TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati revealed that the issue of gender gap often causes a potential loss for the country’s income. She said it can be traced back to the existence of an entrepreneurship gap.

“Not many companies are owned by women,” said Sri Mulyani at the Sheraton Hotel in Surabaya, East Java on Thursday, August 2. According to the 2017 World Economic Forum Report, issues regarding gender equality will need 200 years to solve.

Sri Mulyani said that women would most often face difficulties accessing finance facilities and that women in several countries are barred from owning an asset under her own name. “This is why women cannot further expand their own company,” she said.

Read: Sri Mulyani Gender Equality Better Start since Early Childhood

However, she believed that women empowerment could boost the economic value as well as the economic resilience.

The finance minister asked the public, especially women, to give women a chance to grow either in accessing education, healthcare, and guaranteeing their access to work. “The issue [of gender equality] is not exclusive to developing nations, but also happen in developed nations,” she said.

One of the solutions for the gender inequality issue, according to Sri Mulyani, is to introduce gender equality since its outset through early childhood education programs, such as the Keluarga Harapan Program that is set to anticipate the gender-related issue.

CAESAR AKBAR