Not enough women in the Belgian army

On 1 January 2010 the Belgian army had 2,859 women in uniform, which amounts to 8 percent out of a total 35,668 persons serving. This figure means that in this area Belgium’s army is not performing as well as, for example, that of the Netherlands or France.  The male to female ratio of 92 to 8 has remained unchanged since 2006, despite the fact that the Minister of Defence had signed a charter in 2007 to encourage equality among men and women in the Belgian armed forces. One of the results of this charter was an action plan and additional resources intended to promote gender equality within the army, but it would seem that the measures to attract more women have failed to make an impact. For this reason the N-VA is asking for a detailed assessment of the army’s gender policy because it believes that having more women soldiers yields benefits, namely due to the fact that they seem to be very useful in war zones since they more quickly gain the trust of the local population. Such a situation opens up numerous possibilities, especially since the Belgian army is now primarily involved in humanitarian missions.