SINGAPORE: Women make up just 6.9 per cent of board members of listed companies on the Singapore Exchange (SGX).
This compares poorly with the rest of the region and the world where figures of female participation in the boardroom are over 10 per cent.
The findings came in the first Board Diversity Report to track gender diversity in SGX-listed boardrooms.
Speaking
at the launch of the report on Tuesday, Minister of State for Community
Development, Youth and Sports Halimah Yacob described the situation as
"dismal".
Citing figures, she said Norway has the highest rate of women in the boardrooms at 40 per cent with Sweden at 27.5 per cent.
Madam Halimah said other Asian countries have also done better than Singapore.
In Hong Kong and China, the figures are 8.6 per cent and 8.1 per cent respectively.
Malaysia also fared better with a female representation rate of 7.8 per cent.
The
report is a joint collaboration between BoardAgender, an outreach arm
of the Singapore Council of Women's Organisations, and the NUS Centre
for Governance, Institutions and Organizations.
Madam Halimah
said while Singapore women have achieved much progress in education and
at work, they continue to face obstacles in rising to top leadership
positions in the corporate world.
She called on
government-linked companies and Temasek-linked companies to take the
lead and support the appointment of more women to their boards.
The
study showed that property, transport, storage and communications
sectors have the highest female representation in the Singapore
boardrooms at 9.4 per cent.
The finance sector had the poorest representation with just 5.2 per cent.
Women were also better represented among executive directors than non-executive directors.
The average age of women directors in Singapore is 48 years compared to 53 for males.
The report, to be published annually, will look at gender diversity in boardrooms of all firms listed on the SGX.
The
first report released on Tuesday covered the 2008 to 2010 period and
included more than 700 companies and over 5,000 directorships in each
year.
- CNA/ck/fa