Despite the efforts from corporates to improve women representation at board level, a new report from MSCI shows that it could take until 2027 and 2042 to reach 30% and 50% women representation on boards, respectively. Given that today is International Women’s Day and with the campaign theme being #breakthebias, it seems there is further work to be done to close the gender gap at board level.
The MSCI Women on Boards progress report which has been tracking and reporting on board gender diversity since 2009, found that despite the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, in 2021 there was a moderate improvement in the rate of increase in women representation on boards compared to 2020, among constituents of the MSCI ACWI Index as of Oct 29, 2021. However, the boards of directors of all constituents of the MSCI ACWI Index remained male-dominated overall, with only 1.2% having a majority female board.
The report also found:
- The incremental increase in directorships held by women has also been accompanied by an overall decline in the number of companies without any women representation on boards.
- In 2021, 14.2% of the constituents of the MSCI ACWI Index had all-male boards, down from 17.0% in 2020, and from 18.6% in 2019.
- Among developed markets, European countries had the highest percentage of companies with at least 30% women directors (78.7%). In addition, only 0.9% of the companies had all-male boards
- All top 10 countries by percentage of companies with at least 30% women directors were European, except for one – New Zealand
The oscillation of progress over the years begs the question of how committed companies are to reaching and maintaining at least 30% women representation at board level, and eventually full gender parity, in a timely manner.
Find out more here – https://www.msci.com/www/blog-posts/women-on-boards-the-hidden/02361079223
