"Gender inequality exists to some extent, in many areas of society, in all countries of the world" Geographically examine this statement.

In 1970 Esther Boserup identified women as having been left behind in the development process. Has this changed over time and are the gender inequalities she identified still there? To assess this I will be looking at various areas of the social, economic, cultural and political status of women in a variety of countries.

            The status of women is largely based on the culture and religion of that country as well as the economic status. With all of these combined it predicts whether women will be treated with equal rights or without.

In more developed countries such as Iceland, which is the best place in the world in terms of gender equality and is run by a female minister, there is very good gender equality. Whereas in places like Niger, Chad and Mali are poor and have no women in parliament at all. These three countries have on average a gender development rate of about 0.250 compared to Norway’s 0.941.Norway is presently the highest in gender development rate but Iceland is first overall while Niger is presently the lowest. There are also places such as Swiss where women outnumber men in parliament.

Based on these one is able to see that the status of women is greatly dependent on the culture, religion and economic status and that the less stable the country is the less of a chance there is that women will have a high status.

            The accessibility to education for women fluctuates around the world. With no rights to education young women are forced into the work place at a young age, have no education about child birth or diseases and can also cause many violent outbreaks within a country.

In Pakistan the Taliban have ordered young women not to go to school causing 125,000 girls to have an uncertain future. However other countries have done the opposite such as Yemen where 30,000 girls were able to go to school because of received money. Although some parents still do not want their girls being taught by male teachers after they have hit puberty causing girls to be pulled from school at a relatively young age still. However these countries are only two that have female education problems but 2/3 of children in the world that receive less that 4 years of education are girls and 70% of the 855 million illiterate adults in the world are female. Only 18% of women between 15 and 24 in Afghanistan are literate. Although this is still a large scale problem, there have been improvements around the world such as in Yemen where there has been an increase in literate people due to an increase in enrollment with the illiteracy rate dropping from 90% to 45%.

From this we are able to see that access to education for all females is still some time away but there have been improvements beginning to form to allow all females to be educated.

            The birth ratio of male to female fluctuates around the world and in some cultures they prefer males over females. This can be caused due to culture, religion or government law.

            In China there are more men than women because the boys are valued over girls for many reasons such as ability to work the land and better support of their parents when they age. China has 32 more men under 20 than women and boys outnumber girls by 143 to 100. Gender-selective abortion was banned in China but is still practiced. In some areas only one child is permitted however if that child is a girl, a second child is permitted. The government has expressed concerns that it may lead to social instability and is beginning to encourage female children. As well as the social imbalance, those in the countryside have it worse as many females are leaving to the city to find work. On the contrary to China, in India boys are also superior to girls however there are 1,000 males born for every 1,004 females in 2008, and the last count in 2001 showed that there were 933 females per 1,000 males. Delhi has the high number of females births and the government is giving financial incentives for parents to register female births.

            The main cause of the imbalanced male to female ratio is due to the one-child policy, for every 119 male births there are only 100 female births and until this is fixed, the imbalance will remain.

            In the world of work, there are many gaps between males and females . Women tend to be in lower paying, lower quality jobs although they have the same qualifications.

            The average pay for men is 39% higher than women with their total earnings 47% higher. 55% more males work full-time and have 80% more performance related pay. There are 1 million self-employed women in the workplace which has increased by 18% in five years. In parliament the number of full-time chairwomen and female chief executives have risen from 1 to 3 while the number of female executive committee members have risen from 11 to 18.

            This shows that in the employment world, the gap has decreased showing the improvement in equality between male and female employees. Females are able to get higher standing jobs and take charge rather than men doing all the work.

            Gender inequality exists all over the world however in some places action has been taken to improve the empowerment of women and put them in decision making positions.

            Unfortunately only 28 countries have achieved the 30% target for women in decision-making positions set in the early 1990’s. There are many organizations fight for women’s empowerment such as UNwomen and WOWE (world organization for women empowerment). In sub-Saharan Africa women are 23% less likely to own a mobile phone, 24% less likely in the Middle East and 37% in South Asia. 300 million fewer women than men in developing countries own a mobile phone. An organization called mWomen wants to half the gender gap within 3 years by providing 150 million women with mobile phones. This is a good goal because mobile phones are essential to women business owners who say they earn more money due to their mobile phones. Helping women with their businesses benefits her family and children which effects the wider community. Phones can also help with literacy, health programs and projects and also help develop small businesses and allow them to gain financial independence. In Kuwaiti, women have now received the right to vote and stand in parliamentary and local elections. Prior to this, Islamic law did not allow women to be in positions of leadership which stopped women from having full political rights in 1999.

            In the world less than 16% of the worlds parliamentarians are women, and early in 2010 only 15 heads of state or government were women. This is an improvement and women are slowly working their way into positions of power.

           

            In some countries women have less access to proper health care and have a lower expectancy, this can be based on education, money or the culture of that country.

            In less developed countries women have a higher risk of become HIV carriers than men. WHO and UNAIDS estimated that women make up 50% of people living with HIV in 2008 and 60% in sub-Saharan Africa. Due to culture issues, women are forced to marry at very young ages. Women face barriers because they have little control over their resources and their futures with little decision-making control and restricted mobility. Lack of education in females is said to be the main cause of why women are at such high risk.

            By educating women, we empower them to fight against HIV/AIDS and many other illnesses and diseases that can be prevented. Teaching women pays off and makes them less likely to catch these sicknesses and remain healthier.

            When it comes to land and legal rights, in some areas women have little say in what  will be done leaving all decisions to men.

            In Saudi Arabia, women are not allowed to drive, although there have been struggles to allow women to drive, there is little chance of it succeeding immediately. In Gola Kabele, women were not given more than a sack of grain from their husbands when they divorce however they are now able to receive half of the property upon divorce. Women were also not eligable to own land, however they are not entitled to own and care for their own land. Women were previously in a weak position to bargain or deal with men and now that they have the ability to buy and care for their own land they have much more power in their own societies.

            Women are slowly able to gain legal rights and gain rights to owning land and gain more power over the men in their society.

            When it comes to migration, many women are at a disadvantage compared to men, and do not have the choice to leave their homes in many cases but are instead forced.

            The UN Population Devision estimates that 49% of all international migrants are women or girls, and the number of women migrating to developed regions is 51%. Most women do not have the choice and are forced to migrate due to conflict, persecution, natural disasters or other factors that affect their security or habitat. Women do not only migrate for protection, over 800,000 women and girls are trafficked across borders against their will and are forced into prostitution and other slave positions. However, some women benefit from migration as it helps them to become more educated, have better opportunities, earn more money and learn new skills to bring back to their home. On average in Pakistan, girls from families who have a migrant abroad stay in school 2 years longer than those who don’t.

            Migration has both its positive and negative impacts and as soon as we can remove the negative impacts on women, it will allow them to only benefit and become more skilled and educated.

            In conclusion, all of these various causes and improvements all come down to one solution: education. If we educate women, they will provide for their families, buy what they need to survive instead of alcohol and cigarettes and they will become entrepreneurs. The education of women opens up so many doors and stops so many from closing. Women are the solution to many worldwide problems, and until we can stop discriminating and judging women based solely on their gender instead of their qualifications and skill we cannot solve these problems. The solution to our main problem is education, and we can make that happen if the world comes together to put an end to the unequal treatment of women all over the world.