THE United Nations’ goal of achieving gender equality by 2030 is impossible to attain because of deeply rooted biases against women around the world, a UN report says.

“The world is failing women and girls,” UN Women, the agency promoting gender equality, and the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs said in their Gender Snapshot 2023 report.

According to its findings, “active resistance to gender equality and chronic underinvestment are key factors in slow progress and, in some cases, reversals of gains already made.” 

The report said: “Unequal access to sexual and reproductive health, unequal political representation, economic disparities and a lack of legal protection, among other issues, prevent tangible progress.”

Launching the report on Thursday, UN assistant secretary-general Maria-Francesca Spatolisano told the media that gender equality is becoming an increasingly distant goal. 

Ms Spatolisano pointed to recent setbacks for women and girls living in fragile and conflict-affected countries and the impact of climate change as well as active resistance to equality.

The report, assessing the progress for women in achieving the 17 UN goals for 2030 on issues including poverty, education and war paints a grim picture of the gender gap and what it described as the “lacklustre commitment” globally to equality for women.

The report said that one in every 10 women today lives on less than $2.15 a day – the extreme poverty level. If current trends continue, it said, 8 per cent of the world’s female population will still be living in extreme poverty in 2030, mostly in sub-Saharan Africa.

On access to education, the report said millions of girls never enter a classroom or complete their education, especially in conflict areas. 

“In 2023, up to 129 million girls and young women may be out of school globally,” the report said. “At current rates of progress, an estimated 110 million will remain out of school in 2030.”

The report said less than two thirds of women aged 25 to 54 — 61.4 per cent — were in the labour force in 2022 compared with 90.6 per cent of men, and the women were paid far less.

“In 2019, for each dollar men earned in labour income, women earned only 51 cents,” it said.

The report also said that the rising number of conflicts across the globe have left a shocking 614 million women and girls living in “conflict-affected contexts” in 2022.