Women now make up 9.8% of board members, Institute of Company Directors announces

Women are continuing to fill company board positions, with the Australian Institute of Company Directors confirming females now make up nearly 10% of all board places among the ASX 200.

The announcement comes as the AICD has instituted a mentorship program with some of Australia’s leading entrepreneurs in order to promote more women among listed company boards.

The AICD said in a statement that so far in 2010, 31 women have been appointed to ASX200 boards, making up 27% of all board appointees this year. This means women now make up 9.8% of all board members.

The group says since June, seven women have been appointed as non-executive directors including Wesfarmers Vanessa Wallace, Sundance Resources’ Fiona Harris, Telstra’s Nora Scheinkestel and Cochlear’s Yasmin Allen.

In a statement, AICD chief executive John Colvin said the group believes the new 9.8% figure is the highest on record, but admitted “we still have a long way to go”.

“We have already seen this year more than three times the number of women appointed than for the whole of the 2009 calendar year… This, and the fact that 27% of board appointments this year have been women, shows that real progress is being made on this important issue.”

“However, despite this welcome increase, we still have a long way to go. As we have consistently said, the proportion of women on listed company boards in Australia is not good enough and needs to be increased.”

Colvin repeated the ACID’s position that there are already plenty of “board ready” women available who should be on boards already.