WASHINGTON, June 23, 2023 – Mexico has made substantial progress on gender equality over the years, but remaining gaps limit the country's economic potential. For this reason, the Mexican government promotes public policies to create economic opportunities for women and promote sustainable and inclusive growth, fostering productivity. In recognition of these public policies, the World Bank will provide technical and financial support to the Mexican government.
“Improving women's access to economic opportunities is key to improving their productivity and income, thus reducing inequalities in Mexico,” said Mark R. Thomas, World Bank director for Mexico, Colombia, and Venezuela. “In addition, the supported reforms will help decarbonize the transport sector in Mexico, the main source of carbon emissions in the country,” he added.
This support will be implemented through a US$700 million operation, approved today by the executive board of the World Bank and which the government of Mexico will have one year to contract. The operation will promote public policies advocated by the authorities with the objective of closing gender gaps and facilitating women's access to better jobs. It seeks to increase their productivity, strengthen the social protection of all domestic workers, facilitate digital financial inclusion, and improve the system for the prevention of gender-based violence.
In addition, transport policy reforms will be supported to favor public and non-motorized transport that reduce carbon emissions and respond to the specific transport needs of women to access employment and education.
The operation is based on two pillars that complement each other. The first pillar supports reforms that promote economic opportunities for women by improving their safety in the use of public and non-motorized transport. It also seeks to extend social security coverage to all domestic workers —mostly women— thus increasing the value of their work and their household’s resilience when facing income fluctuations and other risks. Likewise, it seeks to improve systems for the prevention of gender-based violence.
The second pillar supports reforms that promote sustainable productivity growth by prioritizing the expansion of efficient and low-emission modes of transport. The financial and digital inclusion of women will be promoted, a solid system of evaluation and mitigation of the climatic, environmental, and social impacts of large transport projects will be established, and a gender perspective will be applied in the definition of eligible sustainable infrastructure projects.
These measures are expected to improve the perception and safety of women when using non-motorized and public transport, helping approximately half of the people who use public transport in Mexico, and preventing women from opting for private motorized mobility, thus improving their quality of life and reducing the carbon footprint of the transport sector.
The supported policies complement other government interventions to combat gender-based violence on public transport and on the streets, including broader communication and education campaigns, among others. In the long term, the availability of safer transport will improve women's mobility and therefore their ability to access economic opportunities.
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