Women are not making a lot of headway when it comes to positions on corporate boards of directors, according to Statistics Canada.
The latest data from the federal statistics agency in Ottawa shows that less than 20% of board directorships in Canada are held by women. The numbers are based on 2016 data collected through the "Corporations Return Act."
The gender-based study analyses diversity within corporate boards and highlights women in leadership roles across public, private and government corporations. It found that women hold only 19.4% of board seats across Canada.
In 2016, more than half (56%) of corporate boards were filled entirely by men, while another 28% of corporations had only one woman on their board. The study found that government business enterprises had the highest share of women on corporate boards at 28.8% followed by public corporations at 20.5%. Private corporations had the lowest representation of women on boards at 17.4%.
Service industries had the largest share of women on corporate boards.This includes finance at 22.5%, utilities at 21.4% and management of companies and enterprises at 20.1%. The construction and manufacturing sector had the lowest share of women on corporate boards at 12.8% and 14.4% respectively.
