Women’s Leadership: the Key to Advancing Millennium Development Goals

by Kavita N. Ramdas, President, Global Fund for Women, San Fransisco

“India leads the world in…” – the Indian professionals in Silicon Valley could fill in this opening line with all kinds of good news related to India’s rate of economic growth, its outsourcing industry, or its production of engineers. Yet, for those of us committed to Millennium Development Goal # 3, the elusive goal of gender equity, without which no other goal is even remotely attainable, this sentence does not end well. Rather, it ends like this . . . India leads the world in female infanticide and mortality – leading to one of the most imbalanced gender ratios in history – an estimated 927 girls to every 1000 males alive in India today. This anomaly which has resulted in millions of missing girls, according to Nobel Laureate and economist, Amartya Sen, is the result of India’s long standing cultural preference for sons over daughters.