In terms of gender equality Armenia stays behind the European average indicator but is ahead of its neighbors, Asbarez reports.

Those facts are presented in the publication of the gender equality survey results of 2012 conducted by Social Watch organization on the eve of March 8 – the international women’s day.

The gender equality indicator measures the gap between the capabilities of women and men in the spheres of education, economy and politics. The indicator shows the average value of inequality by three measurements. In the education sphere it examines the gender gap in admission to the educational institution at all levels, in the economy sphere the gap is examined in income and employment, the gap in capacity is measured in terms of high ranked jobs, parliament and executive positions.

With 70 points Armenia is in the list of countries with low indicators of gender equality. Armenia’s indicator is by 3 points lower than the average indicator of Europe of 73 (the higher the indicator, the better is situation) but is higher than neighbor countries: Turkey (45), Azerbaijan (64), and Georgia (67).

Compared with other European countries Armenia’s indicator is higher than in Ukraine (69), Malta (63), Belarus (64), Cyprus and Luxemburg (68), and is on the same level as in Italy (70).

The 5 levels of the gender equality indicators are: critical, very low, low, average, satisfactory. It is interesting to mention that not a single country has acquired 90 points or more, that means no country has reached the satisfactory level.

Norway (89), Finland (88) and Iceland (87) lead the list.

5 out of 154 countries have the worst results: Republic of Congo (29), Niger (26), Chad (25), Yemen (24), and Afghanistan (15).