UN Women joins JSE in celebrating International Women’s Day

The Jamaica Stock Exchange (JSE) is championing the cause of gender equality across the globe and joined Gender Minister, Olivia ‘Babsy’ Grange in commemorating March 8, as International Women’s Day (IWD).

The JSE, along with the UN Women took time out to ‘Ring the Bell’ in recognition of women internationally and especially honouring all Jamaican and Caribbean women.

In 2022, IWD was celebrated under the theme, ‘Gender Equality Today for a Sustainable Tomorrow’. This year the celebration continued for equality under the theme, ‘DigitAll: Innovation and Technology for Gender Equality’.

JSE Managing Director Marlene Street Forrest stated that the theme recognises that, while the beginning of the digital age (3rd revolution), the disposition of the revolution was more skewed to males. She observes the movement into the 4th revolution, where lives become more rearranged around digital gadgets, computer, robots and the use of artificial intelligence where some jobs are put at risk, resulting in the disproportionate displacement of women and girls.

Traditional female jobs at risk

She contends that jobs such as call centres and secretarial or administrative assistants are being replaced by digitally programmed devices. Tonni-Ann Brodber, representative, UN Women Multi Country Office – Caribbean spokes a 2022 UN Women, Sustainable Stock Exchanges and IFC publication on how stock exchanges can advance gender equality.

She said inputs were made by 71 experts from 52 organisations across 32 countries, making what is called the informal Stock Exchange Gender Equality Group noting that the Chair of this Group was Street Forrest.

For her part, Grange acknowledged that the JSE and her ministry share similar objectives in shining a light on the critical role that business and markets play in tackling gender inequalities. These include, but are not limited to:

• A focus on advancing gender equality and women’s empowerment in the workplace, marketplace, and community.
• Encouraging adoption and implementation of the Women’s Empowerment Principles (WEPs).
• Highlighting the importance of building a pipeline of women’s leadership talent.
• Promoting gender inclusion and women’s full and effective leadership in all aspects of society.
• Raising awareness about the Stand-Alone, Gender Transformational Goal 5 of the SDGs which promotes the achievement of gender equality for all women and girls.
• Implementing the recommendations of the National Policy for Gender Equality, concerning gender quotas for women in leadership.

The JSE hosted a panel discussion based on the theme with the four panelists being Jamaica Defence Force Chief of Staff, Rear Admiral Antonette Wemyss; Chorvelle Johnson-Cunningham – CEO of Sagicor Bank; Carol Robertson – Senior Business Development Partner, B2B Enterprise Sales; C&W Business and Imani Duncan-Price, Caribbean Coordinator, International Domestic Workers Federation (IDWF) and Consultant to UN Women.