25th October 2023
The European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE) has published its latest Gender Equality Index, measuring equality between women and men in the European Union countries. This year’s focus was on gender equality in the Green Deal – how gender equality is being considered in the EU’s transition to a green economy. The overall European Gender Equality Index increased by 1.6 points this year, rising from 68.6 to 70.2 out of a possible 100 points. Lithuania remains below the EU average, though its situation has improved.
Lithuania moves from 20th to 17th place
Lithuania’s score on the Gender Equality Index rose by 3.5 points over the year, reaching 64.1 out of 100. The country moved up from the 20th place last year to the 17th. However, Lithuania is still over 6.1 points behind the EU average.
This score is based on Lithuania’s gender equality indicators in six areas: work, money, knowledge, time, power and health.
The main reason for Lithuania’s upward movement is new data on time, which measures how much time women and men spend on household chores, caring for children and other relatives, leisure activities and volunteering. Lithuania scored 62.1 in this area, but the gender gap remains significant.
For example, 65% of women and only 29% of men spend time on household chores and cooking daily. Caring for children, grandchildren, grandparents or disabled relatives is a daily activity for 35% of women and 21% of men. It is important to note that men’s involvement in caring for children and other relatives has decreased from 24% to 21% since 2016. Although women’s time spent on household chores has decreased (from 79% to 65%), men’s time spent on household chores has not changed. The only area where time use is equal is leisure: 21% of both women and men engage in sports, culture and other activities outside the home daily or several times a week.
The best-performing area for Lithuania is work, with a score of 75.7. Although the score has risen slightly over the year (from 73.9 in 2022) and surpasses this year’s EU average (73.8), Lithuania has fallen five places in the European context as other countries advance more rapidly towards gender equality at work.
Money is the area where Lithuania lags furthest behind the EU average (82.6). This year, Lithuania scored 71.2, ranking 24th. Gender equality in money has increased by just 0.8 points over the year, due to a growing wage gap and women’s higher risk of poverty.
“We can see that the situation is improving, which is good, but it is important to look deeper. As EIGE experts say, the indicator that has most contributed to the country’s progress is leisure activities. It is an important part of everyone’s life, but it is worth considering why, by 2023, men and women in Lithuania have equalised only in leisure activities, while household chores and wages still show a significant gap.
A very important comparison with 2016 is that the number of women in Lithuania who clean the house and cook every day has decreased, but the number of men who do the same has not changed at all in 7 years – it has remained at 29%. It seems that there has been no improvement in the distribution of work, but rather that households have started to employ more vacuum cleaners, robotic cleaners, other household appliances or service providers, which help to reduce the work that falls on the shoulders of women. Even more depressingly, the percentage of men who spend time each day caring for children and other relatives has fallen. Although the percentage of women has also fallen, the gap remains quite large,” says Equal Opportunities Ombudsperson Birutė Sabatauskaitė.
Gender Equality and Green Change
In addition to the annual index, this year EIGE explored how gender equality is being addressed in relation to environmental and climate change issues. EIGE experts analyzed how men and women use more sustainable transport, how many are involved in decision-making in this area, and how they are affected by the energy crisis.
The findings show that more women than men in Lithuania choose environmentally friendly means of transport: 45% of women and 35% of men regularly travel by public transport or by bicycle or car-pool. Significantly more women (42%) than men (28%) identify public transport as one of their top three travel modes. Around 42% of Lithuanian women and 43% of men say they feel a personal responsibility to reduce climate change (EU average: 62% and 61% respectively).
According to the index’s authors, even before the energy crisis, a large part of the Lithuanian population struggled to meet the costs of electricity and heating. In 2021, many single mothers (38%) and single fathers (41%) were unable to heat their homes sufficiently. The data also show that single women were much more likely than single men to face the same difficulties (34% and 26% respectively). It is likely that these figures have risen significantly due to the ongoing energy crisis.
Notably, the number of men working in the transport and energy sectors in Lithuania is significantly higher than women. Women account for only 23% of energy and 26% of transport workers. They are also under-represented in decision-making processes—in 2022, women made up only 29% of decision-makers in the parliamentary committees responsible for environment and climate change issues.
Sweden, the Netherlands, and Denmark remain at the top of the Gender Equality Index, while the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Romania are at the bottom this year.
The Gender Equality Index measures EU countries’ progress towards gender equality in six areas: work, money, knowledge, time, power and health. In the work domain, it measures the employment of women and men and the distribution of ‘female’ and ‘male’ occupations in the labor market. Money looks at how financial resources (earnings, income) are distributed between the sexes and the economic situation of women and men. The knowledge domain examines the participation of women and men in the education system and the gender balance in feminized professions. The time domain measures the amount of time women and men spend on household, childcare and leisure activities. The power domain analyzes the gender balance in politics, the economy, and organizations of public importance. Health measures women’s and men’s health status, health-related behaviors and access to health services.