Coordinating Minister Airlangga: Women's Economic Empowerment Is The Key To Exit Strategy

Coordinating Minister for the Economy Airlangga Hartarto. (Photo Doc. Ekon.go.id)

JAKARTA - Coordinating Minister for Economic Affairs Airlangga Hartarto said, during times of crisis including the COVID-19 pandemic, economic empowerment for women around the world continues to face major obstacles.

Seeing this, as an outreach group in the G20 Indonesia Presidency that represents women's voices, Women 20 (W20) through the W20 Summit with the theme "En Route to Gender Equality for Gender Welfare" is committed to bridging gender disparities.

“Putting women's economic empowerment at the heart of the forum is key to delivering a successful global exit strategy. This is important because across all G20 members, gender gaps persist and hinder sustainable development," said Airlangga Hartarto when giving a virtual speech at the W20 Summit, Thursday, July 21.

Airlangga said the G20 leaders agreed to reduce the gender gap in labor force participation by 25 percent by 2025 at the 2014 Summit in Brisbane, supported by establishing Women 20 (W20) during the Turkish Presidency in 2015.

Through the G20 Presidency in 2022, he continued, Indonesia now has a big responsibility to focus on delivering the mission.

"At the helm of the world's main economic forum, we want to see tangible results in women's economic empowerment," said Airlangga.

The G20 Forum aims to support members in achieving the G20 target of closing the gender gap in participation by 25 percent by 2025, as well as progress for women's representation in economic activities.

This effort to ensure women's empowerment also thrives in all public and private sectors.

Indonesia certainly wants to take advantage of this opportunity to support women to innovate in business.

The G20 Forum will prioritize sharing best practices in supporting women to access the tools they need as entrepreneurs, and exploring how to best design a framework to support women to succeed in business.

Airlangga appreciated the signs of progress and strength as a result of women's economic empowerment.

Currently, about half of the G20 members have shown better-than-expected progress towards achieving the 2025 goals compared to 2012.

In Indonesia, the role of women is increasingly significant in the national economy.

As many as 61 percent of women contribute to the economy and about 50 percent of the 60 million MSMEs in Indonesia are owned by women.

This is very significant because Indonesian MSMEs are able to absorb 97% of the workforce in the business sector.

The Indonesian government also continues to support women's economic empowerment through the allocation of People's Business Credit (KUR) and the Pre-Employment Card Program.

"We need to do more to achieve W20 goals, namely Recover Together and Recover Equally," said Airlangga.

The Indonesian presidency has identified two main priorities for women's empowerment, which are aimed at creating new economic value and empowering women in the new economy.

First, supporting women-owned MSMEs to fully participate in an inclusive digital-based economic transformation.

Second, invest in digital skills and STEM skills of women and girls to participate in all sectors of the economy.

Coordinating Minister Airlangga hopes that W20 can continue this task and looks forward to seeing the results in the future, especially the W20 communique.

It is believed that the W20 communiqué will add valuable insights to the G20 Leaders Declaration and enhance Indonesia's approach to mainstreaming women's empowerment in the G20 agenda.

“I noted that women can build a much better future generation so that women can act as bridges to improve the quality of life in the future. The idea prepared by W20 this year can be an opportunity to increase the role of women in sustainable development in the midst of a wave of world challenges," he concluded.