Marking the March 8 International Women's Day, Croatia's financial market regulator Hanfa released a statement saying that women account for merely 16 percent of management board members at companies listed on the Zagreb Stock Exchange.

The statement said that the data, taken from court registers, indicates that Croatia and the EU are still far from achieving gender equality measured by women’s presence in management and supervisory boards.

According to Hanfa, some improvement has been made over the last decade, as the share of women holding positions in supervisory boards at ZSE-listed companies increased from 18 percent in 2010 to 35 percent in 2019. However, in 2020 their share dropped back to 22 percent, due to the de-listing of some of the companies formerly traded at ZSE.

During the same period, the gender structure of management boards remained unchanged, averaging between 12 percent and 17 percent depending on the year. In 2020, only 16 percent of management boards were women.

In order to help increase share of women at higher levels of decision-making at companies, Hanfa adopted a new corporate governance code in October 2019, requiring companies to make five-year plans defining a target share of women on its management and supervisory boards, which then must be achieved during the next five-year period. The code does not mandate a specific percentage, though, but does require companies to specify their own in their annual reports.