International Women's Day: PSX, partners ring bell for gender equality

KARACHI: Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) along with its partners, Women On Board (WOB) Initiative, Pakistan Institute of Corporate Governance (PICG), and Pakistan Business Council (PBC) held a gong ceremony to mark International Women's Day at the Stock Exchange.

PSX celebrated women's day this year along with over 100 exchanges worldwide, to reiterate its commitment to the cause of gender equality and inclusion of women. The ceremony included gong striking to begin the trading day by the prominent women invited to the event, memento distribution and an interactive session with the media.

Speaking at the occasion, the PSX MD and CEO Farrukh H Khan said Pakistan Stock Exchange is not only celebrating this event every year for the last four years, but is also making tangible efforts to materialise the objective of gender equality in the capital market and corporate sector of Pakistan. He said Pakistan Stock Exchange not only promotes inclusion of women in its workforce with 14 percent employees and 25 percent of the senior management comprising of women and over 40 percent of the direct reports to the CEO being women, but it also promotes inclusion of women amongst the listed companies whereby PSX has included the criteria of gender equality as one of the seven minimum SDGs required for listed companies to report on, in order to qualify for the Top 25 Companies Award. Moreover, weightage is given for having a woman director on board and for having women employed in senior positions in the listed companies for their candidacy for the PSX Top 25 Companies Award.

Talking about the significance of marking this special day, WOB Initiative team-lead/ founder Aftab Ahmad Chaudhry said WOB appreciates the constant support of PSX for extending the availability of its floor since 2017, to mark the market opening by the inspirational women leaders each year on the eve of International Women's Day. This event has enabled the recognition of the participation of women in the economic development of the country and the importance of woman leadership in the corporate sector.

The PICG CEO Ahsan Jamil said, "Our society is, as a whole, undergoing a transition into a more socially conscious paradigm, of which gender equality is a critical component.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2021