PNB Commits to Support Women Empowerment Principles
Philippine National Bank (PNB) takes its commitment to support gender equality and inclusion to the next level by signing the UN Women Empowerment Principles (UN WEP) organized by the UN Women Asia and the Pacific and Women Business Council Philippines last March 31, 2021.
Launched in 2010 by UN Women and UN Global Compact, the Women Empowerment Principles or WEPs is a roadmap to business sustainability and growth. It is a framework of seven principles that provide guidance for companies to promote transformative change towards gender equality and women empowerment in the workplace, marketplace, and community. These principles will guide companies in evaluating and assessing their policies, projects, and practices, and in identifying areas for improvement.
PNB Chair Florencia Tarriela said: “the Bank hopes to learn from the best practices of other companies locally and abroad, as well as access information and share experiences to further push the promotion of gender quality and women empowerment within PNB. “
Prior to joining the WEPs global community as one of the signatories, PNB has been integrating gender equality and inclusion into the bank’s Sustainability Policy and specific Human Resource policies such as Workplace Gender Equality, Anti-Sexual Harassment, Whistleblower’s Policy, and Diversity and Inclusion.
During the ceremonial virtual signing event, Women Business Council Philippines Chairperson Ms. Monette Hamlin said that the signing event for the WEPs is a momentous event for the Philippine companies in driving gender equality and women empowerment agenda. She added that though the country is making a traction in pushing these agenda by having more women leaders at the helm of their companies now, there are still issues and circumstances which pose as barriers to women’s active participation in the economy and other arenas such as women’s unpaid care work.
In addition to being women leaders of their respective companies, these women also hold multiple roles such as that of a mother, wife, daughter, sister, and a caregiver among others which are usually unpaid or non-monetized. The UN Women estimates the value of such roles to be over a total of 16.4 billion hours spent on unpaid care work every day, which is roughly equal to 2 billion people working 8 hours a day without pay, at 9% of the global GPD or USD11 Trillion. She further explained that women’s unpaid care work at home can be put to good use and can add to the economy if the burden is lifted from the women and shared equally by the men in her house. She emphasized that it is in the home that values formation and respect for women is first developed or formulated. It is also in the home where the next generation of women leaders are developed.
Currently, the Philippines ranks first globally in terms of women leadership positions, with about 48% of senior positions in companies held by women. At PNB, Women employees took up 6,014 of the total employee population, with the number of female employees slightly higher in 2020 than in 2019 and 2018. For three consecutive years, the Bank continued to maintain a gender disparity of 2:1 ratio as the female population takes up 66.3% of the total workforce compared to the male population taking only 33.7%. In terms of key management positions, 59.6% are held by women leaders belonging to the AVP to EVP ranks, compared to 40.4% of men holding key positions
Ms. Katja Friewald, Regional Programme Manager for We Empower Asia from the UN Women Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific delivered, delivered the keynote message for the event. She explained that the event is not all just about signing a commitment document but is also about making a strong call to action to all business leaders regardless of size and sector to start their rebuilding and recovery from the pandemic with the women and girl children in mind. She said that more than 40 million women and girls have fallen into poverty across the world as this pandemic is rising, and that the business community has a huge role to help work against this. She emphasized the important role of the business leaders in promoting and facilitating the integration of gender equality and women empowerment in their organization’s DNA, including it in the companies’ business operations. Signing the WEPs is just the first step for companies to do this, as well as by being part of a global community that works together towards a common agenda which is to advance gender equality and women empowerment in the country.
The UN Women will continue to provide the necessary support in terms of capacity building and activities to the members of the WEPs community to sustain and heighten the momentum of the gender equality efforts the Philippines. In addition, the UN Women will soon launch an innovative program called Care Entrepreneurship Accelerator to help women entrepreneurs who are developing solutions to address the unpaid care work issue of women which holds back many of them back from active participation in the economy.
Ms. Ma. Rosalyn Mesinas, Philippines Programme Manager of UN Women, who also served as event moderator, gave a short introduction on each of the seven WEPs including the corresponding success indicators. Companies may adopt all or select a few specific principles and indicators that they would want to focus and report on. She explained that promoting and integrating WEPs is a winning situation for a company as it does not only promote women’s rights as human rights and ensure the sustainability of the business, but it also enables the company to directly contribute to the UN Sustainability Development Goal No. 5 on Gender Equality. In addition, advancing women’s empowerment drives economic growth and supports business performance and resilience through innovation, cost savings and productivity, market growth, and trust and credibility between and among employees, consumers, and other stakeholders.
Ms. Mylene Abiva, President of Women Business Council Philippines and representing the women-led companies in the country, read the council’s statement of commitment to support WEPs. She enjoined all women leaders present during the signing ceremony to promote women empowerment and gender equality within their own companies.
As of March 2021, over 4,000 companies in 141 countries, have signed and committed to implementing the WEPs. In the Philippines alone, a total of 70 individual companies and member companies of Women Business Council Philippines and the Filipina CEO Circle joined the WEP global community, and PNB is the first local bank signatory to the UN WEPs.
In support of PNB’s sustainability agenda, the Bank also plans to develop and work on a Plan of Action to demonstrate its commitment and sincerity in pushing the Gender Equality and Women Empowerment within its ecosystem of employees, customers / clients, vendors / suppliers, outsourced personnel, third-party service providers, and external communities. The Bank hopes that by doing so, it will inspire others and create a ripple effect especially among its clients to also adopt women empowerment and gender equality principles in their own business and operations.