‘Myanmar National Report’ on women’s participation in, and exclusion from, media

The Myanmar Women Journalists Society (MWJS) told DVB that it will release a new report called the “Myanmar National Report” on how women are portrayed in the media industry in Myanmar later this month.

“In Myanmar’s media landscape, women have traditionally been portrayed as weak human beings, as mothers, and housewives. We are branded as victims who were subjected to arrest and abuse during Myanmar’s civil war,” Soe San Htaike, the Myanmar Women Journalists Society (MWJS) spokesperson, told DVB.

The report is based on data from 20 Myanmar media outlets, including regime media inside the country and independent media outside the country, such as DVB, Myanmar Now, The Irrawaddy, and Khit Thit Media.

The MWJS team collaborated with women journalists and media researchers in Myanmar as part of the Global Media Monitoring Project, a program that documents the representation of men and women in media. The Global Report Launch of 2025, which presented the findings from this research, took place on Dec. 9.

It documents the increase of women’s participation in media in Myanmar – one of the 94 participating countries featured in this year’s report. It cites women’s visibility in Myanmar media has risen to 29 percent of all news sources in 2025, which is up from 18 percent in 2020 and 17 percent in 2017.