During my participation at the recent Government Summit in Dubai, one of the questions debated on my panel was: “What are some of the obstacles that hinder women’s progress towards leadership positions in the Arab world?” I cannot speak for the entire region nor can I elaborate on the question extensively in this space. But I can identify one major obstacle facing working women in the UAE – the length of maternity leave.
Society places unreasonable expectations on working women. On the one hand, there is wide social acceptance for women to join the workforce and seek professional success, but on the other, there is also the expectation that they need to be super-efficient home makers. The equation hardly adds up. Recognising the rights of women and empowering women are two different things. It is easy to make the right sounds about the importance of women in the workforce, but that needs to be translated on the ground.
Empowering women comes in the form of creating the right environment for women to not only survive in the workforce, but also to thrive. Bearing children is a natural process for women, and is necessary for the continuation of the human race. The case is more relevant in countries such as the UAE where the local population needs not just to grow but to be supported as it grows.
Currently, the 45 days maternity leave can hardly be called the right environment for working women. We present mothers with an impossible choice. It is emotionally very hard for mothers to leave their babies behind such a short time after delivery. But it is also equally emotionally difficult to forsake our professional dreams and ambitions. There must be a middle ground that is fair to all parties involved.
It must be remembered that the decision to grant extended maternity leave to women must not solely be driven by financial implications. Motherly care for a newly born baby is instinctive, is natural and is necessary for the physical and emotional well-being of our future generations. A nanny or a relative will never replace the care of a mother no matter how good and caring they are. It’s a given fact. So, how can we ask women to leave their babies, our future generation, behind them to be able to fulfil their professional ambitions?
Pursuing professional ambition is a luxury not shared by all UAE women. Some women work out of financial necessity. Can you imagine their state of health and mind especially the first few months after they come back from their short maternity leave?
Certainly this scenario can and has to change. It has already changed in many countries. According to International Labour Organisation (ILO) statistics, countries in central Europe and central Asia have the longest average statutory maternity leave (almost 27 weeks), while the developed economies offer 21 weeks. The shortest regional average is in the Middle East (9.2 weeks) according to the same report. Canada, for example, allows for 52 weeks maternity leave, and provides men with the choice of taking paternity leave.
In Sharjah, through the Sharjah Baby Friendly campaign, we have already taken the first steps towards achieving this goal. Female employees are now granted maternity leave with total salary for 90 days, and are given a period for breastfeeding, two hours a day for six months and one hour a day for the next six months, for one year after maternity leave, at the beginning or end of working hours. Maternity leave and annual leave or leave without pay up to a maximum of 120 days may be combined from the start of maternity leave. This is a step in the right direction and I am sure the rest of the UAE will follow suit as we are a nation that values motherhood and recognises the family unit as the pivot for all success.
We are blessed with a visionary leadership in the UAE, one that has demonstrated time and again its willingness and ability to understand the needs of an evolving society and to take forward-looking steps towards the future for the sake of our happiness and progress. Extending maternity leave should not be a hard decision to make, especially in light of the immense progress that UAE women have achieved on many fronts thanks to encouragement and serious support of our leadership.
The UAE can lead the way for the rest of the Middle East in extending maternity leave. We can do so because we have the right leadership and the right vision. All that needs to be done is to make a decision to amend some laws to create a truly empowering milieu for women to do well on both the professional and personal front. And the sooner this is brought to the table the better, simply because maternity is an investment in our future and must therefore be provided with the respect and dignity it deserves.
Sheikha Bodour bint Sultan Al Qasimi chairs Shurooq, the Government of Sharjah’s Investment and Development Authority, and is founder and chief executive of Kalimat Publishing Group
