The European Union (EU) and UN Women are joining forces to accelerate women’s employment across the Middle East and North Africa through the Surging Women’s Employment Initiative (SWEI). This regional flagship initiative brings together governments, the private sector, financial institutions, development partners, civil society and UN agencies to address the region’s low levels of women’s participation in the labour market.
The partnership, launched in the margins of the 81st UN General Assembly High-Level Week, comes at a critical moment for the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) which has one of the world’s largest youth cohorts entering the labour market, while women’s labour force participation has remained at around 20 per cent on average for more than two decades. MENA economies need to absorb more of their human capital. Narrowing the employment gap between women and men could significantly increase regional GDP as much as 60 per cent and generate greater productivity, innovation and economic resilience.
SWEI aims to help change this trajectory, targeting an increase in women’s employment by 5 per cent by 2030.
SWEI is a key initiative of the EU’s Pact for the Mediterranean, which prominently supports gender equality in the southern Mediterranean. With the EU’s support, SWEI will focus on three areas: advancing legal and macroeconomic reforms for private sector-led, job-rich growth; engaging businesses to expand women’s employment, and developing innovative employment models in the care, green and Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) economies, backed by public-private financing and strategic investment.
European Commissioner for the Mediterranean Dubravka Šuica said: “Through the Pact for the Mediterranean and our €10 million contribution to the Surging Women’s Employment Initiative, we are working with UN Women to turn ambition into action. The initiative’s overall goal is to create 500,000 jobs for women and increase women’s employment by 5 per cent by 2030, through investment in skills, entrepreneurship and opportunities in sectors with huge potential.”
“The region cannot realize its full economic potential while women remain significantly underrepresented in the labour market. Thanks to UN Women’s partnership with the European Union, SWEI is bringing policy reform, investment and private-sector action together around a measurable, time-bound goal: significantly increasing women’s employment in the Arab States by the end of the decade – the target date for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals,” said Dr. Moez Doraid, UN Women Regional Director for the Arab States.
The partnership builds on the growing commitment of several Arab governments to boost women’s economic participation. To date, UN Women and partners have contributed to the reform of 20 laws to support women’s economic participation, while more than 900 companies in the Arab States have signed the Women’s Empowerment Principles (commitments undertaken by companies to women equality). US$25 million in donor funding has been mobilized from Sweden, Spain and Finland including €10 million from the European Union, alongside financing from the Islamic Development Bank.
The partnership provides a clear example of global efforts to accelerate women’s economic participation and empowerment.
About UN Women:
UN Women advances women’s rights, the empowerment of all women and girls and equality between women and men.
As the lead UN entity on women’s empowerment, we support advancement of laws, institutions, social behaviours and services to close the gap between women and men and build an equal world for all. We keep the rights of women and girls at the centre of global progress – always, everywhere. Women’s empowerment is not just what we do. It is who we are.
About the European Union:
Gender equality is a fundamental principle of the European Union and the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) mandates that the EU aims to eliminate inequalities and promote equality in all its activities, while the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights explicitly guarantees equality and non-discrimination on the basis of sex.
The EU places gender equality and women’s empowerment high on the agenda of its external action in the Middle East and North Africa region, supporting women’s full, equal and meaningful participation in economic, social and political life. Under the Pact for the Mediterranean, gender equality, women’s empowerment, education and training are cross-cutting priorities.
