Geneva, Feb 24 (Prensa Latina) Cuba leads the list of nations with the highest proportion of female inventors, with 53 percent of them women associated with inventions, according to Statista GmbH, an online statistics portal with data on market, opinion and economic studies.
According to figures recorded on the German site, the World Intellectual Property Organization analyzes the international patent applications filed each year and shows that Cuba’s number (an average of 10 per year) in 2021 made the Latin American country number one in that ranking.
The Philippines is next with 38 percent, and Portugal with 34 percent, while four other Spanish-speaking countries are among the top eleven out of a total of 74: Costa Rica and Peru, Chile and Spain, according to the Satistica report.
However, she notes that in economies such as the United States, Germany and Japan, with a reputation for innovation, women are particularly underrepresented in patent applications: 16, 12 and 10 percent respectively; all below the world average.
According to the National Office of Statistics and Information (ONEI), nearly 51,000 Cuban women are engaged in science and technology activities, which represents the highest number in recent years.
The Caribbean country is one of seven nations that have achieved gender parity in scientific research and a significant presence of women among the authors of relevant publications, innovations, invention patents and awards, according to the report of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization.
ONEI reported that by 2022, women made up 53.8 percent of the workforce engaged in this type of activity, a figure that reflects positive progress toward gender equality in a crucial sector for the country’s economic and social development.
They also represent 69.6 percent of the public health sector and of the ten Cuban inventions that have received the Gold Medal of the World Intellectual Property Organization, they are the main authors in six.
“Although the proportion of female inventors has grown steadily in recent decades worldwide, in 2021 they only accounted for 17 percent of persons designated as inventors in international patent applications,” says the Statista text.
She also points out that progress is very slow in terms of the gender gap in the scientific field, as men continue to represent a large majority of the names associated with patented inventions around the world.
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