Country Gender Analysis Egypt June 2014 Country Gender Analysis-Egypt June 2014 Content 1. List of Abbreviations ………………………………………………………………………………………….....3 2. Objective ............................................................................................................... 4 3. General Information .............................................................................................. 4 3.1 FRAMEWORK CONDITIONS ................................................................................... 4 3.2 TRADITIONAL UNDERSTANDING OF GENDER ROLES ....................................... 6 3.3 GENDER IN POLITICS ............................................................................................ 7 3.4 GENDER EQUALITY AT THE LEVEL OF THE FAMILY ........................................ 13 3.5 GENDER IN EDUCATION AND THE ECONOMY .................................................. 20 4. Resources ........................................................................................................... 29 Page 2 of 32 Country Gender Analysis-Egypt June 2014 1. List of Abbreviations CAPMAS Central Authority for Public Mobilization and Statistics CESR Center for Economic and Social Rights ECESR Egyptian Center for Economic and Social Rights ECWR Egyptian Center for Women's Rights (E)DHS (Egypt) Demographic Health Survey ETF European Training Foundation FGM Female Genital Mutilation FIDH International Federation for Human Rights GEDI Gender Global Entrepreneurship and Development Index GET Global Employment Trends GGG Global Gender Gap Index GII Gender Inequality Index HDI Human Development Index HDR Human Development Report NCSR National Center for Social and Criminological Research NCW National Council for Women SCC Supreme Constitutional Court SIGI Social Institutions and Gender Index SRC Social Research Center SYPE Survey of the Young People in Egypt TI Transparency International UN United Nations UNDP United Nations Development Programme VAW Violation Against Women WB World Bank WDI World Development Indicators WGI World Governance Indicators WHO World Health Organization WJP World Justice Project WWR World’s Women Report Page 3 of 32 Country Gender Analysis-Egypt June 2014 2. Objective BMZ/GIZ policy states a clear commitment to gender equality which it considers an objective for development programmes. The objective of gender analysis is to ensure gender sensi- tivity in the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of GIZ Egypt pro- grammes, projects and activities. The objective of gender analysis also seeks to provide understanding of the current situation of gender equality in Egypt. 3. General Information 3.1 Framework Conditions According to the Human Development Index (HDI), Egypt falls in the middle of human devel- opment category index. Egypt has witnessed major improvements in its HDI value from 0.47 in 1980 to 0.662 in 2012, a value higher than the regional average in the Arab States (0.652). Its value is also above average in comparison to middle-income countries (0.640). Com- pared to other rapidly emerging economies such as the CIVETS1, Egypt performs slightly better (0.661). The mean annual growth in HDI has steadily declined from an above average value at both regional and middle-income levels of 2.12% (1980/1990) to a below average level of 0.92% (2000/2012). Moreover, despite the continued improvement in HDI levels, when adjusted for inequality, Egypt's HDI falls to 0.502 (i.e. a loss of 24.1 percent). This is slightly better than the average loss for medium HDI countries (24.2 percent) and for Arab States (25.4 percent) (HDR 2013). There are also disparities in development between rural and urban governorates and espe- cially between Lower and Upper Egypt with the latter governorates and rural areas achieving lower levels of human development. Sixty-seven per cent of the country’s defined poor live in Upper Egypt as well as 83% of the extreme poor (World Bank 2012) while 78% of the poor live in rural areas. The poverty rate among children was 45.3% in rural Upper Egypt com- pared to 7.9% in urban Lower Egypt (CESR 2013). Virtually all health indicators and literacy rates are worse in Upper Egypt than in Lower Egypt and worse in rural areas than in urban areas. Table 1 - General Indicators Lower Middle Income (US$1006 -3975) Population growth (%) 1.75 GDP (US$ billions) 160.26 GDP (PPP) per capita 5,544 Urban population (% of total population) 44 Population between 0-14 (%) 31 HDI Rank 112 /186 HDI Value 0.662 Health: life expectancy at birth (years) 73.5 Education: expected and mean years of schooling 0.53 Income: GNI (PPP, US$) per capita 5,401 Inequality: inequality adjusted HDI 0.503 Poverty: Multidimensional poverty (%) 6 Population below national poverty line (%) 34.4 Sustainability: adjusted net savings (%GNI) 1.4 Egypt's Gender Inequality Index (GII) attributes the decrease in human development to ine- quality between women and men in reproductive health, empowerment, and economic activi- 1 Columbia, Indonesia, Viet Nam, Egypt, Turkey and South Africa Page 4 of 32 Country Gender Analysis-Egypt June 2014 ty. Egypt’s GII was valued at 0.59 in 2012, ranking 126 out of 148 countries in the 2012 in- dex. Egypt's GII was below that of Arab States (0.555) and Medium HDI countries (0.457). Although Egypt improved its Global Gender Gap Index (GGG) ranking of 126 in 2012 to 125 in 2013, its overall score decreased from 0.5975 in 2012 to 0.5935 in 2013. Among 33 similar lower-middle income countries, Egypt ranked 27, while it came in 10th place among 15 MENA countries. Health and education indices reflect more favorable rankings and scores, indicating the improvement in women's social indices over the past two decades2. Low eco- nomic participation and political empowerment indices are mirrored in the very low represen- tation of women in parliament and low labour force participation of women. These poor val- ues further reflect the existing barriers that confront women in politics and labour. Egypt's low SIGI gender indexe delineates the underlying social institutions which influence gender roles and forms of discrimination against women (SIGI 2012). Table 2 - Gender Indicators Rank Score Gender inequality index (GII)3 (2012) 126 0.590 Maternal mortality ratio 66 Seats in parliament 2.2% With secondary education 43.4% Labour force participation 23.7% Global Gender Gap Index (GGG) (2013) 125 (out of 136) 0.5935 Economic participation and opportunity 125 0.4426 Educational attainment 108 0.9199 Health and survival 51 0.9768 Political empowerment 128 0.0348 SIGI Gender Index (2012) 65 (out of 86) 0.35784 Urban/ rural living conditions Stark gender disparities exist between rural and urban governorates, as well as, between Lower and Upper Egypt. Illiteracy rates among young women in Upper Egypt are twice that of their male counterparts, currently measured at 24%,. The 2009 Survey of the Young People in Egypt (SYPE) showed that more than five times as many females (22.1%) have never at- tended school in rural Upper Egypt (CESR 2013) than males (4%). The majority of girls not enrolled in schools lived in rural settings. According to the SYPE findings, girls from rural areas formed 80.4% of the girls who did not attend school at all. Moreover, only 72% of rural women gave birth with the assistance of qualified health professionals as compared to 90% of urban women (DHS 2008). Female participation is limited in self-employment and micro and small enterprise ownership. Only 18% of Egyptian women are involved micro and small enterprises. Informal employment is dominated by women from rural Egypt, where 93% of the 1.1 million women working in the informal sector reside in rural areas (UNDP 2012). Furthermore, 71.6% of women working in rural areas are engaged in informal sector work as compared to 13% in urban areas (Ezzat 2012). Near 70% of rural women working informally are employed by unpaid family businesses compared to 58.6% of urban women. Finally, while 8.7% of Egyptian women enjoy paid positions in urban areas, only 3.2% of women in rural areas receive pay for their work. (Ezzat 2012). 2 Egypt has made significant progress in the fields of primary and secondary education; however, technical education re- mains a real challenge for girls and is a contributing factor to their lack of success in the labour market (USAID 2010). 3 The GII captures the loss of achievement due to gender inequality in three dimensions: reproductive health, empower- ment and labour market participation. The higher the GII value the greater the discrimination. 4 0= low discrimination 1= high discrimination Page 5 of 32 Country Gender Analysis-Egypt June 2014 3.2 Traditional understanding of gender roles Egyptian society largely subscribes to the notion that men and women should have distinct roles. Egypt's new 2013 constitution, approved in January 2014, emphasizes, the equality between women and men in “civil, political, economic, social, and cultural rights in accord- ance with the principles of the Constitution" in Article 11. Article 53, emphasizes principles of equal protection and the equality of all citizens irrespective of factors like “religion, creed, sex, origin, race, color, language, disability, social status, political affiliation, or geographical identity”. Despite Article 52’s strong declarations on equality, Article 11, refers to the State's role in harmonizing women's family duties with their work, which is seen to imply that child rearing and domestic responsibility are the sole burden of women