INTRODUCTION

• Statistics on Women Empowerment in Selected Domains, Malaysia, 2024 presents gender statistics in Malaysia.
• These statistics focus on the core set of gender indicators covering eleven main domains namely economic structures, participation in productive activities and access to resources; education; health and related services, public life and decision making; human rights of women and girls, social protection (special focus: population ageing); disaster risk reduction; peace and security; refugees; environment and climate change; and international migration.
• This publication also highlights Malaysia Gender Gap Index (MGGI) at the national and state levels.

MALAYSIA GENDER GAP INDEX (MGGI) DEFINITION

• MGGI identifies the gap between women and men across four sub-indices encompassing Economic participation and opportunity, Educational attainment, Health and survival, and Political empowerment. A score with a value of 1.0 (100%) indicates the equality of women and men has been achieved.
• This index is prepared using the methodology of the Global Gender Gap Index (GGGI) published by the World Economic Forum (WEF) and data released by the Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM) and other agencies in Malaysia. MGGI 2023 comprises four sub-indices and 14 indicators.

MALAYSIA GENDER GAP INDEX (MGGI) SCORE 2023

• MGGI showed the score of 0.705, or 70.5 per cent in 2023.
• Women’s achievement has surpassed men’s in the Educational attainment sub-index with a score of 1.071.
• Health and survival sub-index recorded a score of 0.956, followed by Economic participation and opportunity (score 0.698).
• Political empowerment recorded the lowest score with 0.096, showing women lagged behind men in the political arena.

MGGI 2023 BY STATES

• The top three states that recorded the higher MGGI score in 2023 were W.P. Kuala Lumpur (0.776), W.P. Putrajaya (0.773) and W.P. Labuan (0.756).
• Seven other states that recorded MGGI above the national level, namely Kelantan (0.737), Negeri Sembilan (0.718), Melaka, Selangor and Sabah (0.715), Perak (0.711) and Kedah (0.707).

FACTS AND STATISTICS ABOUT WOMEN

• It is estimated that 15.9 million (47.7%) of Malaysia population are female out of a total of 33.4 million in 2023.
• There were 219,780 female baby born out of a total of 455,761 live births in 2023.
• Labour force participation rate (LFPR) for women was at 56.2 per cent. However, LFPR for female graduates in 2023 showed a higher percentage at 83.2 per cent.
• Mean monthly salaries and wages for female graduates increase to RM4,683 in 2023 (2022: RM4,435).
• Based on findings from Economic Census 2023, there were 219,015 women-owned establishments across all sectors in 2022, as compared to 187,265 establishments in 2015.