Annual Socioeconomic Report on Women portrays the situation of Brazilian women through indicators

Data collection on the reality of women is a priority for Brasil’s G20 Presidency and is key to combating violence and promoting public policies for equity. The study was conducted by Brasil’s Ministry of Women.

This Wednesday (24), the Brazilian Ministry of Women released the Annual Socioeconomic Report on Women (Relatório Anual Socioeconômico da Mulher - RASEAM), which resumed after four years without publishing. The document presents a descriptive and analytical compilation of data from 2020 onward, referring to Brazilian women's demographic, social, and economic profile. The report has become an important source to subsidize the elaboration and implementation of public policies, one of the priorities of the Brazilian G20 Presidency. 

Data are also relevant in supporting Brasil’s presidency at the forum. This year’s motto, “Building a more just world and a sustainable planet”, represents a commitment to more equitable governance. It also puts combating inequalities and promoting social inclusion as a priority for the countries. 

Under the Brazilian Presidency, public policies for women are under discussion in a G20 Working Group (WG) for the first time. The Ministry of Women coordinates the WG. The data from the RASEAM report covers all the topics discussed in the Women's Empowerment Working Group: Equality (discussed in the Equality and Autonomy and Work and Care Policies axes); Confronting misogyny and violence; and Climate Justice. The Working Group will hold its second meeting in 2024, this time in person, in Brasília, on May 13th and 14th.

“When I took office at the Ministry of Women in January 2023, I stated a personal commitment to resuming policies for women based on the production and dissemination of trustworthy and transparent data and information, which are crucial for the formulation of any governmental action”, said the Minister of Women, Cida Gonçalves.

Information for the report was obtained from various official sources including the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística - IBGE), the National Institute for Educational Studies and Research Anísio Teixeira (Instituto Nacional de Estudos e Pesquisas Educacionais Anísio Teixeira - Inep), the Superior Electoral Court (Tribunal Superior Eleitoral - TSE) and ministries, among others, compiled by the Brazilian Gender Equality Observatory (Observatório Brasil da Igualdade de Gênero - OBIG).

Thematic Axes

RASEAM is divided into three parts. The first one presents a description of the main indicators for each theme. The second contains a synthesis of the most relevant data that capture Brazilian women’s reality. The third provides a more thorough presentation of the RASEAM indicators, exposing the disaggregated data for Brasil and Large Regions.

The text is divided into seven thematic axes: Demographic Structure; Economic Autonomy and Equality in the World of Labour; Education; Integral Health and Sexual and Reproductive Rights; Combating all forms of violence against women; Women in spaces of power and decision-making; and Women in Sports. These themes are subdivided into 270 indicators.  

“The report provides a consistent record of the status of women in several realms of social life. It has been used to subsidize the formulation of public policies and to provide access to information used by civil society to hold the government accountable. Moreover, it is aligned with the principles of public administration upheld by governance policy thus contributing to an evidence-based decision-making process,” highlighted the OBIG coordinator-general, Camila Firmino.

The first indicator that appears in the document shows that women are a majority in Brasil, accounting for 104.5 million in a population of 203.1 million, according to data from the 2022 Demographic Census, a ratio of 94 men for every 100 women. Still, in areas such as job posts, leadership positions, sports, and politics, they are a minority.

Women in spaces of power

At the National Congress, for example, 95% of the political party leaders at the Chamber of Deputies and 78% at the Federal Senate are men. In over 80% of the permanent committees, another important decision-making space, the presidencies are in the hands of men. It only in the mixed committees that women presidencies are a majority: 75%. 

In sports, the situation is similar. According to RASEAM, in the 2022 Tokyo Olympics, from the 105 coaches, only seven were women (6.7%).

Women are the major caregivers

On the other hand, women are the majority in caregiving spaces, including professions. The data compiled by RASEAM show that women who are inserted in the labor market tend to concentrate on certain activity groupings. Among the main occupation areas are: public administration; defense; social security; education; and human health and social services. An additional 12.7% work in domestic services, a predominantly feminine sector.  

“The data from RASEAM point out that caregiving work, for example, represents an enormous overload for women, particularly among the poor. The lower the income, the greater the amount of time spent in domestic chores and caregiving activities.

The data also show that, in 2022, women dedicated an average of 21.3 weekly hours to household chores and/or caregiving to other people, while men’s dedication averaged 11.7 weekly hours. This amount of time, however, reduces when income increases, possibly resulting from hiring outsourced labor, such as nannies, housemaids, and daycare centers or schools. 

Work

The labor force participation rate, which is the proportion of the population aged 14 and older who are either employed or unemployed, tends to be historically lower among women. This can be attributed to factors such as their later entry into the labor market or the unequal division of household chores and responsibilities for children, elderly relatives, or others in need of care.

In this regard, in 2020, during the coronavirus pandemic, while 69.5% of men aged 14 and older were participating in the labor market, either working or seeking work, less than half of the country's women (49.3%) were doing so. However, with the relaxation of sanitary measures starting in 2021, the labor force participation rate began to increase again, reaching 52.5% for women and 71.9% for men in 2022.

Despite having a smaller presence in the labor market, when employed, women tend to be more formally employed than men. In 2022, while the informality rate for women was 37.9%, men’s was 40.6%.

Education, health, and violence

RASEAM also compiled data on education and health. Concerning educational data, it shows that the proportion of women who have reached higher educational levels is higher than men. In health, the report shows a decrease in the maternal mortality rate since 1990, when the ratio was 141 deaths per 100,000 live births. By 2019, this rate dropped to 55 deaths per 100,000 live births.

The report also includes indices of femicide, rape, and the incarcerated population, bringing forth familiar data, such as the number of women murdered due to gender, totaling 1,366 incidents in 2023, with the majority perpetrated by males, often within the victim's home and by individuals with whom she had a relationship.

The issue was in this Monday’s (22) agenda of project “W20 Regional Dialogues” of the G20 women engagement group which aimed to promote discussions around actions mediated by intersectionality, strengthen public policies, and ensure the conduction of studies and the collection of data on combating violence against women and girls. Carried out in Brasilia, the debate was organized around two discussion tables: “Public Policies to Combat Violence” and “Measuring for Action: the Role of Data and Research”.

RASEAM: One decade

Instituted a decade ago, RASEAM was regulated by Decree 8.131/2013. Its role is to tend to the social and institutional need for the production and publicization of data regarding the status of Brazilian women’s realities. Its yearly edition was resumed in the context of Brasil’s public policy reconstruction period. 

First published in 2013, the report aims to gather and provide, in one single publication, data that is otherwise either dispersed through various official sources or yet unavailable to the population.

See also