China’s Hottest Companies Are Ruled by All-Male Boards
Bloomberg 3/8/2021
Warren Buffett-backed carmaker BYD Co., Nike-rival ANTA Sports Products Ltd. and Nasdaq-listed retailer JD.com are all emblematic of the global heft of China’s companies. The Chinese giants have another thing in common: None of them have women on their boards.
All-male boardrooms have long been common at stodgy state-owned Chinese enterprises, but they are also a fixture in many of the nation’s entrepreneurial young companies, spanning industries like e-commerce and electric vehicles that are investor favorites. That’s left the nation with the dubious distinction of being one of the worst places for boardroom gender diversity.
Social biases, slow implementation of female-friendly legislation and a high cost of choosing to challenge the archaic power framework did not stop women of Pakistan from pursuing their passion and fending for families.
Following the lead of resistance icons like Nobel laureate Malala Yousafzai, rape survivor Mukhtaran Mai and the brave human rights activist Asma Jahangir, they are marching on, beating odds, contributing to home-making and nation-building, striving for wage parity, exercising right to education, breaking glass ceilings and transforming society in the process.
The compelling business case for a gender-focused approach to investment decisions in public and private sectors has nudged the government and companies to take interest in applying a gender lens. The slow progress towards gender parity, however, hammers into the need to do more.
China’s Hottest Companies Are Ruled by All-Male Boards
Bloomberg 3/8/2021
Warren Buffett-backed carmaker BYD Co., Nike-rival ANTA Sports Products Ltd. and Nasdaq-listed retailer JD.com are all emblematic of the global heft of China’s companies. The Chinese giants have another thing in common: None of them have women on their boards.
All-male boardrooms have long been common at stodgy state-owned Chinese enterprises, but they are also a fixture in many of the nation’s entrepreneurial young companies, spanning industries like e-commerce and electric vehicles that are investor favorites. That’s left the nation with the dubious distinction of being one of the worst places for boardroom gender diversity.
How the gender quotient can advance equality Policymakers and businesses need to work together to create avenues to include more women in the workforce, including in the government. Only by foregrounding gender can real equality be achieved.
Image: Illustration by Anirban Ghosh
Women are the anchors of our society. In addition to being caregivers, shouldering more childcare and housework than men, they also contribute to national economies as educators, farmers, entrepreneurs and professionals. Representing half of the world’s population, their empowerment both socially and economically, is of key global significance.
Only 10 countries in the world today offer equal rights to men and women, as per a World Bank research. In some communities such as in Kerala, India, and parts of Africa, they even enjoy more superior inheritance, literacy or matriliny rights. But, despite these being relatively conducive environments, none of these models have proven to be a benchmark of eq