Jakarta, 9 May 2022 – Women’s representation on various fronts in Indonesia and globally continuously improves. However, the latest censuses from the IDX, IBCWE and BOI Research show that only 15% of female executives and 4% of CEOs in the top 200 companies indexed by the IDX. Out of the 11 corporate sectors on the IDX, only the consumer cyclical and healthcare sectors have the highest female executive representation with29% and 27%.
Globally, the business world’s interest in improving gender equality at the corporate level is increasing. Recently, Indonesia’s B20 presidency has also committed to providing recommendations and policies to encourage the business world to reduce or eliminate gender disparities in companies.
To support this vision, Indonesia Stock Exchange (IDX), together with Indonesia Business Coalition for Women Empowerment (IBCWE) and BOI Research, has initiated the first steps to understand more about the situation of women’s leadership in large companies in Indonesia through the Census of Women in Executive Position in 200 Companies (Top 200) of IDX. In addition to women’s representation, the census also analyses the composition and gender balance at the company’s executive level. The gender balance refers to using global and national indicators to have at least 30% of females in the company. The census was conducted by focusing on the situation of the top 200 IDX companies in 2019-2021.
In general, there is still a lot of homework that needs to be done to increase the representation of female executives in the top 200 IDX companies. The study finds that there is only 15% of female executives across the 200 IDX companies. This percentage has stagnated since 2019. In line with these findings, the number of female CEOs in the top 200 IDX companies remains static at 4% (8 CEOs) in 2019-2021.
Furthermore, BOI Research finds that several sectors have begun to show good performance in terms of female executive representation, such as in the consumer cyclical (29%) and healthcare (27%) sectors. These two sectors are also the ‘champion sectors’ that have almost achieved gender balance in the top 200 companies indexed by the IDX. But in contrast, the infrastructure, transportation & logistics, and basic materials sectors in the top 200 IDX companies still need to increase their gender diversity at the board of directors level. In 2021, there was only one woman out of 10 executives in the three industries.
This study also analysed the representation of female executives in line and functional roles. Line roles are defined as positions responsible for the company’s profits and losses, while functional roles refer to those without such responsibility. Based on these roles, women’s representation is still lacking by only having 10% of the line roles. The proportion of women in functional roles is also stagnant, fluctuating around 19% since 2019.
