Brussels is considering the introduction of compulsory quotas for women in boardrooms as a new report shows gender balance remains absent at this level, despite self-regulation initiatives taken by the EU years ago.

I am not a great fan of quotas but I like the results they bring- Commissioner Viviane Reding

Boardrooms across the EU are still male dominated but the situation is much worse in Malta, with the lowest presence of women in boardrooms among the 27 member states.

While in 2011 just 14 per cent of company board directors in the EU were female, in Malta the percentage drops to three per cent, closely followed by Cyprus (four per cent) and Hungary (five per cent), according to the European Commission’s report published yesterday.

The Nordics are the most advanced in this area with Finland topping the list with 27 per cent of its company board directors being female, followed by Latvia (26 per cent) and Sweden (25 per cent).

The report shows that while only 29 per cent of boards in the EU do not include at least one woman, in Malta the figure goes up to 79 per cent – the highest in the EU.

The Maltese figures may sound alarming but an EU official yesterday told The Times “the EU is alarmed with the whole picture and not only with Malta’s results”.

“Malta has the lowest female employment rate in the EU and so its figures are not shocking as they reflect the current situation in the Maltese employment market,” the official argued.

“The real problem is that other member states with high female employment rates still have very low percentages of women in boardrooms.”

Although just three per cent of Maltese board directors are women some progress has been registered lately as in 2010 it was 2.4 per cent.

Commenting on the study’s generally negative results, EU Justice Commissioner Viviane Reding told a press conference in Brussels the Commission was mulling the idea of introducing quotas to improve the situation.

“Personally, I am not a great fan of quotas. However, I like the results they bring,” Commissioner Reding said. “I believe it is high time Europe breaks the glass ceiling that continues to bar female talent from getting to the top in Europe’s listed companies,” she said. According to the study some member states have already taken initiatives to boost the number of women in decision-making positions.

Belgium, France, Italy, the Netherlands and Spain adopted legislation introducing gender quotas for company boards, while Denmark, Finland, Greece, Austria and Slovenia adopted rules on gender balance for the boards of state-owned companies.

Malta has no such rules yet although it is government policy to include women in publicly appointed boards.