TEHRAN –The vice president for women and family affairs has said that the administration of the late President Ebrahim Raisi adopted more than 20 new measures toward women’s development.

Women's participation in decision-making councils of ministries, insurance coverage for rural women, mothers with three or more children, and pregnant women are some of the great measures taken by the administration, ISNA quoted Ensieh Khazali as saying.

The empowerment programs of the late President Raisi’s administration have resulted in the self-sufficiency of more than 126,000 women heads of household.

In June, IRNA quoted Khazali as saying that female entrepreneurs have expanded their business, resulting in the creation of sustainable employment for women, as well as the support for job-creating skills.

The empowerment programs covered women with abusive husbands, women breadwinners, single girls aged over 45, women suffering from social harm, and women who are heads of household.
Also, the national sustainable family-oriented business plan, with the assistance of women entrepreneurs managed to empower women seeking employment.

In this project, women entrepreneurs support the employment of women for four years from the raw material preparation stage to the end product sales stage to ensure their sustainable employment.

In addition, the late president’s administration for the first time established an entrepreneurship fund for supporting women heads of household.

Providing online sales platforms, and establishing sales markets across the country were among other empowerment programs for women heads of households which led to the self-sufficiency of many Iranian women.

Also, over the past year, positive measures have been taken to empower women in both social and economic arenas.

Paying attention to the managerial position of women was another important and effective program last year, so 25.2 percent of managerial positions at the high, middle, and executive levels of government institutions were allocated to women.

Setting up 4,200 credit funds for rural women and employing 2,390 women as members of the board of directors of knowledge-based companies were other measures in this regard.

Improving the social security insurance coverage for women heads of households, reducing women's unemployment rate to 13.7 percent, developing sustainable businesses, and implementing a national plan to empower rural and nomadic women were also conducted in the past year.

And last but not least, the national budget bill increased women's share of the budget by 50 percent.

Concerning the fact that population is one of the important and key points in the 7th national development plan (2023-2027), multiple measures are forecast to be implemented in the plan  to strengthen the pillars of family and remove obstacles to the growth and prosperity of women.

According to the Iranian Statistics Center, the fertility rate in urban areas is usually higher than in rural areas. Therefore, free insurance coverage and social support for rural mothers with three children and more was put on the agenda.

MT/MG