BERLIN (AP) – Germany’s Parliament on Friday approved a quota system that will require leading companies in Europe’s biggest economy to have at least 30 percent women on their supervisory boards starting next year.
The quota will apply to more than 100 listed companies. Another 3,500 firms will be required to set targets to raise the number of female directors and women in other leadership positions.
A recent study released by the German Institute for Economic Research found that, last year, women accounted for 18.6 percent of the supervisory board members – the German equivalent of directors – at the country’s biggest 100 companies.
“If there are no equal opportunities at the top of companies, there are none in other areas either,” Manuela Schwesig, the minister for women and families, told ZDF television. “It was important to me to start with the very biggest (companies), where most women work.”
Lawmakers from Chancellor Angela Merkel’s governing coalition of conservatives and Social Democrats backed the legislation Friday. Opposition lawmakers who argued that it didn’t go far enough abstained.