The social pressure and society’s expectations that the women should fulfill their reproductive role often hinders the women from being professionally active and becoming more intensely involved in the political and economic life, psychologist and gender expert Daniela Terzi-Barbarosie said in a roundtable meeting staged by the Institute for Development and Social Initiative “Viitorul”, IPN reports.
The psychologist noted that the reconciliation of professional and private life is the biggest problem faced by the women who become involved in business or occupy executive posts. “Regretfully, the women take a more active part in the process of bringing up children than the men. This diminishes the possibilities of engaging professionally to a greater extent. The global trend as regards the reconciliation of family and professional life is very sad. Statistics show that the women are involved in education in a higher number and study better than the men, but the number of women holding executive posts in Parliament, Government and the business sector is very low,” she stated.
Daniela Terzi-Barbăroşie said such a situation is due to the fact that the women, after getting married, often withdraw from the active professional life, giving priority to the family. But private life should exist before and after marriage and there are countries that start gender equality education at an early age because they realized that the family and society gain benefits from this.
Economist Dorin Vaculovschi considers that the term of social economy is relatively new for Moldova. Social economy is when the companies pursue social goals such as employment, development and community participation and have different inclusive policies and policies to overcome poverty. Gender equality is a social, not economic component. By such social aspects as social economy we can solve many problems. In Moldova, no matter how much they speak about gender equality, the women are a vulnerable group on the labor market and are not engaged in politics and economy to the necessary extent.
Angela Chicu, head of the Association of Professional and Business Women of Moldova, said the women in Moldova can enter the European market with their businesses. As many women chose to go abroad to work, a shortage of skilled labor is often experienced. The Association stages training courses to rehabilitate the women, offering them the possibility of becoming involved.
“There is an inequitable approach to women who intend to start a business. We consider that the women must enjoy the same access to financing instruments as the men. The development of social economy would allow engaging more women in business, but the state institutions should implement more instruments and policies in this regard, with the assistance of the private sector,” said Viorica Antonov, coordinator of the project within which the event was held.
