Double the Women at Brazil’s Central Bank Still Means Just Two
Double the Women at Brazil’s Central Bank Still Means Just Two
(Bloomberg) -- Two women will help run Brazil’s monetary policy when the central bank sets its key interest rate Wednesday, a first for an institution that still lags in gender parity.
Fernanda Nechio this month became the fourth female director in the central bank’s 55-year history, joining Carolina de Assis Barros who took up her post in 2018. Despite those gains on the nine-member board, fewer than a quarter of the bank’s employees are women, a percentage that’s barely changed over the past decade.
“I’m happy to be part of this historic moment, and having two women on the board should be seen as a natural process that could motivate other women to join our profession,” Nechio said. “My goal is to keep contributing in that direction.”
As in much of the world, Latin America’s largest economy struggles when it comes to equal rights and female representation. Women only occupy a fraction of seats in the country’s Congress and a proportionately low percentage of leadership roles in companies while earning a salary on average 20% lower. Meanwhile, they spend almost double the amount of time that men do on domestic chores, according to Brazil’s national statistics agency.
For Nechio, the underrepresentation of female economists and their limited support networks amount to the same kind of challenges that face first-generation college students. She has written about actions aimed at increasing the number of women at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, where she previously worked as a research adviser, and she expects more women to enter the field in Brazil in future.
The advances in Brazil are “long overdue and still show how far we are from equality,” said Luciana de Oliveira Ramos, professor of law at Fundacao Getulio Vargas and specialist in gender studies. “It is very important to have women in key roles.”
Still, entrance barriers are among just the first challenges that women must face, according to Andrea Chamma, a former vice-chairwoman at Bank of America Merrill Lynch and current board member at several companies. To win promotion, women must often work harder to prove themselves than men, she said.
What Our Economist Says
“When I started working as an economist in the late 1990s, it was very common for me to be the only women in the room when I visited corporates to speak to executives about the economic outlook. The implicit message seemed to be that women were good as advisers but not as decision makers. Having more women at Copom seems to be a signal -- as incipient as it is -- that this message is finally changing.”
--Adriana Dupita, Bloomberg Latin America economist
Despite those hurdles, women have risen to some of the world’s most prominent economic posts. Janet Yellen became the first to head the Federal Reserve Bank, while Christine Lagarde was tapped to head the European Central Bank after working as Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund.
In Brazil, Nechio and Barros will have the crucial task of guiding the country’s monetary policy through a period of slowing growth and numerous global risks. By reaching positions of power, women can also change workplace cultures to allow for more diversity, Barros said.
“Women who reach leadership positions can have a decisive role in building environments that favor greater female participation,” Barros said. It’s important “to inspire other women by example, encouraging them to believe in their potential.”
To contact the reporter on this story: Mario Sergio Lima in Brasilia Newsroom at mlima11@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Juan Pablo Spinetto at jspinetto@bloomberg.net, ;Walter Brandimarte at wbrandimarte@bloomberg.net, Matthew Malinowski, Bruce Douglas
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