Women hold less than a third of business management roles, UN says

By Emma Farge

GENEVA, Nov 3 (Reuters) - A critical imbalance remains in the labour market with women still occupying less than a third of management roles, a global survey by the UN labour body showed on Tuesday.

While there is a growing number of women CEOs, they hold just 30.5% of overall management posts, according to a survey by the International Labour Organization with data from thousands of companies across 99 countries.

This share has grown slowly from around 24% three decades ago despite significant gains in women's education, the ILO's senior relations specialist Jae-Hee Chang told a Geneva press conference.

"There has been progress. There is a strong business case, but (women's) considerable potential remains underutilised," she said.

The report described a "critical imbalance" and said that there were signs that implementation of support programmes for women - such as maternity leave which have proven to be effective -  was declining.

It called for companies to implement steps to address structural barriers to progression and said that other factors like unequal care responsibilities outside the workplace also needed to be examined.

(Reporting by Emma Farge; editing by Matthias Williams)