Two decades of successful empowerment of worthy partners in nation-building: Supreme Council for Women

TDT | Manama

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com

The Supreme Council for Women celebrates on August 22 two decades of achievements and accomplishments for and by Bahraini women based on assuming their national responsibilities and duties with efficiency and competence.

The outcome confirms the insightful and broad vision of His Majesty King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, the leader of the nation’s comprehensive development and the lead supporter of women’s progress in Bahrain.

The First Lady of Bahrain, HRH Princess Sabeeka bint Ibrahim Al Khalifa, Wife of HM the King, has had a great role in leading women’s progress and consolidating the pillars of the SCW.

The Council has become the national reference to all official entities about women’s matters and issues and the body responsible for setting the general policy to follow up on the progress of Bahraini women. Two decades of accomplishments and successes testify to the outstanding role of the Council.

Strategic thinking, competitiveness and justice, impact and sustainability

The Council operates under an institutional methodology based on an effective community partnership with all institutions concerned with women.

The foundation stages began with monitoring women’s needs and exploring reality by adopting many scientific tools and practical mechanisms.

The Council has worked on concretising the principles in the National Action Charter and the Constitution of Bahrain about women and setting appropriate mechanisms by activating partnerships with government agencies, official institutions, the private sector and civil society.

It also endeavoured to achieve full integration of the National Plan into the Government Action Plan by as a document bearing the status of “National Ownership”.

The plan aims to achieve the necessary national and international harmonization by linking its indicators to the Bahrain Economic Vision 2030 and the 2030 sustainable development goals.

Family stability, protection, reconciliation and social protection

The first areas of the National Plan highlight the important priority to achieve comprehensive family stability by providing all options to secure the economic and social needs of women and enhance their health and psychological safety.

The Council, in cooperation with partners and allies, sought to strengthen the legislative and legal system to preserves the privacy of women and children within the framework of codifying family laws, and developing decisions and executive regulations in this regard, alongside a commitment to implement continuous awareness programs in the legal and family culture.

The issuance of the royal order to allocate an independent building for the Sharia Courts “Family Courts”, and the issuance of the Family Law and its executive decisions are among the crucial achievements of Bahrain in this regard, in addition to developing the Alimony Fund, vision, guidance and family awareness through activating the role of the Family Reconciliation Office with the obligation to refer family cases to it, and the opening of branches of family reconciliation offices in social centres.

These efforts have contributed to achieving a concrete impact on the level of family stability. The statistics show a 17% increase in the cases pending before Sharia Courts in 2012- 2019, and a decrease in the average time to settle cases to less than 2.6 months in 2020 for 87% of the cases.

The percentage of settling cases in Sharia courts increased from 64% during 2012- 2013 to 100% in 2020. In terms of benefiting from family reconciliation services, the percentage of beneficiaries increased by 44% during 2016-2020.

Women’s participation in the national economy and boosting the GDP

Bahraini women have a remarkable presence and active participation in the national economy. They occupy an influential percentage in the composition of the workforce, which has contributed to increasing women’s participation in the labour market.

The percentage of Bahraini women in the government sector rose by 17% to reach about 55% and by 11% to 35% in the private sector during 2001-2020.

The percentage of female business owners shot up from 15% in 2001 to 47% in 2020, an increase of 32%, which indicates the ease of procedures for engaging in entrepreneurship.

The percentage of their participation in entrepreneurship increased by 6% to reach about 43% of the total number of Bahrainis during 2010-2020, while the number of owners of virtual records increased by 12% in 2016-2020 to reach 50%.

The Bahraini Women’s Development Centre “Riyadat” is a commercial centre that provides a host of services, administrative services, training and quality consultancy. At the “Riyadat” centre, 111 women benefited in 2013-2021, and the rate of the success of the hosted projects and the transition to the labour market reached 75%.

In addition, other national initiatives were launched to support women-owned enterprises. Bahraini businesswomen constituted 39% of the beneficiaries of the “ Export Bahrain” programme, and their products and services reached 51 countries around the world.

The number of women beneficiaries of the opportunity to participate in the “Qaisariya Market” at the new Bahrain International Airport was 14 in 2021.

Equal opportunities and gender balance

In the implementation of the terms of reference of the Supreme Council for Women to empower women to play their role in public life and integrate their efforts into comprehensive development programmes, the Council has taken upon itself the concretization of constitutional texts into reality.

Competitiveness of Bahraini women in political life and public affairs

The Political Empowerment Programme is one of the most important programmes adopted by the Council to support women’s participation in public affairs since the beginning of its establishment.

The percentage of Bahraini women working in administrative and supervisory positions in the private sector increased from 23% to 34% in 2007-2020.

Measuring Impact... Women’s Advancement Award

One of the most important initiatives in support of women’s competitiveness is the launch of Her Royal Highness Princess Sabeeka Bint Ibrahim Al Khalifa Award for Bahraini Women Advancement.

The award achieved a significant impact in gender balance and integrating women’s needs, which resulted in several distinct practices for governmental, private and civil institutions in adopting methodologies for integrating women’s needs in development. The rate of participation of public sector institutions increased by 120% while the rate of participation of institutions in the private sector shot up by 300%.

There was also a remarkable turnout for participation in the award in the categories created in the last edition, with 51 civil institutions and 73 participants in the individual category, and a total of 205 participations within its four categories.

The National Gender Balance Model

Bahrain has a distinguished experience in the implementation of equal opportunities policies, with the issuance of several supporting decisions, such as the decision of the Civil Service Council in 2014, obligating the establishment of equal opportunity committees in ministries and official institutions and the issuance of circulars and directives necessary to activate their functions.

The number of equal opportunity committees reached 50 in 2021, and the private sector and civil society institutions voluntarily adopted methodologies for gender balance and integrating women’s needs.

The number of these committees in the private sector increased from two in 2014 to 20 in 2021. The number of committees for integrating women’s needs into civil society institutions increased to reach 17 in 2021.

The National Gender Balance Report, a tool for assessment and measurement

Bahrain issues a national report on gender balance that monitors a set of indicators. It measures Bahraini women’s participation and competitiveness in public sector institutions and includes qualitative indicators for women in the economy, decision-making, health, civil society and education.

The aim is to help bridge the gaps and invest in partnerships and alliances to sustain the progress of Bahraini women and achieve maximum effectiveness of the policies and programmes.

Lifelong learning

The National Plan in this field focuses on lifelong learning opportunities for women.

The Council works on creating practices that guarantee self and professional development and raise women’s ability to continue education and learning at all stages of life.

National Initiative for Gender Balance in Future Sciences

The Supreme Council for Women also launched the “National Gender Balance in Future Sciences Initiative as an organisational tool to accelerate the achievement of gender balance in the fields of future sciences.

The percentage of women benefiting from scholarships in the post-secondary education stage increased to 68% in 2020, and the percentage of female graduates of higher education institutions increased to 62% in 2020, an increase of 4% in 2012-2020.

Women’s quality of life and the promotion of best health practices

Through all national efforts to sustain health initiatives and raise awareness of preventive health patterns and practices, the percentage of women who enjoy the basics and requirements of health and psychological safety increased to 60% in 2019.

The average Overall Quality of Life for women was 82% in 2018, according to the 2018 National Health Survey. In addition, the average life expectancy of women at birth increased from 76 years to 79 years during 2001-2020. The contribution of SCW to address the Covid-19 pandemic was another proof of the role it plays.

A house of expertise and a regional centre for women’s issues

To represent Bahraini women in national, Arab and international forums and organisations, the Council worked to invest in effective partnerships and alliances.

Today, Bahrain is justifiably proud to be an international centre of expertise on women.

It is one of the first countries that transferred its experience in women advancement to the world through the adoption of the UN Princess Sabeeka Bint Ibrahim Al Khalifa Global Award for Women’s Empowerment launched in 2017. The second edition was launched in July 2021.

Throughout the two decades of its existence, the Council has spectacularly risen to its responsibilities and goals. Yet, its successes have boosted its determination to do more for Bahraini women and the  nation.

On this occasion marking two decades since its establishment, the Council is looking forward to a renewed launch for the next stage, to focus on global transformations and national priorities to empower Bahraini women.