Case study 2018: care Ethiopia's institutional gender reform

Abstract

The public discourse sparked by the #metoo movement has allowed for the issue of gender disparity and power dynamics to come unapologetically into public consciousness. And it is not only discourse - in Ethiopia, universities have been increasing female enrolment via their own institutional changes, including more rigorous anti-sexual harassment policies, a life-skills module and tutorial classes. As of October 16th 2018, 50% of Ethiopia’s cabinet will be female. If an institution is concerned that its staff might not be ready for gender parity reform, know that those changes are in fact overdue, and that the groundwork has been laid. According to the 2017 Global Gender Gap Report, it will take 217 years to reach gender parity in the workforce. Locally, the issue is even starker. According to UN women, Ethiopia “suffers from some of the lowest gender equality performance indicators in sub-Saharan Africa.” While male employment rates rose between 2005 and 2013, female employment rates essentially remained static, and as of 2016 female youth unemployment rates were almost twice as high as male youth unemployment rates.v Despite increases over the past four election cycles, women in positions of power within government has failed to reach 30%. The NGO sector is no exception. Despite global numbers of female workers in NGOs outstripping male workers 3 to 1, the numbers of female staff in NGOs in Ethiopia are low. Of six sample INGOs operating in Ethiopia, all had between 15-25% female workers, if they reported workforce diversity figures at all, and only two of them had gender specific or affirmative action policies in place, and both of these were fairly recent inclusions in their Human Resources artillery. This case study has been compiled to help other organisations create a more equitable working environment in Ethiopia, and elsewhere