Statement by
H.E. Ms. Ensieh Khazali
Vice President of the Islamic Republic of Iran for Women and Family Affairs
Before the 66th Session of the Commission on the Status of Women
On Interactive dialogue, review theme entitled:
empowerment of women in the changing world of work
New York – 18 March 2022
In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful.
Madam President, Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,
At the outset, I would like to express my appreciation for the opportunity to present my address and also express my pleasure for the opportunity provided for exchanging ideas and making efforts toward the promotion of economic empowerment of women in this current volatile world. The economic empowerment of women requires basic and specialized knowledge, strengthening the private sector, a strong will and a planned, regular and sustainable action which in turn requires legal support. In this regard, in the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran, removal of unjust discrimination and providing fair facilities for all citizens including women as well as providing citizens with social security, insurance for unemployment, retirement, senility and disability has been stressed upon. Furthermore, our Constitution stresses on providing conditions and facilities for everybody to have an occupation in order to achieve full employment and providing tools required for employment for every enabled individual who can work but doesn’t have the mentioned tools. And in our labor code, social security law, the charter for citizen rights and the law for supporting and organizing home employment, the women’s rights in the work environment have been protected.
As a result of the laws that advocate employment in Islamic Republic of Iran, acting as a judge, leading political parties, managing startups, accelerators, facilitative groups, and leading thousands of companies in different areas such as agriculture, industries, architecture, pharmaceuticals, and as such by women has been notably increased. As of now, the rate of women employment in the government has gone up from 34% in 2009 to more than 41% in 2021 and for the purposes of supporting non-governmental jobs, around 6000 billion Iranian Rials worth of bank advances has been granted for home employment.
Furthermore, the policies and laws that have advocated education in the last 4 decades, have led to decreasing gender gap in women’s literacy rate, eradication of girls’ and women’s illiteracy with the ratio of 99%, completely bridging the gender gap regarding education in the country at elementary and high schools. It is to be noted that the difference between men and women in education has decreased to 8%. Regarding higher education, women comprise 52% of university students and the ratio of women as faculty members is about 34%. In addition, the gender gap regarding access to technology has decreased by 4%. As of now, men comprise 52% of users of technology and women comprise the remaining 48%. Women make up 23% of mobile application developers and the main part of the driving force of digital evolution namely creativity has originated from women who have contributed to half of the growth of digital evolution. Today, women comprise 45% of total mobile phone users, 48% of laptop and desktop users, and 48% of internet users.
In the field of digital evolution, the Islamic Republic of Iran has been able to advance women’s economic activities and awareness through developing technological infrastructure, strengthening and securing the platform for women’s participation in cyberspace in different forms such as supporting digital domestic jobs, allocating budget for women’s education to enter virtual markets and implementing national plans such as “advancement of home employment”, “economic empowerment of women” and “composition of a road map and political package for ICT priorities for women”.
Ladies and Gentlemen;
Our national approach is to develop and advance the position and progress of women in all aspects of individual and collective life. However, economic terrorism and unilateral, unlawful and coercive sanctions has threatened and jeopardized the life, health, livelihood status and progress of my countrymen. Women have been hurt the most and female entrepreneurs and women who head households have faced major problems and have lost most of their economic investment and their professional and occupational activities especially. Despite this, they have not quit living their lives and moving toward progress. We hope that with added strength and incentive, we can continue moving on this path and achieve valuable results and achievements thought strengthening and expanding international cooperation. Thank you
Dr. Dina Yulianti
Researcher at Padjadjaran University, Indonesia
Assalmu alaikum your excellency, the vice president of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Dr. Ensieh Khazali. I am Dina Yulianti, a researcher at Padjadjaran University, Indonesia, and one of my concerns is digital literacy for women.
Your Excellency, the various data presented in your speech are quite surprising because they are very different from what outsiders perceive regarding the fate of women under an Islamic government system.
In recent years, the world has witnessed how extremist groups in Iraq and Syria have treated women. As a result, the world's citizens get a horrible impression of the teachings of Islam regarding women. Islam seems identical to the prohibition of women from school and work. The women are forced to close themselves entirely, and various other rules complicate their lives.
These images give rise to Islamophobia, the fear of a narrative about the Islamic system. Criticism towards the Islamic Republic of Iran is also often associated with women's issues.
After hearing your speech, the first and most powerful impression that came to my mind was that the situation of women in the Islamic Republic of Iran is very normal, as is the case in many other countries, also in Indonesia. It is very interesting when you mention that the Islamic Republic of Iran has developed digital and technology for the purpose of women's economic empowerment. Our government in Indonesia also encourages women to be technology literate so they can do home businesses through the Internet or online marketing.
Some data even shows that Iranian women are more advanced than women in several other countries. As many of us know, the condition of women in many Muslim-majority countries has not yet reached the ideal condition. There is still a lot that needs to be done to empower women so that their rights as human beings are fulfilled.
My question to you is how Iranian women respond to various concerns over implementing Islamic sharia in a country and how to prove that Islam does not prevent women from actualizing themselves and achieving the highest achievements in their lives.
Thank you
Dr. Ursula Fatima Kowanda-Yassin
researcher at the Sigmund Freud University in Vienna
Thank you Dr. Khazali for this interesting presentation. I would like to ask a few questions on climate change and women’s work situations.
My name is Dr. Ursula Fatima Kowanda-Yassin. I am a researcher at the Sigmund Freud University in Vienna, Austria.
As a researcher on women’s work, especially in view of environmental challenges and climate changes, I would like to pose the following questions:
- What has the Islamic Republic of Iran done for the employment of women in the extraordinary situation of Covid 19?
- What is Iran doing to ensure the health of women in the working environments for avoiding pollution, safe guarding clean air, soil, also in agriculture and in the view of environmental challenges such as draughts and floods?
- Which measures has the Islamic Republic of Iran taken in order to provide and ensure women’s employment in the face of climate changes and natural disasters?
Thank you very much
Dr. Masumah Jafari
International Islamic Scholar from Pakistan and a PhD Student in Women’s Right in Islam
Assalmu alikum wa rahmat ullah wa barakatuh
I am Dr masooma jaffery. I am an international Islalmic scholar from Pakistan and also a PhD student in women’s right in Islam. I appreciate Dr. Ensieh Khazali for your thoughts on women in Iran and their rights. But I have a few questions for you as well. My first question is:
What has the Islamic republic of Iran done for the empowerment of women in the extraordinary situations of Covid-19?
And my second question is:
What steps have been taken by the Islamic republic's government for women's education to increase the number of women working in digital markets?
And my last question is:
Sanctions do affect the economy and naturally job opportunities for women are reduced because of it. What are your plans for women given the circumstances?
Thank you so much
Responses by
H.E. Ms. Ensieh Khazali, Vice President for Women and Family Affairs of the Islamic Republic of Iran
To the questions raised
Yes, thank you for your excellent questions, Dr. Dina Yulianti Soleiman from Indonesia, Dr. Ursula Fatima Kumanda Yasin from Austria, and Dr. Masume Jafari from Pakistan.
I can abridge your questions in three sections:
- women employment and its obstacles;
- women’s health
- Practices and religious customs that can be found in our religion and their relevance to women’s administrative activities.
When it comes to employment, especially in light of Covid-19 changes that affected everyone in the world, especially women in all sectors of society, we have made efforts to make digital businesses prosperous.
We launched virtual shops and malls, and had investments for home businesses.
And if you have observed, the World Banks statistics show that our women’s activities grew from 12% to 24% in 2020, and the entrepreneurship index of women compared to men stands at 63%.
In fact, we hold the 30th position with regard to the entrepreneurship index of women compared to men.
For the most part, we made efforts to define professions for women compatible with their physical and familial conditions, and obligations. Now you can see that women’s employment in professions such as authorship has grown 13 fold within the last decade. The same is true with teleworking envisaged for women, especially women who have young children who are able to manage their work while they are alongside their family and they can present their working assignments through the virtual space.
Indeed, the sanctions led to many pressures and problems concerning employment mostly women’s employment. But, note that in conjunction with this challenge, the sanctions provided us with an opportunity to be self-sufficient; to return to our selves, and detect our capabilities as well as utilizing many of the existing capitals within our country that were going unused.
It also led to fresh achievements, inventions, and innovations at various scientific and technological levels, as well as making science applicable in our country.
The second issue raised was about a plan for women’s health.
We have the Comprehensive Health Plan for women. And since women play a key role in the family, they are covered specifically.
We observe that the death rate for girls dropped from 80 in 100,000 in 1979 to 12 in 100,000.
Life expectancy for women has grown from 54 to 78 years old, which is higher than the global average and it is higher than men’s life expectancy by a few years as well.
When it comes to the working environment, more often than not professions that are defined for women are not physically difficult, or harmful to their comprehensive health; and by health we mean psychological, physical, and familial health.
It is noteworthy that the majority of women’s health is taken care of by female physicians. 98% of the obstetricians are women.
In other specialties, we observe the growth of female physicians on a daily basis.
With regard to the third question that asks whether our abidance and adherence to the Shariah hinder women's activities, and professions, to put it frankly: No.
This abidance and adherence to many principles and values led women to work in a more peaceful and secure fashion in the society, precisely because of this adherence to protective laws which allow women and their families to enter many professional fields with peace of mind.
In fact, you see that there is no instrumental use or abuse of women in our country. They have been minimized, and it is not as widespread as what we see in the western countries.
Since our women enjoy Hijab and chastity, they experience healthy environment in their working fields.
Also we see this in sports as well. So far our females who observed the dress code and standard of Hijab have won 3302 global medals.
The same can be found in other fields and sectors including art, motion pictures, and theater. We see a growing presence of women who enjoy a safer environment so as to be able to contribute their spiritual and not physical ideas, innovations, capacities and potentials.
And due to many conditions arranged for women in our country, women were able to have fine progress in scientific and working fields. As per our law, men are in charge of life expenses, so women are participating in work-related activities with ease of mind and so that they can make progress and not because they are in need to get paid.
And many other laws are specific to men such as the military service from which women are excluded. This leads them to make fine progress in scientific grounds and for the familial conditions, the conditions to get married and having a profession for women to be provided for sooner than men.
I appreciate your contribution.