KARACHI: About 70 per cent of women engineering graduates residing within the country are either unemployed or out of the labour force, a study has found.

The research, jointly conducted by Gallup Pakistan and PRIDE using data from the Labour Force Survey 2020-21, found that 20.9pc of a total of 28,920 women engineering graduates were unemployed. About 50.9pc of them were out of the labour force while only 28pc remained employed.

An analysis of the data for the three groups — employed, unemployed and out of the labour force — by region shows that 21.1pc of all engineering graduates resided in rural areas while 78.9pc of them were based in urban areas. Within the rural areas, 43.9pc of engineering graduates were employed while 36.3pc were unemployed.

The share of engineering graduates who opted to remain out of the labour force in the rural areas was substantially lower (19.8pc) than the national average (50.9pc). As for the urban areas, 24pc of women engineering graduates were employed while 16.8pc of them were unemployed. A major proportion of women engineering graduates remained out of the labour force in the urban areas (59.2pc).

A little more than 64pc of those engineering graduates who opted to remain out of the labour force were married while 28.4pc remained single. The highest share of all women engineering graduates was in the age bracket of 25-34 years (50.9pc), followed by 35-44 years (21.7pc).

Published in Dawn, October 25th, 2023