International Equal Pay Day, celebrated today, 18 September, promotes worldwide efforts towards equal pay for work of equal value – a central part of achieving equality between genders. As a longstanding partner of the World Bank's Equal Aqua initiative and an organization deeply committed to equality and inclusion in the water sector, IAWD toasts the slow, but continuous advance in this field.

What is International Equal Pay Day?

International Equal Pay Day is dedicated to raising awareness about gender pay inequality around the world. It highlights the ongoing challenges that women, and other underrepresented groups, face in earning equal wages for equal work. This global issue isn’t just about compensation—it is deeply tied to fairness, inclusion, and creating sustainable work environments across industries, including the water sector. 

IAWD's Commitment to Equal Pay: A Partnership with EqualAqua

Our association is committed to fostering equality and inclusion in the water sector across the Danube region. Our longstanding partnership with EqualAqua—a global initiative to promote gender equality in water—underscores this commitment. 

The World Bank has established Equal Aqua as a collaborative Platform for Inclusive Water to bring together utilities, water institutions, donors, academics and international organizations interested in promoting gender diversity and inclusion. They all pull their weight to identify solutions, accelerate action, leverage partnerships and promote learning among participating organizations.

Through this partnership, IAWD seeks to address the gender imbalances in the workforce, not just in terms of pay but in terms of leadership, decision-making, and participation at all levels. We believe that achieving gender equity in the water sector isn't just the right thing to do, it’s essential to the long-term sustainability of the sector. 

This is why we have now included the Equal Aqua HR Gender Survey into our Benchmarking activities. We take the occasion to invite you, dear reader, to support Equal Aqua in their efforts to take stock of the situation, the proud achievements, the needs for improvement, and the general perspectives for the near future: Celebrate Equal Pay Day by registering and taking part in the Equal Aqua HR Gender Survey here. Participation is free of charge!

This survey aims to understand how gender diverse water institutions are and how they consider gender in their policies and practices. Data collected through this survey helps to expand the global evidence base; granular data can serve as a valuable benchmarking source. If completed on a regular basis, it can help to monitor the progress made and identify areas for further improvement. 

More than 200 utilities and water institutions have completed this survey. Results are published in an online and interactive Women In Water database, which shows that women remain an untapped resource for the water sector, representing less than 20% of the workforce in an average water institution. 

Contributions from water utilities are of key importance for the quality and accuracy of the survey data. Therefore please join the effort and register. Thank you for your invaluable support!