According to the World Economic Forum’s 15th edition, Global Gender Gap Report 2021, India has slipped 28 places to rank 140th among 156 countries. India was ranked 112th among 153 countries in 2020.
- The massive decline in the gender gap index was witnessed on the political participation front, where India regressed 13.5 percentage points, with a significant decline in the number of women ministers from 23.1 per cent in 2019 to 9.1 per cent in 2021.
- India’s labour force participation rate fell from 24.8 per cent to 22.3 per cent.
- Iceland is the most gender-equal country in the world followed by Finland, Norway, New Zealand, Rwanda, Sweden, Ireland and Switzerland.
- Bangladesh has been ranked 65, Nepal 106, Pakistan 153, Afghanistan 156, Bhutan 130 and Sri Lanka has been ranked116.
About the Global Gender Gap Index
- The Global Gender Gap Index benchmarks the evolution of gender-based gaps among four key dimensions (Economic Participation and Opportunity, Educational Attainment, Health and Survival, and Political Empowerment) and tracks progress towards closing these gaps over time.
- The Global Gender Gap Index measures scores on a 0 to 100 scale and scores can be interpreted as the distance to parity (i.e. the percentage of the gender gap that has been closed).
