The AICD’s quarterly report on gender diversity shows female appointments to ASX200 companies’ boards has barely grown.
An Australian corporate leadership body is questioning why women still do not make up 30 per cent of ASX200 companies’ boards, given the country’s vast talent pool of female directors.
The Australian Institute of Company Directors’ quarterly report on gender diversity revealed on Thursday that at the end of June women overall made up 29.7 per cent of Australia’s biggest listed companies’ boards.
The new data shows a rise of just 0.2 per cent from 29.5 per cent for the corresponding three months to March 31.
AICD’s chief executive Angus Armour says the stagnating results showed more work needed to be done.
“Boards struggling with gender diversity should ask themselves if their search processes are effective and competitive enough to access the large talent pool of female directors in Australia,” Mr Armour said.
“While gender diversity on boards is not sliding backwards, the figures haven’t shifted since December 2018 and clearly more work needs to be done,” he said.
Gender diversity on boards has climbed more than 10 percentage points after the AICD in 2015 called for Australia to become the first country to achieve a result of 30 per cent by 2018.
By the beginning of 2019 the AICD believed Australia was on track to meet the desired result imminently, but a fall at the start of the year marked a drop from 29.7 per cent in December.
In 2015, the number of ASX200 boards with 30 per cent female representation was 40.
It was 96 at the end of 2018.
Four companies – portfolio manager HUB24, parts manufacturer ARB Corp, earthmoving rental firm Emeco and TPG Telecom – had no women on their boards as of June 30.
This year the percentage of female appointments to Australia’s biggest listed companies is 29.1 per cent.
Source: AAP
