Bakery chain Paul Romania has launched Bittersweet, a new cake collection that highlights the gender gap issues in Romania through “bitter statistics on sweet desserts.”

The collection features the Wage Gap Cake, the Under-representation in Parliament Cake, the Top of the Wealthy Cake, the Unequal Start-up Cake, and the Glass Ceiling Tarts (which show the difference in senior management positions by comparing it with the equality in middle management).

Bittersweet is the first collection of social sweets in the world, and was developed by Paul Romania and advertising agency MRM/McCann Romania.

“The CSR project Bittersweet started from a social issue every woman in Romania has faced at least once in life. Starting from the premise (confirmed by statistics) that women eat more sweets than men, we’ve launched a collection of cakes that would start a conversation about gender inequality, inviting women to take the necessary steps to have the same rights as men,” said Monica Eftimie, chief marketing officer Paul Romania.

The revenues resulted from selling the cakes from this collection will be used to finance two activities of the FILIA organization, which advocates against gender inequality in Romania. One of the projects focuses on informing women about their rights in the labor market and the use of legal instruments to combat discrimination, and the second one promotes political representation of women’s interests.

According to a global report on gender gaps in 2015, conducted by the World Economic Forum, Romania ranks 113th out 145 countries on equality in the political class, said Nir Refuah, CEO and chief creative officer MRM/McCann Romania. The country also ranked low when it came to education, health, or financial stability.

How many women do business in Romania and in what sectors?

Bucharest Stock Exchange rings the bell for gender equality. How many women on listed companies’ boards?

Romania registers fifth widest gender employment gap in EU

Irina Popescu, irina.popescu@romania-insider.com