More women in parliaments of nations linked to well-crafted quotas: IPU report

GENEVA, March 5 (Xinhua) -- The share of women in national parliaments increased by nearly one percentage point last year, from 23.4 percent in 2017 to 24.3 percent in 2018, in part due to well-designed gender quotas, the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) said Tuesday.

This 0.9 percentage point increase confirms the continuing rise of women in parliament, at a slightly faster rate of change compared to previous years, said a new IPU report.

"Countries with well-designed gender quotas elected significantly more women to parliament than those without, respectively, 7 points more in single or lower chambers, and 17 points more in upper chambers," the report noted.

IPU Secretary General Martin Chungong said at UN briefing here, "We have good news this year. It's encouraging to see that the tools that the IPU has been advocating for many years, such as well-designed and well-implemented gender quotas, are beginning to bear their fruit."

Chungong said the IPU wants to achieve gender parity in the legislatures of the world.

"We need to have a parentship between both men and women to advance the gender equality cause," said Chungong.

The IPU report showed that electoral quotas for women have now spread to all regions of the world with more than 130 countries adopting quota policies.

Rwanda has the highest percentage of women in the lower legislative house with 61.3 percent women. Enditem