Encourage women executives to reach board positions: SCOPE

NEW DELHI: Women executives should be encouraged to reach board-level positions in central public sector enterprises to promote gender equality, PSUs' body SCOPE said today.

"CPSEs, as a model employer, have adopted best practices to promote gender equality. Many women have reached to the senior levels but not to the board level positions," Standing Conference of Public Enterprises (SCOPE) Director General U D Choubey said at a function here.

Besides, he said that there is a need to assign some weightage towards women employees' growth and empowerment, under the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) which is signed between the CPSEs and administrative ministries/departments.

Under the MoU system, equal weightage (50 per cent each) is assigned to financial and non-financial parameters.

Speaking at the occasion, International Labour Organisation (ILO) Director Tine Staermose said CPSEs in India have always been in the forefront of following fair labour practices and looked up as model employers.

She said that across the world, women experience systemic barriers in almost every aspect of work. Hence, gender equality is a must to usher in an inclusive development.