The number of Egyptian families that are headed and supported by women has registered at 34%, accounting for around 8m families, according the National Centre for Social and Criminological Research.
On the other hand, census data that was published by the Central Agency for Public Mobilisation and Statistics (CAPMAS) estimates the number of families headed by women at 13%, or around 3.3m families out of 23.5m families.
The highest ratio of families was in Sohag, accounting for 33% of the governorate’s population, while the highest number of bread-earning women is from divorced and widows.
Earlier in March, President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi issued decrees to support bread-earning women, such as the initiative to finance micro-sized enterprises through the “Tahya Misr” fund and the Ministry of Social Solidarity, and allocating EGP250m for this purpose, while the Takaful and Karama programme currently supports 1.5m Egyptian women.
Families headed by women is an increasing phenomenon all around the globe. In Europe and North America, around 20% of families are headed by women, while it is estimated at 30% in Lebanon, 22% in Sudan, and 11% in Morocco.
