Gender issues can occur in areas like recruitment, organisational culture and structure, or communication. Strategies and objectives to tackle them include challenging gender stereotypes, closing gender gaps in the labour market, achieving equal participation across different sectors of the economy, addressing the gender pay gaps, and achieving gender balance in decision-making processes.

The European Cluster Collaboration Platform, on behalf of the European Commission, organised the EU Clusters Talk “Gender equality for SMEs’ competitiveness and sustainability” on 10 January 2024 and discussed the state of gender equality in the industry, explored concrete examples of gender equality plans at cluster and policy level, and hear about their impact in the regional innovation ecosystem.