- Title: UAE: Women benefit from high rate of female employement in United Arab Emirates.
- Date: 24th October 2007
- Summary: (MER1) DUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES (RECENT) (REUTERS) TRAFFIC DRIVING THROUGH A STREET IN DUBAI STUDENTS WALKING INTO CLASSROOM FOR AN ENGLISH LANGUAGE COURSE VARIOUS OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE COURSE TAUGHT BY EGYPTIAN TEACHER REEM (SOUNDBITE) (Arabic) REEM, EGYPTIAN TEACHER OF ENGLISH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE, SAYING: ''In reality, life here does not involve any difficulties rega
- Embargoed: 8th November 2007 16:30
- Keywords:
- Topics: Employment,Lifestyle
- Reuters ID: LVA2BEY53LAE59UGEAPGSF7UVJDI
- Aspect Ratio: 4:3
- Story Text: More and more professional women are joining the work force in the United Arab Emirates, which boasts a high rate of female employment and a work environment many women find supportive.
Reem, a young Egyptian woman, left her family and country in search of a better living. She headed for the United Arab Emirates, having heard from friends it was a country which offers a favourable working environment for women. She is now pursuing a career teaching English as a foreign language in the Arab Gulf country. Most of her students at the Dubai foreign language institute are men.
''In reality, life here does not involve any difficulties regarding being a working woman, men do not have any advantages over women. The woman here can be self-reliant, she can hold any job that a man can hold, she can form work contacts, she can have her own car to drive and benefit from being able to go out and do everything in life without the feeling that the man is dominant or that she is deprived of anything," Reem said.
The United Arab Emirates prides itself on a high rate of female employment in comparison to other Arab Gulf countries, and has become a favoured destination for women in the Middle East and Gulf seeking employment and career development.
Ateas Ismael, an Iraqi medical doctor working in Dubai, says the UAE boasts a large number of working women, but most women employed in the highly skilled professions in the UAE are expatriates.
''I've realised that posts in many highly skilled sectors such as medicine and engineering are filled by expatriates rather than Emiratis. I also realised that the local woman can work in all fields. She has proved her competence in education, management, banking, the police force and also in medicine''.
The UAE government has taken measures to encourage the general drafting of Emiratis into the private sector, including educational programmes and the Tanmia initiative, which promotes employment of UAE nationals in the fast-growing economy where most jobs are held by foreign workers.
Tanmia said women make up a majority of job seekers in the UAE.
The government measures, according to businesswoman Fatima al-Jaber, CEO of the private contracting and trading company the Al Jaber Group, and deputy chairman of the Abu Dhabi Businesswomen's Council, is leading to the integration of Emirati women into all sectors of the country's thriving economy.
"I think the presence of women is increasing significantly is all sectors such as financial institutions, engineering and construction. The number of both expatriate and local working women is increasing. In medicine, there are a lot of Emirati women doctors. Their numbers are increasing in the financial sector, and in the legal field, there are a lot of our sisters that are lawyers. There are also many women who work in education and teaching. I feel that women, Emirati women, can be found in all sectors of the economy," al-Jaber said.
Al-Jaber was speaking at the "New Arab Women's Forum" which Dubai hosted on Sunday (October 21) and Monday (October 22), gathering a large number of professional women from the Gulf and the Middle East who spoke on the condition of women in the workplace and the empowerment of women in the region through employment.
Women constituted 11.7 per cent of the country's labour force in 1995 and rose to 14.7 per cent in 2003.
The number of national female workers has more than tripled over eight years, from 16,000 workers in 1995 to 52,000 in 2003. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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