Too few women in Japanese politics
JAPAN: Japan should promote women in politics and business, a
government paper said Tuesday, pointing out that they make up just 11
percent of lower house members and one percent of corporate leaders.
The white paper on gender equality suggested Japan introduce a quota
system to boost the participation of women in politics, as it currently
ranks 121st out of 186 nations in terms of the female presence in
parliament.
In the powerful lower house of parliament, only 11.3 percent of
lawmakers are women, up from 9.0 percent in 2005, said the report
adopted by the cabinet of Prime Minister Naoto Kan. The figure in the
upper house is 14 percent.
“Japan is behind the international standard in terms of female
presence in the political sector,” the paper said, suggesting that the
country introduce quotas like Sweden, Germany and South Korea have done
in the past.
Japan’s government has set an official goal of increasing the female
presence in all key sectors of society to about 30 percent by 2020.
In the business sector, women now account for only 1.2 percent, or
515 out of 42,000 executives in about 3,600 listed companies, it said.
Worldwide, Rwanda has the highest ratio of female lawmakers, at 56.3
percent, the paper said.
Next come Sweden with 45 percent and South Africa with 44.5 percent.
In Asia, Nepal has the highest figure, 33.2 percent, followed by
South Korea, where 14.7 percent of lawmakers are women. AFP
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