UN Women Egypt working on equal representation in the workplace
Finding women in science / technology / politics should not be this hard: DDB Dubai has worked with Japanese illustrator duo IC4Design on a campaign for UN Women Egypt to highlight the low representation of women in the workforce, Digital Arts reported. They ended up creating three print ads drawing on Where’s Wally (Waldo, if you’re on the other side of the Atlantic). The campaign was called Finding Her and, according to It’s Nice That, focuses on “three particular up-and-coming industries in Egypt: technology, politics and science, showing a multi-storey cross-section of a space station, a parliamentary building and a research facility. Each image is adorned with a banner stating the campaign’s message: ‘Finding women in [technology/politics/science] shouldn’t be this hard. Let’s work together for equal representation in the workplace.’” The campaign reportedly ran in several magazines across Egypt.
Egyptian women’s relatively low representation in the workforce reflects in part not just a lack of economic opportunities, but the fact that almost half of Egyptian men prefer women not working. What’s more, 12% of women who are currently employed say they would rather not, according to a Cabinet Information Center poll, Al Shorouk reports. The same poll found that 57% of men and women in Egypt believe that the country’s laws foster gender equality.
Only a third of men and around 15% of women polled believe that Egyptian women are fully able to exercise their legal right to equal treatment.