South Korea urged not to abolish gender equality ministry

South Korean President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol’s election pledge of removing the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family is “premature” and would give the “completely wrong policy signal”, said a senior economist at the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), according to The Korea Herald. 

“Not all OECD countries have a Ministry for Gender Equality, but there are always public agencies that further gender equality in public life — either housed within another ministry or, for example a Prime Minister’s or Cabinet Office,” Willem Adema, senior economist in the OECD’s social policy division told the publication. 

“However, gender inequalities in other OECD countries are often not as large as in Korea. Hence, the abolition of the Ministry of Gender Equality seems rather premature and gives completely the wrong policy signal,” he added. 

President-elect Yoon has said that the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family is obsolete, and “is done serving its purpose in history”. 

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Adema highlighted that “women are also under-represented in leadership positions in public life and spend far more time at home on unpaid household chores than men”, and noted that South Korea has the largest gender pay gap among OECD countries, with a huge gender employment gap of almost 20 percentage points.