The World Trade Organization (WTO) and the World Bank have published a report with recommendations to improve women's participation in trade.
El study entitled, “Women and trade: the role of trade in promoting gender equality”, provides a roadmap to better understand how women can benefit from trade is critical to making trade work for all and sustaining its benefits after the COVID-19 crisis, said WTO Director-General Roberto Azevêdo and World Bank Managing Director Mari Pangestu.
The publication presents New data and analysis on how women benefit from trade differently than men in terms of wages, welfare gains, and the quality and quantity of jobs available to them. It is based on a new dataset that provides gender-disaggregated labor data at the industry level for 72 countries. It is also based on the first database on explicit gender-related provisions in regional trade agreements.
The report reveals that Companies engaged in international trade employ a higher percentage of women than non-exporting firms (33% on average compared to 24% for non-exporting firms).
It also presents findings on how Trade increases wages, improves working conditions and is linked to higher levels of gender equality.
The report identifies trends which point to opportunities for greater women's empowerment, namely, the increase in services, the expansion of global value chains and the growing digital economy. Female labor force participation reaches more than 45 percent on average for specialized countries. innovative activities, like many Western European countries, Israel, Singapore and the United States, among others.
The report highlights the trade policies that countries could introduce to take advantage of these opportunities, such as reducing tariff and non-tariff barriers to goods largely produced and consumed by women, further opening up trade in services, and helping women traders and small businesses benefit from market opportunities through trade facilitation measures and increased availability of trade finance.
The WTO has a key role to play, the report stresses. Ongoing talks related to services, agriculture (which employs a large number of women in developing countries), e-commerce and micro, small and medium-sized enterprises are key to identifying and removing barriers to women’s participation in trade. The WTO also provides a forum where members discuss tariff and non-tariff barriers in a range of sectors and members’ trade policies. Improving transparency in gender-related policies can help establish good practices and draw attention to the challenges women face in participating in global trade.
The report highlights the need for complementary policies aimed at increasing opportunities for women in education, access to finance and improving information technology skills to maximize gains from trade for women. In addition, collective efforts of governments, international organizations and the private sector to promote the role of trade in improving gender equality.
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