Boosting Gender Equality Through ADB Trade Finance Partnerships

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• Publisher: Asian Development Bank
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN: 9789292611385
• eBook ISBN: 9789292611392
• Topic: Betriebswirtschaft
• Subtopic: Finanzdienstleistungen

Despite some progress, women's share in senior management is still poor. Closing the gender gap in leadership leads to better business and financial outcomes. ADB's Trade Finance Program—which guaranteed or funded 3,500 transactions in 2017 valued at $4.5 billion—conducted a gender audit among several of its partner banks. The objective of this study was to develop specific, practical and implementable recommendations to attract, retain, and promote more women in banking. This study was a joint effort between ADB's Private Sector Department and the Gender Equity Thematic Group, funded by the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

Waiting and listening. Shwedagon Pagoda, Yangon, Myanmar (photo by Louise Richards, Fusion HR Solutions).

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Introduction and Background

Introduction

Gender equality and women’s empowerment are essential for meeting Asia’s ambitions for inclusive and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Gender equality needs to be pursued not only for a just and equal society, but also for better development outcomes—inclusive growth, faster poverty reduction, and the SDGs, particularly SDG 5 on gender equality.

The economic empowerment of women is a critical gender equality goal. However, only 49% of working-age women in developing Asia participate in the labor force, in contrast to 80% of men. It is no longer widely contested that getting more women into the paid workforce makes economic sense, leads to diversity of thinking in the workplace, and improves the bottom line. There is a plethora of evidence pointing to how advancing gender equality will lead to greater economic growth, including McKinsey’s groundbreaking study, The Power of Parity, which shows how advancing women’s equality can add $12 trillion to global growth.¹

Thus, women’s economic empowerment is not only critical to their personal growth and autonomy—there are also significant economic benefits to removing gender inequality. In the Asia and Pacific region, per capita income would rise by 30.6% after one generation, and 71.1% after two, by improving women’s and girls’ time use allocation, promoting education and training, and increasing women’s labor market participation.²

Promoting Gender Equity at ADB

The ADB Strategy 2020 highlights gender equity as one of five drivers of change for promoting and achieving inclusive and sustainable growth, reducing poverty, improving living standards, and achieving the Millennium Development Goals.³

ADB’s Policy on Gender and Development identifies gender mainstreaming as the key strategy and approach for promoting gender equality and women’s empowerment across all sectors. A dual approach is adopted that includes both gender mainstreaming and targeted approaches to reduce glaring gender disparity.

ADB has set corporate gender targets to be met by 2016: 45% of all operations and 55% of those financed by Asian Development Fund resources will address gender equality objectives. This is broadly referred to at ADB as “operational gender.” In 2013, ADB’s annual performance exceeded the 2016 gender target, with 55% of overall, and 59% of ADF-financed operations categorized as “gender mainstreaming.”

ADB’s Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment Operational Plan, 2013–2020 was approved in 2013. The plan provides the road map for guiding ADB operations, and recognizes that more needs to be done to reduce gender gaps and disparities across the region.

ADB is also committed to improving its own “institutional gender equality.”

Gender Equality and the Trade Finance Program

In 2017 the ADB’s Trade Finance Program guaranteed or funded 3,500 transactions valued at $4.5 billion through partner banks. Beyond its transactional work, the Trade Finance Program sought to conduct a simple gender audit of several partner banks, who volunteered, to assess their institutional gender equality. The rationale was to determine if partner banks’ human resources policies could be enhanced to attract, retain, and promote more women in banking. The study aims to make specific and practical recommendations to partner banks to advance this objective.

The study confirmed that human resources practice in the participating banks is compliant with labor law in each country. Current good practice is highlighted along with areas for further development; there is room to enhance recruitment, and family-friendly promotion and development policies and practices, to attract and retain more females.

Such improvements will contribute to creating a better climate for women to advance their careers, and enable them to play their full role in the workplace. This report also looks at the key success factors and differentiators that contribute to and foster gender equality, such as the availability of talent, the importance of becoming an employer of choice, technological infrastructure, and the use of data to inform the development of policies and practice.

As part of the ADB Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment Operational Plan 2013–2020, the Trade Finance Program, in partnership with the Sustainable Development and Climate Change department, launched the first private sector project on institutional gender equality with the Trade Finance Program’s partner banks in November 2016. Forty banks from nine of the Trade Finance Program’s 21 countries of operation Bangladesh, Fiji, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Myanmar, Pakistan, Samoa, Viet Nam, and Uzbekistan were invited to join the initiative and 20 participated.

This unique project establishes for the first time the extent to which human resources (HR) policies and gender strategies at banks in developing Asia contribute to gender equality. A range of research tools and methods, coaching conversations, and guiding approaches were used in the process. The aim of the initiative is to enable the participants to adopt and advance practical gender- and diversity-inclusive HR policies and practices to increase the employment, retention, and progression of women within the workplace. It has the potential to be expanded beyond the initial countries approached, and to build upon and foster further development within the pilot countries in later phases.

1.1 Methodology and Process

The core documents for the project were the human resources policies, guidelines, and procedures provided by the participants:

• gender strategy;

• recruitment;

• promotion policy and guidelines;

• training, and learning and development;

• family-friendly measures (includes maternity and paternity leave, childcare, leave, and working arrangements); and

• retention measures.

Some of the policies were translated into English for the purposes of the study, while others were already available in English and the local language. It was interesting to note that some organizations only use English.

In addition, gender statistics for headcount, representation at each level of the organization, and turnover figures were requested.

The quantitative and qualitative research methods were

• desk research on each organization, a review of local labor markets, law and practice;

• policy review using analytical tools;

• structured telephone and video interviews with HR and business professionals to supplement documents received and to focus on actual practice;

• an interim report with initial findings for in-depth discussion in-country was developed;

• in-country visits took place in Bangladesh, Myanmar, and Viet Nam⁴ with chief executive officers, chief information officers, chief operating officers and other senior bank and HR management. Discussions covered the banks’ business drivers, gender equality aspirations, operating context, challenges, and initial findings; and

• individual and focus group discussions were held with women in diverse roles in business (operations, retail banking, treasury, financial institutions, small and medium-sized enterprises, structured finance, compliance, and risk). Interviewees were at varying levels in the banks and had differing family situations.

All data sets were updated following the meetings and focus groups.

After reflection and analysis of the consolidated information and further research on gender in the financial sector, the banks have been distinguished according to where they are on their journey toward gender equality: (i) well advanced on their gender journey, (ii) on the journey, or (iii) starting their journey.

Proposals for implementation are set out, along with commentary on key emerging themes. In addition, each bank has been given its own, specific recommendations.

1.2 Overview

Participating ADB Trade Finance Program partner banks have been fully engaged and collaborative, expressing both profound interest in the initiative and interest in being part of potential change. The participants made positive steps toward achieving institutional gender equality in the workplace, and want to exert more effort in this direction. There was a demand from the banks for support on their individual journeys. This augurs well for the future.

The banks included in the study range in size from just over 100 employees to 7,000 in Myanmar and Viet Nam. Some participants are just out of the start-up phase, whereas others have been in existence for longer, and each organization has its own company culture. These factors influence the dynamics of change and what policies and procedures each bank has already put in place.

Cultural norms and societal practices play a role in perceptions of the importance of gender equality and what it means. For example, in Myanmar, women are perceived to have a high status in society based on inheritance and landowning rights, but their role is more limited in decision-making.⁵ Across the region, internalized gender norms appear to lead to the typical gendered division of labor, with women in the banks typically in more junior roles compared to men, and carrying the burden of unpaid work caring for the family and home.⁶

“Women face more difficulties than men, but work harder than men.” – CEO, Viet Nam

The policies, guidelines, and procedures received for each of the areas range from brief e-mail explanations to very detailed documentation. The language used was gender-neutral rather than gender-inclusive. Currently, there are no reliable benchmarks in the region for comparison purposes, and specific data on best practice in HR policies and procedures as they relate to gender equity is lacking. Several global players (SAP, L’Oréal, Axa, Allianz, Technip, and IFC) have been certified for EDGE (Economic Dividends for Gender Equality—a world class standard for gender mainstreaming in business). However, these are very few and far between and most are at the first level (“Assess”). ADB has recently begun the proc...

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Figures
• Foreword
• Acknowledgments
• Abbreviations
• 1. Introduction and Background
• 2. Policies and Recommendations
• 3. Outcomes
• Appendixes