”Singapore’s top companies have led from the front in helping to remedy one of the blights on the local corporate scene – the under-representation of women on company boards.
A new report has found that across the 30 listed companies comprising the blue chip Straits Times Index (STI), 10.2 per cent of board seats were held by women last year, up from 7.6 per cent in 2014.
It was an even brighter picture for new appointments, with women accounting for 27 per cent, significantly higher than the overall 14 per cent, said the Diversity Action Committee (DAC) yesterday.
The DAC is the authority on statistics tackling women’s representation on boards of Singapore Exchange (SGX)-listed companies.
Only nine of the 30 STI companies continue to have all-male boards, it noted.
The DAC also found that besides large firms, smaller companies also improved their gender diversity.
Overall, women held 9.5 per cent of directorships in all 758 SGX-listed companies last year, up from 8.8 per cent in 2014 and 8.3 in 2013.
DAC chairman Magnus Bocker said: “For the past two years, we have seen a significant improvement in the number of women directors on boards of SGX-listed companies, especially in large companies.
“This indicates that companies are responding to investor groups’ and the DAC’s call for greater gender diversity on boards, as part of a broader view of board diversity.”……………………..”
Source: The Strait Times – http://www.straitstimes.com/business/companies-markets/women-stepping-up-in-singapore-boardrooms
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