The world's women 2010: trends and statistics

This UN report about women in the world highlights the differences between the status of women and men in various areas of contemporary life. The paper finds that progress in ensuring the equal status of women and men has been made in many areas, but much more needs to be done to close the gender gap in public life.

The main findings of the report can be summarised as follows: 

• in all regions, women live longer than men; however, social, cultural and economic factors can affect the natural advantage of women compared to men 
• women’s participation in the labour market remained steady in the two decades hovering around 52%, while global labour force participation rates for men declined steadily over the same period
• women have entered various traditionally male-dominated occupations, but women continue to bear most of the responsibilities for the home 
• while rates of women exposed to violence vary from one region to the other, statistics indicate that violence against women is a universal phenomenon and women are subjected to different forms of violence 
• poor infrastructure and housing conditions as well as natural hazards disproportionately affect women from the less developed regions in terms of unpaid work, health and survival
• women account for two thirds of the world’s adult illiteracy - a proportion that is unchanged over the past two decades
  

The paper also indicates that a lack of gender balance in decision-making positions in government persists around the world. Nevertheless, it points that there is a lack of gender statistics in other areas, such as disease prevalence, home-based workers, access to credit, human trafficking and femicide. Therefore, to help improving women’s situations, increasing the capacity to produce reliable, accurate and timely gender statistics should be an urgent goal for many countries.