The results of the research "Raising the Bar: A Rights-Based Analysis Based on Turkey's Gender Equality Performance between 2000-2019, UNDP Human Development and Gender Development Indices" were shared with an online launch on 3 March.
Within the scope of the research carried out by CEID with the support of the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), areas of progress and decline in the last 20 years were determined by using UNDP's standard human development indices. In this context, the most worrying lag was seen in the areas of income and education.
After 20 years of steady progress, Turkey ranked 54th among 189 countries in 2019 according to the Human Development Index and was in the "very high human development" category. However, the country's Gender Development Index (TCDGE) ranking is far behind.
Turkey is ranked 68th out of 162 countries, however it is the lowest among OECD countries.
While Turkey is among the countries with the greatest disparity between women's and men's HDI values, only two countries, including Turkey, are among those with the highest HDI values and whose TCGE values are much lower than the countries in this group. Saudi Arabia and Bahrain are the two countries in question.
Turkey has the highest early school leaving rate among European countries
The report also revealed that despite the recent progress in education in Turkey, gender equality still remains below the level of countries with high HDI values and very high HDI values. According to the report, although all reforms to increase compulsory education benefit both genders, it is seen that men benefit more from education as the gender gap remains the same. This situation also shows itself in the average education period of women and men.
According to the data of the European Statistical Office (Eurostat), Turkey has the highest early school leaving rate among European countries. In 2019, while this rate was 28.6% for women, it was 28.9% for men.
Poverty negatively affects girls' access to education
According to the report, poverty is still the determining factor in the failure of children to attend primary education, and it affects girls more negatively, especially in North East Anatolia, Middle East Anatolia and Southeastern Anatolia regions. The high school enrollment rate of female students in 2019 is 70.8% in Middle East Anatolia and 68.4% in Southeastern Anatolia.
One of the main causes of inequality is the income gap.
According to the study, one of the main reasons for this general outlook is the income gap between women and men. The average income of women is at the level of 47 percent of the average income of men, according to 2019 data. The reason for this is that most of the women are out of the workforce: The female labor force participation rate is 34 percent, compared to 72.6 percent for men. Recent data show that the situation has worsened due to the global epidemic, with female labor force participation falling to 30 percent.
The labor force participation rate of women, which is 34% in Turkey, is well below the average when compared to the average rate observed in high human development (54%) and very high human development country groups (52%).
The report aims to present a roadmap to close the income and education gap of women; Thus, Turkey's global ranking in gender equality will also rise to a level equivalent to the country's human development ranking.
The proportion of women in parliament is still very low
The proportion of women in the parliament in Turkey increased from 4.2% in 2000 to 17.4% in 2019, increasing more than fourfold. In contrast, the proportion of women in parliament remained lower than in all country groups with different levels of human development. While this rate is 24.5% in highly developed countries, it is 28.3% in countries with the highest level of development.
In the report, it was also reminded that the basic laws regulating the political decision processes and the principles of political representation do not include human development and gender equality, with different ratios of women in parliament. In the report, it was stated that "Action plans that aim to increase the representation of women in decision-making mechanisms and that are prepared for the empowerment of women only foresee activities with very limited effects such as indirect intervention, awareness raising and mentality transformation."