The Dubai Financial Market (DFM) today hosted a bell ringing ceremony to promote Gender Equality on the occasion of the International Women’s Day. The DFM has joined around 75 global exchanges in a week of bell-ringing activities in partnership with the UN Sustainable Stock Exchanges Initiative for the third consecutive year, as part of DFM’s active role in empowering women in capital markets and support the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) on Gender Equality (Goal 5).
Senior dignitaries attending the bell ringing ceremony included; female board members of listed companies as well as senior DFM officials and representatives of various capital markets institutions, which underlines their strong commitment to promoting gender balance.
Hassan AlSerkal, Chief Operating Officer (COO) and Head of Operations Division of DFM said: “We look forward to expand collaboration with various institutions in the UAE and beyond in line with the leadership’s vision and the national strategy on women empowerment and gender balance. We are actively promoting women’s presence in capital markets as the DFM is amongst leading exchanges that have joined the United Nations Sustainable Stock Exchanges (SSE) Initiative since 2016. We also encourage listed companies to attract capable cadres to the board of directors. As part of its numerous initiatives within this context, the DFM has launched the eBoard platform in cooperation with the Dubai Women Establishment (DWE), linking listed companies with Emiratis looking to assume board memberships. Through the platform that has registered 18 nominations since launch in 2019, UAE nationals can identify board membership opportunities on the DFM-listed companies and submit their nominations directly to these companies.”
“Moreover, the DFM’s active cooperation with various leading institutions in the UAE to qualify proficient UAE nationals for board directorship increased women’s board representation to one third of listed companies. We would like to thank listed companies for women empowerment and attracting women to their boards and encourage other companies to follow suit in line with the UAE’s women empowerment and gender balance strategy as well as the corporate governance requirements issued by the Securities and Commodities Authority (SCA), that require 20% women representation on the board of directors,” H.E. Essa Kazim added.
