Costa Rica is one of the 20 countries with the greatest gender equality, according to the most recent report of the World Economic Forum, published on June 12. With an average of 0.78, on a scale of 0 to 1, our country ranks 19th out of 146 economies analyzed in the Global Gender Gap Index 2024.
The study compares parity between men and women in various indicators, encompassed in four main dimensions: economic participation and opportunities, educational attainment, health and survival, and political empowerment.
Education and health are the areas in which the country obtained the best results, with scores of 1.0 and 0.97, respectively. In the first indicator, it ranks first in the world table, while in the second it ranks 59th.
It is followed by economy with 0.67 (81st place) and politics with 0.48 (15th place). Despite this last result, the report highlights Costa Rica’s global example in terms of leadership representation in government.
At the parliamentary level
“Gender parity at the parliamentary level reaches a record 33% in 2024, having almost doubled since 2006 (18.8%). At the regional level, Latin America demonstrates continuous improvement over time. Some of the economies influencing the overall positive global trajectory include the United Arab Emirates, which has maintained parity since 2021, followed by Costa Rica, which has recorded a parity score of 90% over the last three editions,” the report notes.
Women indicator
In the indicator of women in parliaments, our country also stands out in sixth position worldwide with a percentage of female participation of 47.4% versus 52% of men.
The first place in the world in gender equality is Iceland, which has led the Index for a decade and a half and remains the only economy that has closed more than 90% of its gender gap.
Nicaragua leads Latin America with a score of 0.8 and ranks sixth globally. Globally, it will take 134 years to reach full parity, approximately five generations beyond the 2030 Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) target, the study concluded. While no country has achieved full gender parity, 97% of the economies included in this edition have closed more than 60% of their gap.
