Johannesburg - Only nine percent of media houses in South Africa have a gender policy in their work environment, Gender Links said on Monday.
According to research conducted by the gender rights organisation in 2008, men earned eight percent more than their women colleagues in the media industry, chief operations officer Kubi Rama told the Print and Digital Media Transformation Task Team hearings in Johannesburg.
Rama said other GL research showed that in news content, 81 percent of the sources were men, and 19 percent women.
Gender-based violence made up four percent of news content, and HIV and Aids issues two percent.
The task team was established after calls from society and Parliament for transformation of the South African media landscape.
The hearings in Johannesburg followed others in KwaZulu-Natal, the Eastern Cape, Limpopo and Mpumalanga, where local and regional publishers made submissions.
The Johannesburg hearings include submissions from local and regional publishers in Gauteng, North West, Western Cape and Northern Cape. - Sapa