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S. Korea ranks 115th in world for gender equality: report

November 19, 2015

An office in the Gangnam district in Seoul, South Korea (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

By Brian Han

For a country that’s seen exponential economic growth in the last half century, South Korea seems to sometimes lag in social development.

The most recent evidence of that comes from a 2015 World Economic Forum (WEF) report, which ranked it 115th in gender equality out of 145 countries.

The organization based scores on four categories including health and survival, education, politics and economic equality.

Despite having a female president in Park Geun-hye, South Korea lagged considerably in female participation in politics as well as wage gaps between genders.

In the Asia-Pacific, the Philippines placed the highest on the list at seventh overall followed by New Zealand and Australia.

“The Philippines has made progress from last year and continues to rank among the top 10 in the overall index and first in the region with 79% of its gender gap closed,” the WEF wrote in its report. “This can be explained by an increase on its Economic Participation and Opportunity score, which is due to more female legislators, senior officials and managers as well as professional and technical workers.”

Iceland topped the list followed by Norway and Finland.