KARACHI: Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) celebrated International Women’s Day with an elaborate gong ceremony held at main trading hall of the Exchange.
Distinguished women leaders, executives, professionals and eminent women from different walks of life participated in the celebration. PSX, along with UN Women, Women On Board (WOB), International Finance Corporation (IFC) and Pakistan Institute of Corporate Governance (PICG) marked this auspicious day by ringing the bell for gender equality for a sustainable future. PSX joined more than a 100 exchanges all over the world to mark this important day this year.
The Ceremony included striking of the gong led by Dr. Shamshad Akhtar, Chairperson PSX; Ms Sima Kamil, Deputy Governor, State Bank of Pakistan; and distinguished women of the country from various fields ranging from banking, financial, entrepreneurial, and corporate sector to designing, medical, and legal professions.
The gong striking was followed by speeches by Dr. Shamshad Akhtar; Ms. Zunee Muhtashim, Principal Investment Officer - International Finance Corporation; Ms. Maryam Baqir, Co-Founder–Women On Board, and Ahsan Jamil, CEO –Pakistan Institute of Corporate Governance. A prominent part of the Ceremony was a Panel Discussion followed by a Q&A session. Mementos were also presented to the participants of the event.
Speaking at the occasion, the Chairperson of PSX, Dr. Shamshad Akhtar said International Women’s Day is a UN global compact initiative that lifts the ambition surrounding SDG5 on gender equality and its reinforcing components from leadership to empowerment.
In recent years, there is a growing recognition that nurturing capital markets ecosystem can facilitate financial inclusion process significantly, she said. An untapped but high potential area, the capital markets ecosystem, if structured effectively, will have high payoffs in terms of reducing gender disparities, she said adding that companies need to be rewarded for gender-equitable hiring.
“At PSX, we encourage listed companies to report on ESG and SDG5 to promote gender equality and inclusivity. We at PSX look forward to working with Sustainable Stock Exchanges (SSE) Initiative, the World Federation of Exchanges’ (WFE) sustainability working group and with others to adopt gender equality goals and women empowerment efforts within the overarching ESG principles”, she said.
“This year, as we mark International Women’s Day at PSX and across the world, we stand to resolve to further the cause of gender equality, diversity, and inclusion in our societal and corporate structures as well as industry,” Farrukh H Khan, CEO of Pakistan Stock Exchange said.
He said Pakistan Stock Exchange is proud of the fact that it promotes inclusion of women in its workforce with more than 16 percent employees comprising of women and more than 40 percent of the direct reports to the CEO being women. Moreover, PSX promotes gender diversity and equality in listed companies, as well, whereby, for the PSX Top 25 Companies Awards 2021, the criteria set-out for winners includes the reporting on SDG of Gender Equality as part of the 6 minimum SDGs required for listed companies to report on.
“The year 2022 marks our eighth year globally and fourth with the Pakistan Stock Exchange to promote women’s empowerment through Ring the Bell for Gender Equality event,” said Zunee Muhtashim, IFC’s Principal Investment Officer.
“Women hold just 5 percent of CEO roles and around 20 percent of board positions worldwide. We work with regulators and stock exchanges across emerging markets to encourage increased gender diversity at work and in leadership positions, and, ultimately, spur inclusive sustainable growth.”
Maryam Baqir, Co-Founder, Women on Board said that Women on Board is pleased to be at the forefront of building the momentum for an increasing role for the women on the Board table. The next evolution in this process is to build a solid pipeline of eligible female leaders to steer the Pakistani corporate sector to the next level.
Ahsan Jamil, CEO, Pakistan Institute of Corporate Governance said it’s time to take greater Affirmative Action to get women on boards. Necessary exposure, training and support for women board members is a critical responsibility of the Corporate. Tokenism must give way to active and real support, so more women enter and rise to board room challenges. This would go a long way in unlocking real value for all stakeholders, and help create pathways to a more balanced, inclusive, and humane society, he added.
To support this, Ahsan Jamil announced that PICG will provide a 50 percent discount to all women participants in its Directors Training Program for FY22. He advocated SDG 17 related to working in partnerships as critical to moving the needle on gender diversity and inclusion and cited the UN “HeForShe” campaign to enlist male role models who support women in the journey to gender equity.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2022
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