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Cyprus At The Bottom: The Gender Gap In EU Politics

by THEFUTURE.TEAM
March 11, 2025

Women now hold a third (33.4%) of parliamentary seats across the European Union, marking a steady rise in political representation over the past decade. Fresh Eurostat data shows this figure reflects a 5.6 percentage point increase compared to 2014. But while some EU nations are closing the gender gap in politics, others remain significantly behind—Cyprus among them.

Cyprus: The Lowest Female Representation In The EU

Cyprus stands at the bottom of the EU ranking for female parliamentary representation, with just 14.3% of MPs being women. This figure has remained unchanged since 2014, highlighting a decade of stagnation in gender equality within the country’s legislature. Compared to the EU average of 33.4% and the frontrunners—Sweden (45.6%), Finland (45.5%), and Denmark (44.7%)—Cyprus lags significantly behind.

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The situation is no better in the national government. Unlike countries making progress in appointing women to ministerial roles, Cyprus remains far from achieving gender balance. While Belgium (55.0%), Estonia (50.0%), and France (50.0%) now have at least half of their national governments made up of women, Cyprus remains among the least progressive in this area.

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Uneven Progress Across The EU

Despite Cyprus’s stagnation, other EU countries have made significant strides. Malta (+14.9 pp), Latvia (+13.0 pp), and France (+10.3 pp) have seen the largest increases in female parliamentary representation over the past decade. Similarly, Belgium (+32.8 pp), Portugal (+25.7 pp), and Lithuania (+24.9 pp) recorded the biggest jumps in female participation in national governments.

Meanwhile, some EU nations remain stark outliers. Hungary had no women in its national government in 2024, while Czechia (5.9%) and Croatia (10.5%) had some of the lowest shares of female ministers.

As Europe pushes toward greater gender equality in politics, the gap between progressive and lagging nations continues to grow. The question remains: will countries like Cyprus take action to close the divide, or will they continue to fall behind?

Read Gender Equality Remains A Top Priority, Says Cypriot President

The AI Agent Revolution: Can the Industry Handle the Compute Surge?

by THEFUTURE.TEAM
March 28, 2025

As AI agents evolve from simple chatbots into complex, autonomous assistants, the tech industry faces a new challenge: Is there enough computing power to support them? With AI agents poised to become integral in various industries, computational demands are rising rapidly.

A recent Barclays report forecasts that the AI industry can support between 1.5 billion and 22 billion AI agents, potentially revolutionizing white-collar work. However, the increase in AI’s capabilities comes at a cost. AI agents, unlike chatbots, generate significantly more tokens—up to 25 times more per query—requiring far greater computing power.

Tokens, the fundamental units of generative AI, represent fragmented parts of language to simplify processing. This increase in token generation is linked to reasoning models, like OpenAI’s o1 and DeepSeek’s R1, which break tasks into smaller, manageable chunks. As AI agents process more complex tasks, the tokens multiply, driving up the demand for AI chips and computational capacity.

Barclays analysts caution that while the current infrastructure can handle a significant volume of agents, the rise of these “super agents” might outpace available resources, requiring additional chips and servers to meet demand. OpenAI’s ChatGPT Pro, for example, generates around 9.4 million tokens annually per subscriber, highlighting just how computationally expensive these reasoning models can be.

In essence, the tech industry is at a critical juncture. While AI agents show immense potential, their expansion could strain the limits of current computing infrastructure. The question is, can the industry keep up with the demand?

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