Women's potential and the importance of ending discrimination were underlined yesterday at a seminar marking the 40th anniversary of the National Council of Women.
The target for European Union member countries is to increase the female employment rate to 60 per cent by 2010. At the end of last year, the female employment rate in Malta stood at 33.7 per cent while that for males exceeded 73 per cent, Sue Vella, the Employment and Training Corporation's general manager for strategy, said.
However, female employment had increased by 20 per cent since 1963, when it was only around 13 per cent, she added.
The rate of female self employment was also low, at eight per cent, compared with more than 17 per cent for males, while 16.8 per cent of females work only on a part-time level, as opposed to 3.2 per cent of males. Ms Vella said the rate of females working only on a part-time basis had increased five-fold since 1990.
More than eight per cent of women are considered as unemployed while the rate for men is 7.8 per cent.
Janet Mifsud, chairman of the Commission for the Promotion of Equality between Men and Women, said there is a slightly higher percentage of female graduates despite the fact that the level of employment for males is higher and there are more men in senior management.
Young mother and businesswoman Claudine Cassar spoke about the juggling involved between raising a baby and running her own business. She said women need to be kinder to themselves. "We set very high expectations for ourselves but we need to learn not to be so proud and take the support from those around us," she said.
Ms Cassar also stressed the importance of having more day care facilities for children since these would help mothers in their struggle to juggle work and family life.
Malta Employers' Association president Arthur Muscat said companies who took non-discriminatory approaches reaped the benefits.
Val Singh, senior research fellow at Cranfield University's Centre for Developing Women Business Leaders, said equal opportunities legislation had yet to deliver. She said women in Malta were still battling against traditionally gendered roles and expectations, which was reflected in few women in management posts and a large gender pay gap. Boards of one-third of the big companies in the UK were still made up of middle-class white men. She said that although women made up 30 per cent of those in a management position, they only made up eight per cent of directors.
Dr Singh stressed the importance of diversity. She said males needed to be more gender aware and not stereotype women. On the other hand, women needed to make an effort to fit into today's working world and not wait for this to change to accommodate them.
Family and Social Solidarity Minister Dolores Cristina said research had shown that the benefits of eliminating discrimination in the workplace went beyond the individual worker and benefited both the economy and society as a whole.
The minister said legislation was not enough to make the most of people because there was still a great cultural and mental change that needed to be undertaken.