The third Millennium Development Goal is about promoting gender equality,

 more specifically by eradicating income differences between men and women and ensuring wider participation of women in governance. Women’s participation in the labor market grew to 47.5% in 2007 from 43.9% in 2002, but is still far from the 60% EU Lisbon target by 2010. The number of employed women in Bulgaria is 3 percentage points lower compared to EU- 7 and 4 points lower compared to the old EU member states (EU-15). The pay gap is closing faster.

        Between 2001 and 2005, it dropped from 21.17% to 17.16%, down by 4 percentage points. At the end of 2005, working women were paid on average 82.84% of the wage of working men against an 80% target by 2015.

        Formal gender equality before the law, however, continues to go hand in hand with substantial imbalances. There are discrimination practices in the labor market with regard to some groups of women (for example, young women with short professional experience, pregnant women and women with small children, women over 45 years). A global issue such as feminization of poverty has its dimensions in Bulgaria, too.

        Women from minorities, single women and mothers, unemployed and old women, women from agricultural and rural regions all face the risk of poverty. Gender differences by economic sector also show feminized professions (79% of employees in education and 79.5% in healthcare are women) and in all economic sectors the average salary of women is lower than that of men.

        After more than doubling up to 26% in the 38th National Assembly, the number of women parliamentarians edged down to 22% in the 40th National Assembly. As a result, Bulgaria slipped from the 19th position worldwide in March 2003 to 42nd in August 2007.  By October 2007, only 43 of 240 representatives in the 40th National Assembly were women.

        Women are represented even less in the executive and in local governments. In October 2007, only 4 of 18 ministers were women and only 5 of 28 district governors were women. The number of women in office is even smaller at the local level – out of 264 municipal mayors, only 20 were women.

        Bulgaria needs to systematically implement gender equality policies in all spheres of life. A particularly important step is the adoption of the Equal Opportunities Bill, which has been postponed since 2001. An important area of future action is the development of mechanisms and actions to promote the policy of reconciling family and professional obligations for parents who are raising small children or are taking care of a dependent family member. Promoting fatherhood is also essential for achieving equality.