World Bank adopts gender equality strategy in lending money

Economists say that when gender equality increases, poverty is reduced.

Swedish Minister for Finance Magadalena Andersson (left), Swedish Minister for Children, the Elderly and Gender Equality Asa Regner (middle) and World Bank's Senior Director in Gender Caren Grown discuss mainstreaming gender equality budget for better development in Stockholm on May 17, 2017.  [Photo: Chen Xuefei/China Plus]

With that in mind, the World Bank has recently adopted a gender equality strategy in relation to its lending policy worldwide. 

The inspiration to the move has come in part from Sweden, which has been promoting gender equality policies for the last ten years.

CRI's Chen Xuefei caught up with the World Bank's Senior Director for Gender Caren Grown, who was on a visit to Stockholm. 

Caren Grown was in the Swedish capital to discuss gender equality policies with the Swedish Finance Minister, Magadalena Andersson, and Minister for Children, the Elderly and Gender Equality, Asa Regner. 

She cites Swedish Feminist policy as an inspiration, and gender equality policies as crucial to realizing the World Bank's recently adopted gender equality strategy. 

"This new strategy on gender equality is oriented in closing gaps between men and women in education and health, in the labor market particularly, and in creating more and better jobs, also helping women in owning assets, key assets like land and housing and technology and finance." 

Grown believes the Swedish experience has shown that if women are given equal support, it boosts economic development generally. 

"Because we recognized that in the processes of closing gap between men and women, it actually resulted better outcome for a country or for a sector, such as agricultural sector, or even for a company itself, in terms of its own business strategy and its own profitability."

Sweden also implements a feminist foreign aid policy. That means, when they give foreign aid to developing countries, equal opportunities must be guaranteed. 

Gender should be central to government policy, says Swedish Minister, Asa Regner.

"This is important because it is the rights issue. That women and men should have the same rights. To mainstream the national budget from a gender equality perspective is actually a way of safeguarding like you do treat women and men equally, but it is also a smart economic thing. "

Regner also says where governments implement financial policies to help with caring for the elderly and children, it is also a way to liberate women so that they can better contribute to economic development. 

"In many countries, if elderly care doesn't work as an organized service, then women are many times those who take care of their elderly fathers or mothers also and that inhibits their own work in the labor market and their contribution to the national economy and so on and so forth."