Women in leadership roles

Currently the world is suffering the consequences of greedy men in finance

There is a need for more women in global financial institutions.

The Bank for International Settlements has no female directors

The IMF has one woman executive

The World Bank has two out of 10 executive directors

It is essential that women play a full role in rebuilding the world's shattered financial systems.

That is not an argument put forward solely on notions of fairness and equality, but on pragmatic grounds;

It will be much harder to mend the damage if we fail to harness women's economic potential.

Women are the single biggest - and least acknowledged - force for economic growth on the planet.

This is a claim made by the Economist, which suggests that over the past few decades women have contributed more to the expansion of the world economy than either new technology or the emerging markets of China and India.

But surprise, surprise: technology and emerging markets have gleaned acres of coverage in the business press; the potential of women, seen as a "soft" issue, has not.

There is a proven correlation between equality of the sexes and economic achievement, in both developed and developing economies.

So it is an uncomfortable situation for Britain when women in some areas are losing their jobs at twice the rate of men, sometimes as a result of discrimination by employers.

The economy cannot afford to lose talented women.

If the plight of women here is worrying, then spare a thought for those in the developing world.

As Okonjo-Iweala points out, families are more likely to pull their daughters out of school than their sons when they need to boost the household income; that can have a knock-on effect down the generations when these under-educated girls become mothers themselves.

Adult women in the developing world also risk suffering disproportionately, because they account for up to four out of five workers in export manufacturing, so when their richer sisters in the West stop shopping for cheap clothes, they lose their jobs.

Investing in women in emerging markets pays dividends for the wider community; they reinvest 90% of their incomes in their families and communities, compared with men, who reinvest only 30 to 40%.

The flip side of that is that if you deprive a woman of an income, you are not only hurting her, but her children and husband as well.

There is a school of thought that the crisis was the product of overwrought masculinity on trading floors and in bank boardrooms.

The mostly male commentary is in a similar vein, couched in language that is dehumanising, aggressive and militaristic.

We can't undo the crisis, but we can change the terms of the analysis so we think and talk about it in a more rounded way; so that we listen to the voices of women; and so that we bring some humanity into economic discourse.

The harsh truth is that this clean-up is too important to be left to the men who made the mess.

Ruth Sunderland the Observer's business editor