Italy has just declared its “pink quota.”

A new law mandates that by 2015, women should be one-third of all board members for listed and Italian state-owned firms. Currently, the total is somewhere between 3.7 and 6%. (Checking 2 sources, I found different statistics.)

Looking at how Australia and France have raised female board presence, which approach do you favor? Here are some facts:

Australia:

• Legislative incentives.
• Mandated diversity policy reporting.
• Female board membership up by 5.3% from 2009-2011.
• Currently at 13.8%.
• A formal mentoring program is bringing female candidates to boards’ attention.

France:

• Legislative fiat.
• Female board membership has skyrocketed by 7.5% from 2009-2011.
• Currently at 16.6%.
• Mandated to rise to 40% by 2016.

Here are some interesting statistics from Catalyst, a group that gathers information about women:

Women on the Board (countries at the top of a 44 country list):

Women on the Board (countries at the bottom a 44 country list):

A note: On the 44 country list, at #34, Italy is close to the bottom.

At first, I learned about Italy’s “pink quota” in a WSJ article. Here though, is the best report I accessed about women on corporate boards and the source of some statistics while the others came from Catalyst, a research organization that focuses on women. For further discussion on occupational and wage gender gaps, you could go to these econlife posts here and here.