Saudi Arabia is seeking through its Vision 2030 to increase women’s participation in its development process.
It has prepared 13 programs aimed at achieving sustainable development goals through empowering women in various fields.
During the past few years, women have been assigned leadership positions, and their employment amounted to 8.5 percent in Q4 2018.
The Ministry of Labor and Social Development has set a goal to increase women's participation in the labor market, its Minister, Eng. Ahmed al-Rajhi, told Asharq Al-Awsat.
He explained that this goal includes 10 initiatives that have been rapidly implemented, stressing that it would ensure increasing women’s share in the labor market in the private sector from 29 to 40 percent in late 2020, with the private sector achieving 32.7 percent by the end of 2018.
Rajhi pointed out that women’s economic participation increased from 17 to 19.7 percent by the end of 2018.
He said the goal is to reach 25 percent by 2020 and then work to achieve the Saudi vision’s target of 30 percent by 2030.
Director of Princess Nourah bint Abdulrahman University Dr. Inas bint Suleiman bin Mohammed al-Issa affirmed that the universities’ role in achieving development lies in the knowledge industry.
She said they should provide an integrated system with various public sectors, the private sector, scientific research and innovation.
The universities’ role has evolved with the recent cultural and cognitive revolution, she noted.
Besides being educative, universities have also become institutions for the development of entrepreneurship, innovation and building the economy through knowledge and focus on the concept of sustainable development.
She pointed to an upcoming initiative by her university to empower women through preparing and supporting women leaders, following-up on legislations that support them and establishing human and infrastructure partnership with the public and private sectors.
She noted in this regard that Princess Nourah bint Abdulrahman University has signed with the Ministry of Labor and Social Development a project titled “Leaders of 2030” to train 1,000 female staff in the ministry.
She made her remarks at a conference in Riyadh on Saturday during which indicators of the “National Observatory for Women” was launched. The meeting also included several dialogue sessions on the empowerment of women in various fields.
