Ljubljana - The state of gender diversity, equality and balance in the managements of 56 state-owned and listed companies in Slovenia, monitored by the Slovenian Directors' Association (SDA) and the company Deloitte Slovenija, has seen a slight improvement in 2021, the SDA said on Thursday.

The SDA and Deloitte Slovenija have started monitoring the progress towards gender diversity goals in state-owned and public limited companies in 2019 through the 40/33/2026 initiative.

The initiative's goal is for each of 56 participating companies to achieve two goals until 2026 - 40% representation of the under-represented gender (usually women) on supervisory boards, and 33% representation in supervisory boards and management boards combined.

According to the SDA and Deloitte, 18 out of 56 companies (32%) achieved the gender representation goals by the end of 2021, six more than at the same point a year earlier.

Meanwhile, 38 companies (68%) did not reach the target representation, down from 44 in the year before. Of these 38 companies, 11 had absolutely no gender diversity in their management bodies, as ten have all-male boards and one has all-female boards.

The SDA and Deloitte Slovenia also prepared a report on Slovenian Sovereign Holding's voting record for 2021 at the general assemblies of state-owned companies, for which they also monitor the progress towards gender diversity goals.

The situation in 2021 regarding the representation of women among the newly appointed members of supervisory boards, which stood at 11.4%, deteriorated significantly compared to 2020, when the proportion was almost 22%.