African Journal of Business Management Vol.5 (8), pp. 3369-3374, 18 April 2011 Available online at http://www.academicjournals.org/AJBM DOI: 10.5897/AJBM10.1544 ISSN 1993-8233 ©2011 Academic Journals Full Length Research Paper National legislations and gender equality in Chinese flower industry: A case study of twenty flower business companies Abu Kargbo, Cai-yun Wang*, Shi-mao Li, Ya-fei Li, Rong-zhang Mai Qiang Fu and Li Li Key Laboratory for Biology of Horticultural plants, College of Horticulture and Forestry Sciences, Ministry of Education, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, P. R.China Accepted 21 February, 2011 The study investigated the extent gender equality had been mainstreamed in the flower industry based on the provisions of the1982 China constitution and the 1995 Labor act. A gender pyramid which provided a framework for mapping and assessing gender inequalities was developed. The data showed male participation at administrative structure was 53% greater than female and significantly different (P<0.05). The survey found that male workers’ mean daily wage was higher than female workers by RMB 6.26 though not significantly different (P<0.05). However, the mean wage of a male or a female permanent worker was significantly different by RMB 17.35 or RMB 14.60 than a male or a female casual worker respectively. The paper concluded that gender issues have not been practically mainstreamed in the industry and provided the basis for gender mainstreaming. Key words: China constitution, Labor act, male, female, gender mainstreaming. INTRODUCTION This paper examines how gender equality incorporated into the National legislations (NL) has been practiced in flower companies. It explores the extent to which gender issues have been mainstreamed in the industry with the guidance of the provisions in the China Constitution (1982) and Labor Act (1995). China economy maintains (Xinhua, 2009) steady growth and its labor force partici- pation and income disparity are smaller than Japan, Russia and United States of America (Xing, 2007). The country gender empowerment measure is 0.533 ranking 72 out of 109 countries (HDR, 2009) and 81 out of 177 countries in gender development index (UNIFEM, 2007). The Chinese government having realized the inequality that prevails between men and women in the social and economic spheres and with an intention to close the gap in inequality, proclaimed in the 1982 constitution and 1995 Labor act equal rights for the sexes in all social and economic sectors of the society. *Corresponding author. E-mail: wangcy@mail.hzau.edu.cn. Tel.: +862787282010: Fax: +862787282010. However the practical application of this proclamation at the formal sectors especially in corporations remains a challenge thus this needed mainstreaming gender in all productive sectors. Gender mainstreaming (GM) is a new strategy to achieve gender equality at the work place. GM is a process of transformation beyond individual rights for equal treatments and positive actions to address group disadvantage, involves identifying low organizational systems and structures that cause indirect discrimination and changing them as appropriate (Rees, 2002). It has become a strategy for making women’s as well as men’s concerns and experiences an integral dimension of the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of all policies and programs in all political, economic and societal spheres so that women and men benefit equally and inequality is not perpetuated (UND, 2006). Gm be- came popular during the Beijing conference on gender in 1995. It requires the involvement of women into existing system as active participants. It assesses the im-pact of policies on women and men (Grosser and Moon, 2005). GM focus is on the systems and structures that influence the development of special needs, responsibilities, roles