Recent years have been marked by major setbacks for gender parity globally, with previous progress disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact on women and girls in education and the workforce, followed by economic and geopolitical crises. Today, some parts of the world are seeing partial recoveries while others are experiencing deteriorations as new crises unfold. Global gender gaps in health and education have narrowed over the past year, yet progress on political empowerment is effectively at a standstill, and women’s economic participation has regressed rather than recovered.

The tepid progress on persistently large gaps documented in this seventeenth edition of the Global Gender Gap Report creates an urgent case for renewed and concerted action. Accelerating progress towards gender parity will not only improve outcomes for women and girls but benefit economies and societies more widely, reviving growth, boosting innovation and increasing resilience. The report provides a tool for consistent tracking of gender gaps across the economic, political, health and education spheres, and is designed for leaders to identify areas for individual and collective action.