Quotas for women or based on ethnicity ruled out for the Nobel prizes

An image showing a Nobel prize medal

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Head of the body that awards the Nobel calls the small number of females Nobel laureates ‘sad’, but says quotas are the wrong approach

On the heels of announcing this year’s chemistry Nobel prize, the secretary general of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, Göran Hansson, has announced that there will be no quotas for women or minorities when choosing laureates. ‘It is sad that there are so few women Nobel laureates and it reflects on the unfair conditions in society, particularly in years past but it is still existing,’ the head of the organisation that awards the Nobel prizes told Agence France-Presse. ‘And there’s so much more to do,’ he added.