Women on boards: Hong Kong firms under pressure to improve boardroom gender diversity as asset managers turn up the heat
- Hong Kong-listed firms with single-gender boards have until end of 2024 to introduce greater gender diversity
- One third of firms listed in the city had all-male boards in 2020, according to Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing
Publicly listed companies in Hong Kong, including blue chips, reported only a marginal improvement in the poor representation of women on their boards last year. And with new rules taking effect from January 1, they are greater pressure from fund managers to dismantle all-boys clubs.
The 64 constituent members of the benchmark Hang Seng Index had only 110 women board members accounting for 14.6 per cent of the total last year, according to data compiled by sustainability data and technology firm Miotech. That compared with 13 per cent in 2020 and 12.6 per cent in 2019.
The picture was no different at the more than 2,500 Hong Kong-listed firms. Only 14.9 per cent of the board members were women last year, a tiny increase from 14.4 per cent in 2020 and 13.8 per cent in 2019.
“The region has significantly lagged behind the US, Europe on board diversity, said Fay Wu, global head of research at Miotech. “Women’s board representation came in below 15 per cent among the firms that make up the Hang Seng Index, mainland China’s CSI 300 Index and Taiwan’s Taiex index.”
Among constituents of the MSCI ACWI global stock index, women held 34 per cent of director seats at UK-domiciled firms in 2020, compared to 28.2 per cent in the US, 19.5 per cent in Singapore, 10.7 per cent in Japan and 4.9 per cent in South Korea.
