

Report calls for equality between men and women; fathers share their views

In just about 202 years, women all over the world will be economically on par with men, according to a Global Gender Gap Report, released by the World Economic Forum (WEF). If that number is not distressing, here’s another: fewer than half of fathers around the world take all the paternity leave on offer while most men still see changing nappies as a woman’s job, according to another report by Promundo, a US-based organisation that is trying to engage men and boys more in promoting gender equality. Promundo partnered with other organisations to bring out the State of the World’s Fathers report 2019, that was released at Women Deliver, a global conference on gender equality held every three years and which this year was held in Canada.

The report has a big ambition: it’s calling for nothing less than full equality between women and men, in the workplace and in the home. The third State of the World’s Fathers report is pivoted on the value that unpaid care work must be valued as much as paid work, and shared equally between men and women. An important element to enhance this value is paternity leave. About 90 out of 187 countries now offer statutory paid paternity leave, usually for a few days or weeks, the Promundo report says.

In the words of Jody Heymann, founding director of the World Policy Analysis Centre, quoted in the report, “To achieve gender equality both in the workplace and the home, it is essential for men to have an equal chance to be there with their newborn babies.”

Paternity leave

In the UAE, paternity leave varies and depends on the company’s policy. For example, male employees of the Abu Dhabi government are entitled to three days paid paternity leave.

Earlier this year, the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) said that its male employees will get five days of statutory paternity leave as per the new employment law as the country looks at gender equality at the workplace. In 2018, the then newly-launched UAE National Family Policy said it was working on a paternity leave legislation that ensures equalising fathers’ role in parenting.

The world over, two issues impede the acceleration of gender equality in paid care: the uneven volume of paternity leave and socio-cultural stereotypes, i.e., taking care of a baby is primarily a mother’s job.

Brian Heilman, a researcher at Promundo and report co-author, says, “There’s so much in the report that emphasises how these gender stereotypes — that some people may inaccurately believe are kind of a thing of the past — really remain so strong.

“When you have all these expectations in the home, that’s part of what holds women back in their career pursuits,” he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

The Promundo research in seven countries involving nearly 12,000 people found fewer than half of men took the full time offered after birth or adoption, with Canadians the most likely to take no time off citing financial worries.

Another study in the report found the majority of men in 15 out of 20 countries said changing nappies, bathing and feeding children was a woman’s job, a view held by more than 80 per cent of men in Egypt, India, Pakistan, Moldova, Nigeria and Mali.