How the UK is Advancing Gender Equality through Trade

Women in trade agreements

Trade agreements can play a pivotal role in unlocking women’s full potential in international trade by creating more inclusive and equitable economic opportunities. The UK uses its agreements to help create a fairer trading environment by addressing unfair practices and facilitating better access to resources and markets. We want more women to benefit from our trade agreements, by supporting women-led businesses to start, grow and scale globally.

What is a trade agreement?

Trade agreements are made between two or more countries and set out the preferential rules for buying or selling goods or services between them.

They reduce restrictions on trade, which can make buying and selling easier and cheaper.

How many trade agreements does the UK have?

The UK has signed agreements with 70 countries and most of these can be used by businesses right now.

We have announced our ambition to negotiate new or updated agreements with countries including Switzerland, South Korea, Turkey and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) trading bloc.

The UK has also signed a deal to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP)opens www.gov.uk in a new tab, a large Indo-Pacific and Americas trade group spanning 12 countries. For the first time the UK will have a trade deal with Malaysia, giving UK businesses better access to an economy worth £330 billion in 2022.

How can trade agreements benefit my business?

Trade agreements make it easier and cheaper to do business overseas in a number of ways.

These may include:

• lower or removed tariffs
• better investment opportunities
• improved market access
• enhanced protections for businesses in areas such as data protection and intellectual property
• These benefits will differ depending on what was agreed with the partner country during the negotiating process

Trade and gender equality chapters and provisions at a glance

The UK has successfully negotiated Trade and Gender Equality Chapters with Australia and New Zealand, and a Women’s Economic Empowerment in Trade Chapter in the UK-Japan Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA).

These Agreements allow the UK and partner countries to work together to address barriers for women entrepreneurs, business owners and workers.

Women owned businesses are often disadvantaged when it comes to making the most of opportunities to trade in overseas markets, often due to lack of time or resource.

Our gender equality and women’s economic empowerment Chapters and provisions in our Agreements with Japan, EEA EFTA, Australia, and New Zealand commit the UK and our partner countries to working together to support women as business owners, entrepreneurs and workers to fully access and benefit from the opportunities created by these Agreements and to trade in each other’s markets.

Our Agreements include commitments to promote financial inclusion, foster women’s entrepreneurship and support economic opportunities for women looking to trade.

Mainstreaming Gender Equality

Complementing a standalone chapter, the UK seeks to integrate women’s economic empowerment through mainstreaming gender provisions across our free trade agreements in chapters where there are known impacts on, or barriers for, women in trade. This enables provisions to be targeted to the areas where they have the most impact, ensuring that we keep our actions tangible and directly trade-related.

Gender mainstreaming is a strategy to improve the quality of public policies, programmes and projects, ensuring a more efficient allocation of resources.

You can find out more about how our FTAs are benefitting you as a woman in trade below.