WELLINGTON (BLOOMBERG) - New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has urged Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) countries to do more to include women and indigenous people in their workforces, saying it could bring enormous economic benefits as the world recovers from the pandemic.

"Every crisis does present an opportunity," Ms Ardern said on Thursday (Nov 11) as she opened the virtual Apec CEO Summit. "The 21 Apec economies have been dealt a heavy burden, but also an opportunity to strike an economic reset on a scale we haven't seen since World War II."

Ms Ardern is chairing this year's Apec meeting virtually because of the pandemic.

She said that if business and government took action on gender parity in the workplace alone, global gross domestic product would be US$13 trillion (S$17.6 trillion) higher in 2030, as estimated by management consulting firm McKinsey.

"That's like adding an economy the size of China to our global economic weight," she said. "The adoption of gender-responsive policies and business practices will enable women and girls to participate in and benefit from the recovery.

"This is particularly important as we deal with the US$1 trillion shock of women falling out of the workforce as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic."

Empowering indigenous peoples is another area of economic opportunity "that is also the right thing to do", Ms Ardern said.

"There are about 270 million indigenous peoples across our region, the majority of whom have been disproportionately affected by the pandemic," she said. "We want to work alongside other Apec economies to grow the opportunity for indigenous businesses across the entire region."