Women in Bhutan
Woman in Bhutan, 2011
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| Gender Inequality Index | |
|---|---|
| Value | 0.464 (2012) |
| Rank | 92nd |
| Maternal mortality (per 100,000) | 180 (2010) |
| Women in parliament | 13.9% (2012) |
| Females over 25 with secondary education | 34.0% (2010) |
| Women in labour force | 65.8% (2011) |
| Global Gender Gap Index | |
| Value | 0.6651 (2013) |
| Rank | 93rd out of 144 |
Economic development has increased opportunities for women to participate in fields such as medicine, both as physicians and nurses; teaching; and administration. By 1989 nearly 10 percent of government employees were women, and the top civil service examination graduate in 1989 was a woman. During their government careers, women civil servants were allowed three months maternity leave with full pay for three deliveries and leave without pay for any additional deliveries.
Reflecting the dominance of males in society, girls were outnumbered three to two in primary and secondary-level schools. With many pro-women organizations on the rise including CSO, MBO etc. women have been seen to be contributing towards livelihoods of individual families. For instance SABAH-Bhutan tries to empower women in earning through weaving, tailoring food processing and other economic activities, thereby making women participate in earning for the family(s).
Between 2008 and 2011, recruitment and retention of Tshogpas, or local government council members, remained a serious issue. Obstacles range from lack of interest and lack of economic incentives to difficulty in compliance and obtaining accreditation under existing election laws. The functional literacy and skills test alone left many constituencies without the minimum of two candidates, leading to lengthy delay of the local government elections of 2011, originally slated for 2008.
The first round of the functional literacy and skills test left many Gewogs with no representatives, though second round results showed a pass rate over 90%. Although women elected to office remained relatively few (14% before local elections according to the UNHCR), more than half of voters in initial local government elections were women. In initial local-level voting in 2011, voter turnout was about 50%. This has raised the question of whether women would benefit from quotas in public service, highlighting the need to encourage further female electoral and political participation.
Women in the 1980s played a significant role in the agricultural work force, where they outnumbered men, who were leaving for the service sector and other urban industrial and commercial activities. In the mid-1980s, 95 percent of all Bhutanese women from the ages of fifteen to sixty-four years were involved in agricultural work, compared with only 78 percent of men in the same age range. Foreign observers have noted that women shared equally with men in farm labor. Overall, women were providing more labor than men in all sectors of the economy. Less than 4 percent of the total female work force was unemployed, compared with nearly 10 percent of men who had no occupation.
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