Republic of Moldova

Over recent years, gender equality has become a major concern of the Government of Moldova. The Government has tried to promote equality of opportunities between women and men through different actions. The achievement of this goal will facilitate the accomplishment of all the other Millennium Development Goals.

International targets

• Eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education preferably by 2005 and in all levels of education no later than 2015.
  

Initial national targets

• Expand women’s participation in the social life.
  

(Source: draft National Report „Millennium Development Goals Report:„New Challenges – New Objectives”)

 

Revised national targets

• Increase women’s representation in decision-making positions. Increase the representation of women at the decisionmaking level (from 26.5% in local councils in 2007 to 40% in 2015, from 13.2% in district councils in 2007 to 25% in 2015, from 18% of women mayors in 2007 to 25% in 2015 and from 22% women lawmakers in 2005 to 30% in 2015).
• Reduce gender inequality in employment: reduce the disparity between women’s and men’s salaries by at least 10% by 2015 (the average monthly salary of women was 68.1% of the average man's salary in 2006).

TRENDS

• In 2005, women held only 20.7 percent of Parliamentary seats. Although this figure is higher than in 1998 and 2001 (8.7 percent and 15.8 percent respectively), this level of the representation is not sufficient to ensure an equal number of seats held by men and women.
• At the legislative administrative level, the current structure is more favorable for women. The number of women lawmakers rose from 22 percent in 2005 to 24.7 percent in 2009.
• Moldovan women are mostly employed in low-paying jobs and occupy lower positions in the job hierarchy where they are employed. In 2008 the average monthly salary of women was 73.3 percent of the average man's salary, which was an increase of 0.7 percentage points compared to 2007.
• Discrepancies between the salaries of women and men have decreased in recent years, with the average female salary standing at 76.4 percent of the average male salary in 2009.

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