Hong Kong must unleash women's potential to drive progress

The Hong Kong government attaches great importance to promoting the well-being of women. The Women's Commission plays a high-level strategic role in advising the government on policies, legislation and services affecting women.

We have adopted a three-pronged approach which boils down to the "Three E's" strategy: enabling, empowering and educating women to play a full role in society and to unleash their potential.

First is an enabling environment. Since 2002, we have implemented gender mainstreaming in over 45 policy or programme areas, including promoting stopping smoking, breastfeeding and the provision of baby-care facilities, as well as the development of a gender-specific programme for women offenders.

Another example is the introduction in 2004 of a gender benchmark of 25 per cent for appointing members to the many government statutory and advisory bodies. The benchmark was further increased to 30 per cent in 2010. Currently, 33 per cent of all government-appointed members are women.

In the corporate world, it is encouraging that the Hong Kong exchange is promoting board diversity, including gender diversity.

In the Executive Council, there are five women among 15 non-official members. And let us not forget that our chief secretary is a woman. At the top of the civil service, half of the 18 permanent secretaries are female.

We have 11 female elected members among the 70 Legislative Council members. At the district level, 89 district council members are women. This figure is on the low side, considering we have more than 500 members in the territory. Obviously, more needs to be done to achieve true equality.