Despite advancements globally for women’s and girls’ rights, these achievements remain delicate and susceptible to reversal. In 2024, a alarming one in four countries worldwide experienced setbacks in women’s rights as reported in UN Women’s latest assessment.
Belén Sanz, Regional Director of UN Women for Europe and Central Asia, remarked to Euronews that while the world is more gender-equitable today than at any historical juncture, this progress isn’t assured and without consistent effort could be undone. Sanz emphasized women’s significant strides in the global arena, yet lamented the troubling trend of backslides in these rights.
The UN Women report, “Women’s Rights in Review: 30 Years After Beijing,” shows substantial progress in areas such as girls’ education, a third reduction in maternal mortality, and women’s parliamentary representation which has more than doubled in the past thirty years. However, Sanz urges the European Union and global community to remain vigilant against potential retrogressions, underscoring that the current advancements can be swiftly dismantled.
The report brought to light that in 2024, a quarter of the world’s countries witnessed pushbacks against women’s rights. Sanz cited Georgia’s scrapping of its parliamentary gender quota as a concerning example of regression.
Sanz advocated for the reinforcement of the European Union’s policies and called for comprehensive monitoring and sufficient resources to prevent any potential reversal of these gains. She pointed out that around 50 million women in the EU experience high levels of sexual and physical violence, and the gender employment gap remains a pressing issue, with unpaid care responsibilities disproportionately affecting women.
Globally, women are burdened with 2.5 times more unpaid care work than men, with this inequity even more pronounced in Europe and Central Asia. Sanz argued that progress, while achievable, has been sluggish, disjointed, and precarious, asserting that the world is neglecting its responsibility to women and girls.
UN Women’s estimations show a long road ahead: a girl born today would not live to see the day women hold an equal number of parliamentary seats as men, child marriage eradicated, or extreme poverty eliminated without commitment to change.
Sanz warned that recent global crises, including the pandemic, climate change, and economic instability, have only heightened the imperative for action. She asserted that 2025 will be a critical point for women’s rights and feared that anti-feminist and far-right movements are misleadingly framing gender equality, threatening to roll back the progress made.
“There is no room for additional setbacks. Women and girls cannot wait; we must find solutions together,” Sanz concluded.
Source: https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2025/03/08/world-more-gender-equal-than-ever-but-progress-is-reversible-warns-un-women-regional-chief
