Turkey heads toward the bottom in gender inequality according to World Economic Forum

Turkey ranks 129th among 146 countries in the World Economic Forum's (WEF) Global Gender Inequality Index for 2023.

Wednesday June 21 2023 08:45 pm

This picture depicts Istanbul's famous Women's Day March in İstiklal Avenue.

Duvar English

In the World Economic Forum's (WEF) Global Gender Inequality Index for 2023, Turkey's position is 129th out of 146 countries. In the index where countries are given a score between 0 and 1, Turkey's score was announced as 0.638. This score means that the gender gap in Turkey is 63.8 percent closed.

Turkey, which decreased by 0.1 percentage points compared to 2022, also dropped five places in the ranking. Included in the "Eurasia and Central Asia" category, Turkey ranked last among the countries in this region.

The index measures the status of women in four main areas, and the country ranked 133rd in "economic participation and opportunity," 99th in “educational attainment,” 100th in "health and survival" and 118th in “political empowerment.”

This infographic is taken from the report.

Turkey also ranked 110th in terms of the number of women in parliament and 134th with a six percent female minister ratio. The WEF report stated that the representation rate of women in local governments in Turkey is 10.1 percent.

The country ranked 130th in terms of women's labor force participation rate, 91st in pay equality for the same job, 128th in estimated income, and 119th in access to executive positions.

Turkey also ranked 100th in literacy rate, 80th in primary school enrollment, 107th in secondary school enrollment, and 106th in higher education.

According to the evaluation report of the Parent Association (Veli-Der) for the 2022-2023 academic year, there are also 1.5 million girls outside the education system in Turkey.

The WEF announced that the closing rate of the global gender gap is 68.4 percent worldwide. This rate was 68.1 percent last year. The forum estimated that if progress continues at this rate, the global gender gap will be eliminated in 131 years.