The Jamaica Employers' Federation (JEF) president, Wayne Chen, is scoffing at a recent world report that has ranked Jamaica an overall 44th in the world for its progress towards gender equality.

The report, done annually by the World Economic Forum, was released last Wednesday.

The placement was a downgrade of 20 places for Jamaica from its 2006 24th position among countries worldwide and five places down from its 39th rank last year.

Norway has the narrowest gender gap, according to the report, and Trinidad and Tobago leads among Latin American and Caribbean countries with a 19th-place ranking.

Disagreement

What has peeved the federation particulary is Jamaica's ranking when equality in the labour force and equal wages for similar work are taken into consideration. Jamaica is ranked 63rd and 92nd in both circumstances, respectively.

"I have a strong disagreement with that because, anecdotally, I don't see that as the case," says the JEF president.

"If you look in any of the publicly listed companies - and I sit on many, many boards - there is no discrimination whatsoever with people of a similar level," he adds.

He believes the data might have been poorly analysed and as a result the country might have been unfairly positioned as one that discriminates against women.

"I am not aware of it. To drop us down to 92 is a very unfair ranking. I would love to know where those figures came from and who is matching what," says.

He believes Jamaica's 63rd position in equality in labour force participation is similarly erroneous.

"It would imply that there are more women than men looking for work and can't find such work," says Chen. "That doesn't make any sense," he adds.

However, labour statistics do, in fact, show that more women seek jobs than men.

According to the 2006 labour force statistics by the Statistical Institute of Jamaica, an average of 38,475 females were active job seekers each quarter, while only an average 27,475 males actively sought jobs. Only an average 12 per cent of active males seeking jobs had any training or qualification compared to 25 per cent for females.

On the contrary, females participated less in the workforce - only 551,300 females compared to 697,800 males.

Director of the Centre for Gender and Development Studies at the University of the West Indies, Mona, Professor Barbara Bailey, qualifies this.

"The generally higher certification of females does not translate into better positioning in the labour market," she says.