European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen addresses a news conference after an EU Summit in Brussels, Belgium December 17, 2021. Geert Vanden Wijngaert\/Pool via REUTERS\/File Photo<\/p>\n
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Jan 20 (Reuters) - The proportion of women in leading positions at major European companies rose last year, but fell behind schedule to reach the European Commission's proposed target of 40% for 2025, a study by an EU-sponsored non-profit organisation showed on Thursday.<\/p>\n
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said earlier this month she would try to unblock legislation for a quota of women on EU company boards, which has been stuck since 2012. read more <\/p>\n
The proposal calls for listed companies in the bloc to fill at least 40% of non-executive board seats with women.<\/p>\n
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Female representation at board level rose by one percentage point to 35% in 2021 after a similar rise a year earlier, according to the study by Brussels-based association European Women on Boards (EWOB), which analysed 668 top European listed companies, included in the STOXX 600 index (.STOXX) and national benchmarks.<\/p>\n
\"At the current speed of change we will not be able to reach 40% women on boards by 2025,\" said Rosa Kriesche-Kderli, chair of research and communication at EWOB.<\/p>\n
Progress is also slow in top jobs: in the second year of the pandemic, only 7% of the companies' chief executives were women, according to the study, after a jump from 4.7% to 6% between 2019 and 2020.<\/p>\n
The number of companies with high scores on EWOB's Gender Diversity Index (GDI) rose to 84 from 62 in 2020.<\/p>\n
It defines a high score as an index reading of 0.8 and above, where zero means there are no women on the board or in senior management positions and 1 is 50% representation.<\/p>\n
Dutch chemicals company DSM (DSMN.AS) led the rankings with a score of 1, while British insurer Admiral (ADML.L) showed the strongest annual progress, jumping to 0.94 from 0.6.<\/p>\n
France, Norway and Britain led the country ranking with a GDI of about 0.7, while Greece, Luxembourg, Switzerland and Poland were at the bottom of the table.<\/p>\n
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Reporting by Aida Pelaez-FernandezEditing by Milla Nissi and Mark Potter<\/p>\n
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European firms make slow progress in appointing more women to boards - Reuters<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen addresses a news conference after an EU Summit in Brussels, Belgium December 17, 2021. Continue reading