Republic of Cyprus Second Voluntary National Report - Sustainable development goals

58 NARRATIVE Cyprus continues to target all forms of gender inequality as made evident by coordinated national initiatives and actions. Particular efforts have been made to prevent and combat domestic violence, human trafficking and protect child-victims of domestic violence or sexual abuse. Concerning the promotion of gender equality, efforts are focused on minimising inequality of opportunity (e.g. via education) and inequality of outcome (i.e. gender pay gap). Overall, Cyprus shows an improvement towards reducing gender inequality and efforts will continue to be made through additional measures promoted through the new National Action Plan for Equality between Men and Women. Finally, non-governmental organisations greatly support and promote gender equality via the implementation of relevant actions and projects. ANALYSIS Two of the most important indicators on gender equality are the gender employment gap (the difference between the employment rate of men and the employment rate of women) and the gender pay gap (the percentage difference in average gross hourly earnings between men and women). In Cyprus, the gender employment gap in 2019 was 11.6% relative to 11.7% in the EU, ranking Cyprus 17 th among EU27. Accordingly, Cypriot women earn 10.4% less than men, having a smaller pay gap than the EU equivalent of 14.1%. This result places Cyprus in the top 10 countries with the smallest gender pay gap (see Figure 16). Despite this relatively positive picture, Cyprus still lacks in regards to the percentage of leadership positions held by women in senior management. In particular, 9.4% of board members and 17.5% of executives are women, placing Cyprus in the 26 th and 14 th positions, respectively, among EU members. Encouragingly enough, both indicators show a positive trend. Specifically, the percentage of female board members rose to 9.4% in 2019 from 4% in 2010 (the EU average in 2019 was 28.4%), and the percentage of female executives rose to 17.5% in 2019 from 8.6% in 2012 (the EU average in 2019 was 18%). Similarly, Cyprus continues to rank relatively low with respect to women in politics and in leadership positions, even though some progress has been recorded in the last years. The percentage of seats held by women in national parliament is 17.9% (ranking Cyprus 25th among EU members), while the percentage of seats held by women in national Government is 16.7% (ranking Cyprus 22nd). The corresponding average percentages for the EU are 32.1% and 31.2% respectively (see Figure 17). A positive trend is observed, between 2010 and 2019, for the percentage of seats held by women in national parliament, rising from 12.5% to 17.9%. For the percentage of seats held by women in national Government, this positive trend is observed between the period from 2016 to 2019, during which the percentage doubled from 8.3% to 16.7%. In regards to the percentage of women who have suffered from physical or sexual violence, Cyprus stands among the top EU countries with 5% relative to the EU average, which is 8%. Unfortunately, this indicator cannot be discussed in depth because the data presented refer to 2012. In terms of education, no significant gap is observed throughout the period of 2010 to 2019 between men and women, with the results corresponding to those mentioned in SDG4. 11.6 11.7 0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 Gender Pay Gap in Unadjusted Form (% of average gross hourly earnings of men) Gender Employment Gap (% points) Cyprus EU 14.1 10.4 Figure 16.: Gender gap Seats held by women in National Parliament Seats held by women in National Government Positions held by women in senior management positions (Board members) Positions held by women in senior management positions (Executives) 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 % 17.9 16.7 9.4 17.5 32.1 31.2 28.4 18.0 Cyprus EU Figure 17.: Leadership positions