Research on the six economies of the Gulf Cooperation Council
Category: United Arab Emirates
The United Arab Emirates, ‘the UAE,’ or simply ‘the Emirates,’ is at the eastern end of the Arabian Peninsula. It is a federal elective monarchy made up of seven emirates, with Abu Dhabi serving as its capital. The seven Emirates are: Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Sharjah, Ajman, Umm Al Quwain, Ras Al Khaimah and Fujairah. The UAE shares land borders with Oman to the east and northeast, and with Saudi Arabia to the southwest; as well as maritime borders in the Persian Gulf with Qatar and Iran, and with Oman in the Gulf of Oman. As of 2025, the UAE had an estimated population of 12.2 million, of which just one million were Emiratis. Thus, less than one in ten individuals in the UAE have claims to the country’s sovereign wealth.
The more educated a father is, the more likely he is to encourage his daughter to take up a high-powered career, a study suggests
Researchers from United Arab Emirates University are studying the influence of parents in their children’s careers. And an Emirati child with parents in the private sector is much more likely to hold similar aspirations, it says. Before Mariam Al Zaabi had finished university, her father urged her to become a self-sufficient, professional woman. “He wanted me to be as strong as the men,” said Ms Al Zaabi. “So he said, ‘you need to work and you need to go and earn your degree’.” Her experience is in line with the two main findings of the study into the influence of parents in their children’s careers, by researchers at UAE University.
Academics polled 335 female Emirati students to see what influenced their career intentions. Dr Emilie Rutledge, associate professor at the university’s College of Business and Economics, hoped the two findings could help with Emiratisation policy. “Encouraging more males to undertake tertiary education and continuing with the policy of subsidising the employment costs of nationals will pay longer-term dividends in terms of female labour force participation,” Dr Rutledge said. An unexpected finding was the lack of influence mothers had over children’s career choice. “Mothers, irrespective of their educational attainment level, had no significant influence in the career decision making process of their daughters,” said Dr Rutledge.
The survey also asked students whether they wanted to work in the public or private sectors, to which 78.5 per cent responded public. “Furthermore, 29.6 per cent strongly agreed with the statement that they would ‘wait’ for a government job, as opposed to taking a private sector job in the interim,” the study found. The respondents also said that if the prospective job were “interesting,” the employer offered maternity leave and employed women role models, it would increase women’s likelihood of entering the workforce, the study found. “The job being interesting was ranked as the most important and this was subsequently found to significantly increase the likelihood of labour market entry,” the researchers wrote. While salary was also identified as a factor, “it did not turn out to have a significant relationship” with choice of career.
Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed has told Emirati youth to think beyond expectations of “comfortable” government jobs and prepare to compete with the rest of the world.
“If you want to participate in shaping the future then you need to stop thinking of a government job,” the Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation said.
“No other country in the region supports youth-led projects like the UAE. It is one the easiest countries to set up a run a business, so start your own business and corporations.”
He spoke on Tuesday at the Mohammed bin Zayed Majlis for Future Generations in Abu Dhabi, which brought together more than 3,000 Emirati university students.
While many see globalisation as one of the biggest challenges, Sheikh Abdullah said he sees it as an opportunity.
“It’s an opportunity to compete. You are no longer competing amongst yourselves but with the greatest minds around the world,” he said.
He encouraged youth to develop their skills and gain more to keep pace with the latest technological and global advances.
Seventy-five per cent of jobs available today will be obsolete by the time children born this year join the workforce, he said.
“I invite you to seize the opportunity and the opportunities available around you,” he said. “Invest your precious time in your education so you can be ready for your working life.”
Youth must be more “serious and dedicated”, he said, with more ambitions and hope, and a desire to develop and give more to their country.
There are no more “comfortable” jobs in the UAE, he said, because the Government is looking towards the future, envisioning projects in renewable energy and a colony on Mars.
Fields such as renewable and nuclear energy are ones that he never imagined studying in university, he said.
“Now the opportunities of development in these fields are more than ever. We can now take part and participate in international development,” said Sheikh Abdullah.
“Brothers and sisters, those made the biggest and greatest changes in the world and in our lives are not those who learned more, but those who were dedicated.”
The Minister of State for Youth and the Ministers of Higher Education, Climate Change and Environment, also spoke at the start of the two-day summit.
Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, visited the exhibition after its launch. He will deliver an address on Wednesday.
Sheikh Mohammed said Emirati youth are capable of presenting “innovative initiatives and creative solutions to tackle challenges”.
“We encourage and provide them what it takes to excel in education and scientific research while adopting their ideas and innovations in different fields,” he said.
Shamma Al Mazrouei, Minister of State for Youth, said Sheikh Abdullah’s speech was inspiring, particularly when he said there were no comfortable jobs in the government of the UAE. The summit was aimed at inspiring youth and supporting them in building the future.
Dr Ahmad Belhoul, Minister of State for Higher Education, said the majlis is way to inspire students and provides them an opportunity to choose their careers. One of the messages from the summit is the importance of investment in one’s self.
“A university degree alone is not enough to face the changes of the job market,” he said.
Living in a technological age means the skills a student acquires today might not be required by the job market once he or shee graduates, he said, so it is important to invest in one’s self and constantly keep abreast of changes.
Dr Thani Al Zeyoudi, Minister of Climate Change and Environment, hosted a session during which he highlighted the pivotal role that UAE youth play in combating climate change and advancing the protection of natural resources.
He said climate change will affect all inhabitants of the Earth and will lead communities to change their lifestyles.
“Climate change affects the fundamentals of our daily lives, such as the air we breathe, the water we drink, the food we eat, the work we do and the house we live in,” he said.
“Innovation and creativity are the fundamental pillars of sustainable and nontraditional solutions adopted by the UAE in its journey towards sustainability and decreasing the effects of climate change and adapting to it.”
Emiratisation must address the inequity between the working conditions of the private and public sectors, according to new research
James Christopher Ryan from the College of Business and Economics at the UAE University pointed to the discrepancy in number of holiday days, working hours and salaries. He said standardisation between the two was the way to make the private sector more attractive to Emiratis. “Looking at ensuring that experience and qualification requirements for comparable work are the same across sectors and aligning salaries for comparable work between sectors” should also be considered, Dr Ryan said. He also said that more needed to be done to change the mindset of Emiratis to help them find work in the private sector.
“Historical evidence suggests Emiratisation has not been a success thus far,” he said.
“Also, my continuing interaction with UAE national students still offers clear evidence of their preference to work for public sector organisations. Once we have established a culture where the citizenry come to expect employment in government positions it can be very difficult to move successfully away from that expectation.” The push for Emiratisation in the private sector has been slow when compared to its government counterparts, he said.
“To date Emiratisation in the government sector, that is replacing expatriate expertise with local expertise, has had success,” he said. “However within the private sector there is not enough sustained improvement in UAE national employment to determine if we have any real success yet.” Dr Ryan’s research was published in the Journal of Business Research.
“Successful Emiratisation will require a better balance between the conditions and rewards offered in the public and private sectors for UAE nationals. Any steps we can take to reduce the imbalance are steps in the right direction.”
Dr Emilie Rutledge, associate professor of economics at UAE University, undertook research of her own on Emiratisation that supports Dr Ryan’s observations. “In the long run, fully integrating Emiratis into the labour market is crucial for economic prosperity and social inclusion,” she said. “Unemployment rates have been high among the Emirati population in recent years, with estimates in double digit figures, much of which is structural unemployment and can be attributed to strong public sector preferences. “It is essential to address the paradox in pay and working hours if more Emiratis are to be willing to enter private sector employment.”
In Abu Dhabi she said only about 4 per cent of private sector employees were Emirati. Incentives were needed, such as aligning benefits and working hours, if this was to be reversed. She said sociocultural barriers also remained an obstacle to Emiratis entering the private sector. “Several vocations in the private sector are not considered socially or culturally appropriate for nationals, and there is still a certain amount of prestige attached to attaining a public sector post.”
As I’ve written elsewhere, somewhat prophetically, an adverting campaign by a government-owned construction company, Nakheel Properties, pasted on billboards along Dubai’s Sheikh Zayed arterial road in the early 2000s, read something like: “Dubai puts ‘The World’ on the map; The World puts Dubai on the map.”
‘The World’ (Arabic: جزر العالم; Juzur al-Ālam) is an archipelago of artificial islands constructed in the shape of a world map, just off of the coast of the Emirate of Dubai.
Dredging works
The dredging works were undertaken by two Dutch joint-venture specialist companies, Van Oord and Boskalis. It was these companies who also created the now very much completed Palm Jumeirah (see below). These two companies began dredging works for The World project in 2003 but, works were halted for quite some time due to the 2008 global financial crisis.
Grand AmbitionsAs seen from the International Space Station
Dr Emilie Rutledge, associate professor of Economics at UAE University, at the lecture on Parental Influence on Female Vocational in the Arabian Gulf at Mohammed bin Rashid School of Government.
Parents play critical role in Emirati women’s career choices, UAE study shows
The research team was led by Dr Emilie Rutledge, associate professor of economics at UAE University, who presented their findings to academics at the Mohammed bin Rashid School of Government (MBRSG) on Tuesday.
“Parental influence has a significant role on a given female’s likelihood of seeking to enter the labour market post-graduation,” she said. “Parental support reduces what women perceive as cultural barriers to employment.”
Sixty-eight per cent of the women said their parents influenced their decisions about careers, and 80 per cent said they preferred to work in the public sector. Forty-six per cent said they felt it was the Government’s responsibility to find them work in the public sector. Working in education, the civil service and police were deemed the most culturally “acceptable” careers for an Emirati woman, although areas such as advertising, marketing and pharmaceuticals were deemed more “attractive”.
“However, if parents are engaged in the vocational decision-making process, the female is more likely to consider exploring opportunities in the private sector,” Dr Rutledge said.
For Emiratisation to be successful, there must be more emphasis on these other fields rather than banking, human resources and finance, which the women did not consider interesting or attractive, Dr Rutledge said.
“Being in a gender-segregated environment was not as important to the girls as the salary or the job being interesting was, even if society or parents as a whole object to this,” she said.
Dr Rutledge cited holiday time and maternity leave as important, both of which were more attractive in the public than private sectors.
Ensuring the women return to the workplace through flexible working times and better maternity benefits was vital.
“A lot of females leave the workplace when they have a family because of the poor provisions, so they simply don’t go back and in turn, they lose their skills,” she said.
A father’s level of education was key in determining how his daughters would be guided. Fathers with degrees are more likely to support and encourage women to seek employment.
“Private-sector career paths are more attractive if the parent already works in the private sector,” Dr Rutledge said.
“This is of importance as there is merit to incentivising more Emirati males into higher education for the long-term participation of Emirati women in the labour market.”
Women graduate at a 3 to 1 ratio from UAE federal universities. Dr Maryam Salem Al Marashad has been a long-standing academic at UAE University since she graduated with the first batch of students in 1977. She left her post as dean of students two years ago but is still active in academia. She said a husband’s influence could not be underestimated.
“We see many girls at UAEU get married in their third year, so by the time they are going to the labour market, it is not only the family but their husband – she is stuck with an answer from her husband that she can or cannot work here or there.”
Geography will also sway a woman’s choices, she said. “In Fujairah when I go to my bank, the whole first row is full of Emirati women who are supporting their families and are interested to work,” she said. “In Abu Dhabi or Dubai where there are many more opportunities, they can afford to be more picky.”
MBRSG’s head of gender and public policy, Ghalia Gargani, said more research was needed for the long-term participation of Emirati women in the job market. Only 9 per cent of the labour force is Emirati, a fifth of them women. “We need to think of ways to have policies for both men and women to balance their work and life and the responsibilities that come with their culture here,” she said. “It’s very relevant to research we’re doing here on the family unit.”
Parental attitudes can reduce the cultural barriers that keep Emirati women from entering the workplace.
A study polled 335 female citizens between the ages of 15 and 24 from across the country. The research team was led by Dr Emilie Rutledge, associate professor of economics at UAE University, who presented their findings to academics at the Mohammed bin Rashid School of Government (MBRSG) on Tuesday.
“Parental influence has a significant role on a given female’s likelihood of seeking to enter the labour market post-graduation,” she said. “Parental support reduces what women perceive as cultural barriers to employment.”
Sixty-eight per cent of the women said their parents influenced their decisions about careers, and 80 per cent said they preferred to work in the public sector.
Forty-six per cent said they felt it was the Government’s responsibility to find them work in the public sector.
Working in education, the civil service and police were deemed the most culturally “acceptable” careers for an Emirati woman, although areas such as advertising, marketing and pharmaceuticals were deemed more “attractive”.
“However, if parents are engaged in the vocational decision-making process, the female is more likely to consider exploring opportunities in the private sector,” Dr Rutledge said.
For Emiratisation to be successful, there must be more emphasis on these other fields rather than banking, human resources and finance, which the women did not consider interesting or attractive, Dr Rutledge said.
“Being in a gender-segregated environment was not as important to the girls as the salary or the job being interesting was, even if society or parents as a whole object to this,” she said.
Dr Rutledge cited holiday time and maternity leave as important, both of which were more attractive in the public than private sectors.
Ensuring the women return to the workplace through flexible working times and better maternity benefits was vital.
“A lot of females leave the workplace when they have a family because of the poor provisions, so they simply don’t go back and in turn, they lose their skills,” she said.
A father’s level of education was key in determining how his daughters would be guided. Fathers with degrees are more likely to support and encourage women to seek employment.
“Private-sector career paths are more attractive if the parent already works in the private sector,” Dr Rutledge said.
“This is of importance as there is merit to incentivising more Emirati males into higher education for the long-term participation of Emirati women in the labour market.”
Women graduate at a 3 to 1 ratio from UAE federal universities.
Dr Maryam Salem Al Marashad has been a long-standing academic at UAE University since she graduated with the first batch of students in 1977.
She left her post as dean of students two years ago but is still active in academia. She said a husband’s influence could not be underestimated.
“We see many girls at UAEU get married in their third year, so by the time they are going to the labour market, it is not only the family but their husband – she is stuck with an answer from her husband that she can or cannot work here or there.”
Geography will also sway a woman’s choices, she said.
“In Fujairah when I go to my bank, the whole first row is full of Emirati women who are supporting their families and are interested to work,” she said. “In Abu Dhabi or Dubai where there are many more opportunities, they can afford to be more picky.”
MBRSG’s head of gender and public policy, Ghalia Gargani, said more research was needed for the long-term participation of Emirati women in the job market.
Only 9 per cent of the labour force is Emirati, a fifth of them women.
“We need to think of ways to have policies for both men and women to balance their work and life and the responsibilities that come with their culture here,” she said. “It’s very relevant to research we’re doing here on the family unit.”
Dubai, which needs to repay US$20bn to three Abu Dhabi entities next year, will meet its obligations and is not negotiating to refinance its debt, according to the chairman of the emirate’s Supreme Fiscal Committee, Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum. However, if necessary, Abu Dhabi would probably roll over the debt, to avoid any negative impact on market sentiment.
The emirate, which was on the brink of a default in 2009, borrowed US$20bn from its wealthier neighbour to shore up a troubled conglomerate, Dubai World, and others. The debt comprised US$10bn from the Central Bank of the UAE and US$5bn each from two state-owned banks, National Bank of Abu Dhabi and Al Hilal Bank. The US$10bn debt is due to mature in February and the bank debts in November 2014. In comments to reporters, Sheikh Ahmed also said that Dubai’s state-linked companies were doing well and were able to meet their debt repayments.
Debt rises on improved sentiment
Dubai’s debt, including that of government-related entities (GREs), has continued to rise since the global financial crisis. The IMF stated in June that the total debt of the emirate and its GREs rose by US$13bn between March 2012 and April 2013, to US$142bn. This is equivalent to 102% of the estimated 2012 GDP of Dubai and the UAE’s poorer northern emirates. Of the estimated US$93bn owed by GREs, US$60bn will fall due between now and 2017, the Fund added.
The increase in GRE debt in 2012 and early 2013 reflects successful debt restructuring, the strengthening of the UAE economy and its property sector and ample global liquidity. These factors meant that Dubai GREs regained access to international credit markets and sought to take advantage of favourable borrowing conditions.
Fundamentals
Dubai’s performance in 2014 will be pivotal to maintaining solid investor sentiment. Senior government officials have said consistently that the emirate will meet its debt obligations next year, buoyed by the UAE’s wider economic recovery. The UAE is not well served with high-frequency economic indicators, but what indications there are regarding tourism, transport, the property sector, the stockmarket and company results point to considerable strength in the economy persisting in 2013. Ongoing support from high oil prices and the UAE’s appeal as a safe-haven investment location in the region have bolstered the economy.
Rises in airport traffic and hotel occupancy contributed to a strong performance by the tourism industry in Dubai and Abu Dhabi in the first six months of the year. Tourist arrivals in Dubai rose by 11.1% year on year to more than 5.5m in the first half of 2013, helping to drive overall hotel occupancy to 84.6%. The city state’s main airport handled 32.6m passengers during the period, marking an increase of 16.9% year on year. Furthermore, the property market in Dubai sparked back into life in 2012 and has continued to gain momentum in 2013. This has certainly benefited the finances of many GREs.
The main risks to this ongoing rebound include a shift down in oil prices and slowing global growth. We forecast that international oil prices will dip next year but will remain above US$100/barrel. On balance, we expect global GDP this year to expand by 2% at market exchange rates, down from global growth of 2.2% in 2012. However, we expect most of the currently suffering emerging markets to perform better in 2014, if only because the US, the EU and Japan are poised for faster growth. This should lead to a mild rebound in global GDP next year, to 2.7%.
More reforms needed
Dubai has been successful in restructuring GRE debt since the financial crisis, with most major agreements in place; a final deal regarding the debt of Dubai Holding is advanced but still pending. Progress with restructuring certainly boosted investor sentiment in 2012. Alongside this, the UAE is working on reforms to limit the risk of a renewed debt crisis.
The Central Bank has moved to curtail local banks’ exposure to GREs, proposing that lenders should offer no more than 100% of their capital base to local governments and to state-linked entities. This law was announced in April 2012, and banks were told to be in compliance by the end of September last year. However, several banks—including leading UAE banks such as National Bank of Abu Dhabi, Emirates NBD, Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank and Noor Islamic Bank—said that they were unable to comply. The Central Bank has not yet managed to finalise this rule, but it announced in mid-September that an agreement had been reached with commercial banks and would be confirmed before the end of 2013.
The IMF has also stressed the importance of greater transparency with regard to the finances of GREs. The Fund acknowledged that the government had taken some steps towards better oversight. For example, the Dubai government has put in place a team to oversee debt issuance, and any new borrowing by GREs needs to be approved by the Supreme Fiscal Committee. Abu Dhabi, meanwhile, has improved its monitoring of GRE debt. Nevertheless, the IMF has urged a more comprehensive approach to transparency and the governance of GREs, stressing the importance of better data availability on debt and further reforms to improve corporate governance of GREs.
Roll over?
The finances of Dubai and the emirate’s GREs have benefited from the economic rebound in 2012‑13. As a result, Dubai may now be in a position to repay its debts to neighbouring Abu Dhabi on schedule in 2014. However, any difficulties in meeting the due debt would play out behind closed doors, and Abu Dhabi would probably roll over the debt if necessary, to avoid any negative impact on market sentiment.
A list is being compiled by the Great Place to Work (GPTW) institute in the UAE, which will conduct surveys to sort the best from the average. 1,400 teachers to lose their jobs by end of year Move is part of Emiratisation plan and will also see male teachers replaced with females in lower grades. GPTW-UAE is part of a global research and consultancy group that releases an annual list of the best places to work in the world, and in 45 countries.
The Great Places for Emiratis to Work index is a new sub-list of their annual survey, which will highlight companies with strong Emiratisation programmes in various sectors. “We want to highlight the diversity of disciplines available to Emiratis,” said Dr Farrukh Kidwai, the chief executive of GPTW-UAE. “This will broaden the avenue for them to participate in the private sector and hopefully boost the knowledge economy in the UAE.”
A paper by Ingo Forstenlechner and Emilie Rutledge from UAE University, published in the Middle East Policy Journal last summer, showed Emiratis account for only 4 per cent of the private sector workforce.
Nadia Salameh, a consultant who specialises in Emiratisation at Cobalt Recruitment, said Emiratis were most likely to take up private-sector jobs in human resources, marketing, engineering, business management and organisational development.
“Emiratis should believe from an early age they can work in any field,” Ms Salameh said. “Companies that encourage continued learning are the most successful in Emiratisation.”
The normal GPTW-UAE list is drawn up according to two scores. A “trust” survey is completed by all employees to measure aspects such as camaraderie, respect and pride, and accounts for two thirds of the final score. A second survey quizzes management and HR to gauge the corporate culture. The Great Places for Emiratis to Work list will only take the corporate cultural audit into account, as many companies may not have many national employees but do have excellent Emiratisation programmes at management level. “There are companies that have impressive programmes regarding Emiratisation and we want to communicate those to the wider public, as they are doing outstanding work,” he said.
Mohammed Hamza Al Qasimi said his experience in working for the French oil company Total helped him to develop many skills. Mr Al Qasimi was recently sent to Paris to oversee a project related to a challenging oilfield in the Middle East. “The international experience I’ve gained from my assignment in Paris is not only beneficial on a personal level,” he said.
“I am really looking forward to more challenges in my career in France and by absorbing those challenges I will be able to return the favour to my country, and bring new and innovative ideas in the development of UAE oil and gasfields.”
Mr Al Qasimi was chosen for an internship while studying for his bachelor of applied sciences at the University of Waterloo in Canada. He did an internship at the Abu Dhabi office of Total in 2004.
“I was given a challenging project in the geosciences domain,” he said. “I was a bit worried but the confidence management placed in me made me realise I was up to the challenge.”
The company then offered him a scholarship to complete a Masters of Science at Institut Francais du Petrole in France before he joined Total full-time in 2009.
Suaad Al Hajri, 33, who has 12 years’ experience in the private sector and now works at a senior level in treasury and cash management for Aldar Properties, said the workplace was challenging at first because of the misconception private companies had about Emiratis. “I tried my best to work hard and prove myself,” she said. “I was so lucky that my management noticed me and gave me all the chances to develop my career, motivate me and give me all the delegation I needed to get the job done. “If you want to be successful in your career you have to take the charge of your own growth. Ask for specific and meaningful help and plot out your personally developed plans and goals.”
Companies older than two years that employ more than 50 people may register to be included on the GPTW-UAE list until October 31.
Many Emirati women prefer private-sector careers, but the allure of high-paying, stable government jobs is hard to resist, new research shows.
Emirati women often prefer careers in the private sector but see government work as more realistic and socially acceptable, according to new research from the UAE University and the Emirates Foundation. The study by professors at the university in Al Ain asked 335 Emirati women with an average age of 21 to rank what they considered the most “attractive” and the most “appropriate” jobs.
The women put educational careers at the top of both lists, but listed jobs in advertising, sales, consumer goods and beauty therapy as the next most “attractive”.
Jobs near the top of the “appropriate” list included bastions of the public sector: civil service, the police force and health care.
“The public sector is considered much more appropriate and that’s still a major issue,” said Professor Ingo Forstenlechner, one of the academics who worked on the research project. “It’s not an unknown issue, but it’s a big one.”
The research, funded with help from the Emirates Foundation and Occidental Petroleum, comes as the UAE steps up its long-standing Emiratisation drive, which aims to bring more UAE nationals into the private-sector workforce as the country’s economy develops. Surveys have repeatedly shown Emiratis would rather take government jobs because of the better pay, better benefits and shorter working hours they offer. “Our findings add weight to the contention that the UAE’s labour market distortions are in no small part due to the national cohort’s desire to work in [the public] sector,” the UAE University research paper said.
“Irrespective of profession or occupational role, the public sector is a more realistic sector to pursue a career in because of the compensation packages and work-life balance it affords to national employees.”
The study, led by Emilie Rutledge, an assistant professor of economics, found that in addition to better pay and shorter hours, Emirati women considered government work preferable because it was more acceptable culturally.
“It’s not that they don’t want to work anywhere else [other than the public sector], it’s that it’s expected for them,” Prof Forstenlechner said. “There are some occupations they report as being attractive which simply don’t happen among Emirati women.”
The study’s authors also noted some of the sectors targeted by government Emiratisation bodies did not align with jobs women actually wanted.
“Of particular note to labour market policymakers in the UAE, it seems that the professions, industries thus far targeted for labour nationalisation quotas, particularly human resources and secretarial positions, are not in sync with the sorts of career choices Emirati women consider, be it in terms of [appropriateness] or attractiveness,” the study said.
Manar Al Hinai, an Emirati fashion designer and writer in Abu Dhabi, pointed to better pay packages in the public sector as a critical force behind the preference for government work.
Women had been moving into the private sector in greater numbers before the Abu Dhabi Government raised salaries across the board a few years ago, she said.
“Before Abu Dhabi increased the salary packages just a few short years back, many of my female friends preferred to work in the private sector,” she said.
“To them it was fun working in, for example, an advertising agency, or a TV network.
“However, now the salary packages have increased, many find it useless to work in an organisation that offers Dh6,000 [US$1,633] or less in comparison with the government sector that is secure, has shorter working hours and pays way higher.”
The UAE University study also looked at the role of parental influence on Emirati women’s career choices. Those whose parents were well educated and in the workforce were more likely to follow suit. Those whose parents were less well educated were more likely to be discouraged from working.
“Parents also interfere when it comes to the job-selection process,” Ms Al Hinai said. “They know how much the government jobs pay and if they are going to allow their daughter to enter the workforce, then it might as well be worth their time.”
The push given by parents, however, was found to be a weaker factor than the pull of the public sector. Fewer than 10 per cent of respondents to the survey said they planned to work within the private sector, while a full 28.4 per cent said they would not work at all unless they could get a government job. Another 49.6 per cent said they would wait for a future government job rather than taking a private-sector job right away.
“We do observe, though, that the subsamples whose parents both have advanced levels of education or are both currently employed are on average more willing to consider private-sector career paths,” the study’s authors said. “In addition, the sample members who had a parent working in the private sector were themselves significantly more likely to consider employment in this sector.”
A recent study suggests that although women are better skilled than men, it is harder for them to find work.
“Female nationals are a valuable human capital resource in the UAE – one that is significantly underutilised,” said Dr Emilie Rutledge, assistant professor of economics at UAE University.
“Existing evidence suggests females find it much harder to find employment than their male national counterparts, yet paradoxically they typically have much higher levels of educational attainment,” she said.
She said officials should implement more gender-aware labour policies to correct the imbalance.
“While labour nationalisation policies have acted to increase female labour force participation, many more gender-aware policies need to be implemented,” she said.
A paper to which Dr Rutledge contributed, titled “Women, labour market nationalisation policies and human resource development in the Arab Gulf States,” will be published in the peer-reviewed journal Human Resource Development International in April.
Four researchers, including three in the UAE and one in Saudi Arabia, collaborated on the paper and interviewed policy makers who are directly involved in the Emiratisation and Saudisation processes.
Dr Rutledge said Emirati women need to be more willing to travel in order to take full advantage of their employment opportunities.
Other notions that need addressing involve family constraints, such as parents who frown on their daughters’ working in a mixed-gender environment, or the perception that women who work in the private sector only do so because they do not have adequate wasta(connections), explained Dr Rutledge.
“Some private-sector employers are unwilling to recruit from [among women], either because they believe it might be costly in infrastructural terms or because it would be costly if the newly recruited national female employee was to be ‘offended’ in some way by an incumbent non-national employee,” Dr Rutledge said.
The study stresses that labour nationalisation bodies need to improve their monitoring and evaluation of the consequence of policies in a gender-sensitive way.
Political reforms that have resulted in women being appointed to senior positions can broadly be seen as part of the process to “normalise” the role of women in the workplace, the researchers state.
“Increasing women’s participation will depend not only on their motivation, but also on the ability of society to accept new roles for women and remove existing barriers to economic integration,” said fellow researcher Dr Fatima al Shamsi, secretary general at UAE University and faculty member at the Economics Department.
Dr al Shamsi, who has also served as a consultant to the UAE National Human Resource Development and Employment Authority, added, “Above all, women should not shy away from the kind of work that was previously reserved for men, and they should impose their skills and education on the labour market, and not let the market impose the marginal and secondary positions on them.”
Interviewees also said conditions in the private sector – like a lack of child care, flexible working hours and length of maternity leave – were also contributing factors that needed to be tackled to increase female participation.
“There is over-representation of women in lower-paid and non-decision making positions,” Dr al Shamsi said.
