East Asia Update 60

Gender Equality in East Asia: Progress, and the Challenges of Economic Growth and Political Change

Introduction However, despite progress, persistent inequalities remain

and new challenges continue to unfold. Drawing on the wealth of gender-related material that has become available in the last decade, and using a select set of indicators as a proxy for women’s status, this paper attempts to highlight some of the advances that East Asia has made in closing the gender gap, extract some evolving common trends, and draw attention to both old and new challenges for gender equality in five areas: participation in the economy, health care, education, representation in decision making, and legal and institutional mechanisms. It tries to identify for government, civil society, and development agencies where there is still “low-hanging fruit” to be picked in terms of reducing gender gaps, and some of the structural changes that need to be made to address the tougher challenges.

This special focus looks at the track record of progress on women’s empowerment in East Asia especially in the context of the evolving economic and political environment. The paper coincides with the ten-year anniversary of the Beijing World Conference on Women and focuses on changes since then, within the context of broad trends over the last forty years. Since the 1960s many East Asian countries have invested heavily in human development and have reaped the benefits in terms of economic growth and improved social indicators. Aggregate regional indicators show the dramatic improvements in the health and education of women that have occurred over the last forty years. (Table 1).34

Table 1: East Asia. Human Development Indicators 35 Participation in the Economy 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 Life expectancy at birth, female (years) 40 60 66 69 71

Fertility rate (births per woman) 4 6 3 2 2

Literacy rate, adult female ages 15 and above (%) 43 58 72 86

Mortality rate, infant (per 1,000 live births) 134 85 56 43 34

Narrowing the Gap: the Road since Beijing Any analysis of changes in women’s participation in the economy since Beijing needs to be set against the backdrop of the main economic changes in the region and their impact on women. The rapid economic growth of the 1980s and early 1990s came to an abrupt halt during the East Asia financial crisis in 1997/1998. But most countries have recovered and are back on the growth trajectory, with greater openness of markets and investment, and substantial moves towards regional integration.

Source: World Development Indicators (2004)

It is now widely accepted that gender inequalities hinder development, while increasing gender equality helps foster it. The relationship also runs the other way, so that income growth and economic development also bring broad new opportunities for women and contribute to improving gender equality. East Asia’s efforts to reduce gender inequality and to promote development since the 1960s have clearly reinforced each other, contributing to its successes in both areas. (World Bank, 2001).

Figure 1. Change in Female Employment 1990-2002

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Source: ADB (2004).

34 The paper draws heavily on gender assessments prepared by the World Bank and/or ADB in Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Lao PDR, Mongolia, the Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam, supplemented with information on other countries from UN, ILO and other sources. Due to space limitations, the paper touches upon most of the 12 areas mentioned in the Beijing Platform of Action (http://www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/beijing/platform/plat1.htm), but does not try to deal with each in depth. Similarly, because of space limitations and the absence of consistent data series, the paper refers to MDGs where possible, but does not address the gender aspects of all of them comprehensively (see http://www.developmentgoals.org/). 35 The economies included in East Asia and Pacific regional aggregate are: American Samoa, Cambodia, China, Fiji, Indonesia, Kiribati, Korea, Dem. Rep., Lao PDR, Malaysia, Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Fed. Sts., Mongolia, Myanmar, Northern Mariana Islands, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Thailand, Timor-Leste, Tonga, Vanuatu, and Vietnam.

The number of working women worldwide is today at its highest ever, a record 1.1 billion female workers, representing a 22 percent increase over the last 10 years (ILO 2004). Much of this increase has taken place in

East Asia Update 61

Time Poverty. Women’s dual roles at work and in the home remain a major challenge. For example in Vietnam, the hours worked increased between 1993 and 1998 for both men and women, but more so for women, who identified disproportionately heavy workloads as one of their key problems (World Bank, 2000). Between their income-generating and household work, women’s working day is now 6-8 hours longer than men’s (ADB 2002). A reduction of social services in Mongolia – such as the 50 percent reduction in the number of preschools and kindergartens between 1989 and 1998 – has shifted the burden of care to women, reducing their opportunities to enter formal employment (ADB & WB 2004).

regions with high growth rates such as East Asia, where demand for labor has increased and where women have traditionally participated in the workforce. The vast majority of the East Asian female workforce is still in agriculture, although the trend in most countries is for women to move out of agriculture and into manufacturing and services (Figure 1). Official statistics in China show that 40 percent of the 7 million new workers hired in China’s export processing zones in the last few years have been women (Cooke 2001). In Cambodia, 84 percent of the over 200,000 garment industry workers are women (UNIFEM et al, 2004). Similarly, in the Philippines, female employment soared with the growth of the service sector and export industries in the 1990s.

Labor Mobility Vulnerabilities and Trafficking. Labor migration is associated with increasing vulnerabilities for women, including trafficking, violence and sub-norm working conditions. Migrants’ income is often significantly reduced when they are forced to pay illegal fees to agents, facilitators and immigration authorities. Women enter informal services such as domestic work, or commercial sex industry more than men, and are more vulnerable to isolation, abuse and trafficking, particularly in East Asia, which accounts for one third of the global trafficking trade. Increased female migration alters gender relations, often causing disruption within the family, with adverse consequences for children. Efforts are underway to better understand and mitigate the impact of these vulnerabilities. The Philippines has initiatives to raise awareness of female workers before departure. Indonesia and Thailand are looking at ways to provide services in embassies in receiving countries. Other activities seek to sensitize agents to the rights of female workers, and help to ensure that remittances are protected and used well in the women’s absence.

International Migration from Indonesia (Thousands. 2002)

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Source: World Bank (2004 a) Labor migration has also increased dramatically, both internally from rural to urban areas, but also international migration. Governments have been quick to see the opportunities for exporting labor, and the economic benefits of remittances. Twenty million Asian migrant workers worked outside their home countries in 2000 – the same year that migrant workers sent home $6 billion to the Philippines, and $1 billion to Indonesia (World Bank 2004c). Cambodia’s female garment workers are estimated to support 1.5 million people on their remittances (Phav 2005). The majority of the workers are female, and in the informal sector, as illustrated by the 2002 figures for Indonesia presented in Figure 2.

Work Vulnerability and Bargaining Constraints. Too often, labor codes in female-dominated manufacturing industries are poorly adhered to or waived. In the Philippines, workers in the female-dominated EPZs are often exposed to difficult working conditions, without recourse to collective bargaining. In Guangdong, women in garment factories – many without social insurance or written contracts – put in 150 hours of monthly overtime (OXFAM 2004) and are seldom in a position to negotiate with employers. Because of women’s disproportionate presence in many of East Asia’s growth industries, the vulnerability that is associated with these sectors takes on a gender dimension.

There is no doubt that all of these new labor force opportunities have brought improvements in economic benefits and social indicators for women, as well as in their perceived roles. However, it is a rapidly evolving situation in which gaps and discrimination persist, while new challenges are also emerging:

Job and Income Insecurity, Market competition and the shrinking of public social services in transition economies can leave women increasingly vulnerable to job and income insecurity. According to a recent survey, the new contractual arrangements that many Chinese women hold are increasingly constraining them to make a choice between job security and their reproductive role (ILO

East Asia Update 62 2004a). A survey conducted in China’s Shanxi province found that one fifth of women workers had suffered job losses in some regions and industries, with childbearing responsibilities listed as one of the main reasons for the lay-offs (Cooke 2001). To offset income insecurity and wage gaps, many women in Vietnam are forced to take on multiple jobs, with almost a quarter of women being both self-employed and engaged in wage work (ADB 2002). The Sticky Floor and Occupational Stereotypes. Women’s employment in labor-intensive and low-skill industries such as the garment sector can relegate them to a narrow circle of industries and occupations that are typically seen as appropriate for women, perpetuating cultural stereotypes, limiting upward mobility, and undermining educational attainment. In the Philippines, for instance, the electronics industry is highly segmented by gender; women are in predominantly production operator positions that offer little career mobility while men are engineers and technicians – this despite the country’s high proportion of female graduates (ADB 2004b). Changes in Gender Relations and Power Dynamics. A study in Vietnam found that that domestic abuse is greatest in households where the woman is the main income earner (World Bank 2000). In Cambodia, where the formal sector offers women more opportunities than men, there is concern that feelings of disempowerment among young men are increasingly translating into violence towards women. Closing the Gap: the Road Forward

Quick wins in agriculture. Growing employment opportunities in manufacturing and services should not eclipse women’s disproportionate presence in agriculture. Better inclusion in agriculture programs, and increasing women’s access to land, credit and markets would have immediate returns in terms of poverty reduction, increased food security and better health and nutrition for families. It is arguably one of the most effective measures to help countries meet the MDG on reducing poverty and hunger. Better protection for workers, especially migrants. Improved policies on cross-border labor flows are becoming more important as the region integrates. Programs are needed to help educate migrants about risks before they leave home, provide protection in receiving countries, or help them get legal help if their rights are abused. Better support for the implementation of the relevant labor codes in factories will become increasingly important, as is the need to strengthen women’s participation in unions. Support for women in business. Women are increasingly business owners, the majority small and micro entrepreneurs. Amongst the challenges they face are inadequate access to credit, financial services,

communications and information, as well as lack of required business or financial skills. Efforts are needed to support women entrepreneurs, including through access to small loans, markets, and training.

The Social Sectors: Equality in Access to Health Care Narrowing the Gap: the Road since Beijing

Figure 3. Maternal Mortality (per 100000 live births)

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1990 1995 2003 MDG target2015

CAMBODIACHINAINDONESIALAOMONGOLIAPHILIPPINESVIETNAMTHAILANDEast Asia High Income

Source: ADB (2004).

Health needs are different for males and females, and vary throughout the lifecycle, starting before birth. Infant and child mortality data in most countries in the region suggest that through childhood, girls and boys receive similar access to health care in the early years of life.36 The health needs of women increase disproportionately as they reach reproductive age, when there are additional needs for reproductive health care. Health service utilization rates should therefore be higher for women than for men, but often are not. Maternal Mortality Rates (MMR) can be considered a proxy for women’s access to health care. As Figure 3 indicates, there are gaping regional disparities that set Lao PDR at one end, and developed countries such as South Korea, Japan, and Singapore at the other. MMRs have generally trended lower as a result of factors such as general improvements in nutrition, increased access to safe water and transport, more skilled staff to attend births (Figure 4), and falling fertility rates, which, by reducing maternal depletion syndrome, reduce the probability of maternal mortality. As in other countries and regions fertility rates have fallen as a result of new incentives created by the development process itself, 36 However, in China and South Korea, son preference and the technology to detect and abort female fetuses has resulted in the number of boys born to every 100 girls being 117 for China and 110 for South Korea - well above the norm of 105.

East Asia Update 63

Closing the Gap: the Road Forward for example large falls in infant mortality (reducing the number of births needed to achieve a desired family size), or the increasing market value of women’s work outside the home. Family planning has also played a significant role in reducing fertility rates across the region, though women’s right to make their own reproductive choices is limited in some countries, for example, on the one hand, in China through strict enforcement of the one-child policy, and on the other, in the Philippines, where religious opposition to contraception results in higher than desired fertility rates and reduced birth spacing.

As the region moves towards ensuring equality in access to healthcare for men and women, especially with a view to meeting the 2015 MDG of reducing MMR by three quarters, important steps need to be taken. Easy gains can still be made by increasing access to basic healthcare, and quality of service delivery. Easy gains can be made by bringing services closer to women – especially rural women – through extension-like programs and the provision of mobile health workers. Efficiency of service delivery is essential; a woman will not travel to a service center if there is doubt that she will receive service when she gets there. Efforts must be made to ensure greater linkages between service users and providers in order to allow women as users of services the ability to voice their concerns and demand the kind of care that they are entitled to.

Figure 4. Maternal Mortality and Births

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Source: World Bank (2004), ADB (2004)

Greater resources are needed to promote affordable women-friendly and culturally appropriate services. Because of their disproportionate health needs during reproductive years, women are responsible for a larger portion of health costs. Women or their families are often put in situations where they must weigh the benefits and costs of health services, particularly as health care systems increasingly are offering both private and public services. While the availability of more choice among providers is positive, policies and programs are often needed to help cushion the costs for the most vulnerable, particularly for poor women. For instance, health equity funds such as those being piloted in Cambodia, help poor families to bear the cost of healthcare in a more sustainable manner, and may have a greater impact on women. Mother and child services help women fulfill their role as care-givers while also providing services to the women themselves. Women – especially ethnic minorities – can be encouraged to use health services more if they are more culturally appropriate, with staff who speak local languages and understand local customs.

Low income countries with high MMRs in 1990 such as Cambodia, Lao PDR and Indonesia, were able to achieve dramatic improvements by increasing basic access to health care and education, improving infrastructure and communications. Lower middle and middle income countries had made these easy gains before 1990 and started the decade with harder challenges to reduce the rate further. The downward trend in MMRs in the low-middle income countries has slowed, as in China and Vietnam, and few countries look set to reach the MDG target for 2015. The biggest challenge is to change women’s standing in

society. The tendency and expectation for women to put their families’ well-being before theirs has a hidden cost on their health, particularly poor women. In Indonesia during the financial crisis the average body mass index of poor women dropped without a similar drop in their children's, suggesting that women prioritized their children’s nutrition over their own (World Bank 1999b). Societal norms harmful to women persist. Beliefs – such as “hard work during pregnancy strengthens a woman for childbirth” – reflect societal notions that undervalue women as individuals and view them in relation to their reproductive role. Such notions pose a difficult challenge, but incremental change will come from women’s increased education and participation in the public sphere.

In all countries, the gap in access to maternal healthcare increases in rural areas where high fertility rates combine with low education and limited infrastructure. In Lao PDR, 75 percent of the population – among whom a number of ethnic minority groups – are scattered across remote rural areas. Rural MMR stands at 580, more than triple the urban MMR and disproportionately higher among ethnic minorities (ADB 2004a). In Mongolia, time costs associated with long distances in rural areas make it difficult and time-consuming for women to reach health facilities, contributing to rural MMR that are 61 percent higher than urban ones (World Bank 2002b).

East Asia Update 64 The Social Sectors: Equality in Access to Education Figure 6. School Participation Rates

(15-17) by Gender and Wealth Quintile

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Source: World Bank Edstats (2004)

Narrowing the Gap: the Road since Beijing Girls’ educational attainment has seen significant achievements in East Asia, be it in increased literacy rates, enrolment rates, or completion rates. With some exceptions, most countries started the 1990s with relatively high educational indicators at the primary level, and a relatively small gender gap in favor of boys, so the scope for large improvements was limited. (Figure 5). However, having started the 1990s with the lowest regional educational indicators, Lao PDR and Cambodia did make dramatic progress in primary enrolment rates and in narrowing the ratio of girls to boys at that level. Cambodia saw rapid growth of primary enrolment rates in the poorest quintiles, especially for girls. In retention rates, there has been a 65 percent increase in the number of female pupils who reach grade 5 between 1990 and 2004.

The greatest gaps are found in tertiary education, suggesting a perception of higher opportunity costs associated with remaining in school, and the seemingly low returns on education for girls – or in some countries, boys – at that level. In China, where the tertiary enrolment ratio is 5 girls to 10 boys, there is evidence that women university graduates have been discouraged from applying for certain jobs by some employers (World Bank 2002a). Mongolia and the Philippines are the exceptions again, and the gaps are in favor of girls. The largest gender gap in education in the region is a gap in favor of girls at tertiary level in Mongolia, possibly reflecting the high opportunity cost, or the lack of relevance of tertiary education, for boys who are primarily herders.

Figure 5. Education: Ratio of Girls to Boys (2000)

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Source: World Bank (2003); ADB (22004)

Closing the Gap: the Road Forward Closing the gender gap in secondary education is within easy reach, increasing access for all is harder. Given how far East Asia has come, little effort is needed to close the remaining gender gaps in secondary education in those countries like Cambodia and Lao PDR where they still exist. Doing so will mean ensuring girls can travel safely to school, protecting the modesty of adolescent girls, for example by providing separate toilet facilities or safe boarding accommodation. A greater challenge is to increase the access to secondary education for both boys and girls in these countries by increasing the number of schools in rural and remote areas. Such an investment would go a long way in boosting their human capital and securing greater returns to education.

Equality at secondary level has been harder to achieve although China, Indonesia, and Vietnam have succeeded or are close, while the Philippines and Mongolia now have a problem of keeping boys rather than girls in secondary school. As for Cambodia and Lao PDR, their accomplishments at the primary level have not been matched at the secondary level, and in Cambodia’s case its progress has even gone backwards with less boys and girls enrolling than before. Interestingly, in selected East Asian countries male-female school enrolment gaps in urban areas are very similar to those in rural areas until higher levels. The bigger issue is the gap for both boys and girls between urban and rural areas. Similarly for income levels, the biggest difference is between rich and poor children rather than the male-female gaps within the same income brackets (Figure 6).

Efforts are needed to address pricing issues, expenditure targeting, and opportunity costs. The introduction of educational fees in East Asia is affecting access, particularly for the poor. In China, there are growing concerns that rising educational costs risk eroding educational gains,

East Asia Update 65 especially in rural areas. Opportunity and other costs can easily work to the disadvantage of girls. Therefore, pricing policies need to take into account this gender dimension and be accompanied by measures to protect the most vulnerable. At the same time, public expenditure needs to be more in-line with educational needs and policies. In Cambodia, tertiary and technical education – which comprises 0.5 percent of the overall student population – accounted for 30 percent of public spending in 1996 (World Bank 1999a). In view of the relative absence of women in tertiary and technical education, this budget allocation not only suggests a lack of gender-sensitive targeting but also that educational expenditures on boys at that level exceed those on girls. The move towards greater fiscal decentralization in East Asia – which has moved much of the responsibility of financing basic education to local governments – also needs to be considered in light of potential gender inequalities. Unequal revenue bases – and consequently unequal abilities to bear the costs of provision – by many local governments can adversely affect the most vulnerable. In this regard, a systematic compensatory policy is needed at the national level to assist poor local governments in the provision of educational and other services. Efforts are needed to address gender stereotypes in schools and society. School curricula need to be carefully designed and teachers trained to ensure that the potential of boys and girls is not limited by stereotypes. According to a recent survey on domestic violence in Lao PDR, a woman’s level of education was a significant factor influencing the occurrence of domestic violence in rural areas, with the higher the level, the greater the likelihood of abuse (GDG 2004). Education for ethnic minorities is particularly challenging in this respect as the conflict between strongly held cultures and traditions and the realities of the modern economy may be particularly threatening to both men and women.

Representation in Decision-Making Narrowing the Gap – Progress since Beijing

At a mere 1.6 percent, the overall increase in women’s political participation in national elected bodies between the early 1990s and today appears minimal. Perhaps more encouraging is that while women’s representation reached double digits in only four of fourteen countries reviewed, in the early 1990s, today only four of these countries have less than 10 percent women in parliament.

There are some interesting trends across the region. The proportion of women in national assemblies is higher in single party states (Figure 7) apparently as a result of top-down affirmative-action selection principles. On the other hand, in multi-party systems women have greater choices between political ideas and policies, and typically also a greater variety of civil liberties, but have to be selected for office through open competitive elections, in which the

public’s traditional stereotypes and prejudices can play a role, as can the type of electoral system. (Also, there seems to be no correlation in the multi-party states between the stage of socio-economic development and women’s representation – Japan lies between Papua New Guinea and Mongolia with the lowest representation.)

Figure 7. Proportion of Women in National Assemblies

(Last 3 Elections)

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There are however, examples in the region that show it is possible to increase women’s participation in democracies where there has been strong commitment and support for this. Concerted efforts by the Timorese resulted in a 23 percent participation of women in the first national parliament of the new country – the highest in a multi-party state in the region. After years of very low participation of women, the leadership in Singapore decided to increase women’s participation, and used a mixture of rules, incentives and encouragement to send a strong signal to political parties with the result that women’s participation increased from 2.5 percent in 1991 to 16 percent in 2001. Across the region, the trend in multi-party states is slowly and steadily upwards but greater action will be needed to foster and accelerate this trend.

This is not to say that women are not participating in the political process. It is worth noting that almost always in national elections, voter turn-out is higher among women. There is also the increasingly organized and effective role of women in independent civil society and social movements. When the grass-roots women’s movement, the Voice of Concerned Mothers took to the streets in Indonesia to demonstrate against the price of milk powder in 1997, it was the start of months of broader protest that led to the downfall of the Suharto regime. Women’s organizations throughout the region have worked with state agencies to

East Asia Update 66 help draft new constitutions that give women equal rights to men, and have lobbied successfully for various changes in laws and policies. In Thailand, women’s groups lobbied for the right to retain family names after marriage, and for a quota in village councils that would make decisions on allocations of money through a government village fund proposal. Watchdog or human rights NGOs actively fighting corruption are often headed by women, such as the Center for Social Development, or Licadho in Cambodia, or Procurement Watch in the Philippines.

Figure 8. Proportion of Women at National and Local levels (2004)

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Source: IPU (2004) and World Bank

The trend in the region is to decentralize decision-making to lower levels and women’s representation in government and civil society at sub-national levels is also important. A comparison of women’s representation in sub-national elected bodies in a selection of countries across the region (figure 8) shows a trend for fewer women to be elected at lower levels. For example in China, where village committees are now directly elected, women’s representation dropped from 30 to 16 percent since 1998. (China Daily 2004). The exception is Mongolia, where women’s participation increases progressively at lower levels. There are some positive signs that over time this trend will improve: the percentage of female elected village heads in Indonesia has increased progressively year by year from 2 percent in 1996 to 3.4 percent in 2001. At the same time, despite the success of women’s civil society groups at national level, they have been less effective at the local level. The absence of women in local parliaments or other voice-mechanisms has led to examples of local laws being passed that actively discriminate against women. In Indonesia, religious edicts are being introduced in certain parts of the country, threatening to undermine the rights and protections that were previously available under a centralized system. (World Bank 2004). There are some successes: for example women’s church movements in local areas of West Papua in Indonesia successfully lobbied for restrictions on the sale of alcohol which they saw as a contributing factor to the high levels of domestic violence.

Closing the Gap: the Road Forward Representation of women in formal decision-making in East Asia still has a long way to go to meet MDG targets. Despite overall progress, the region has yet to tackle the barriers that reinforce unequal gender relationships and perpetuate women’s marginalization in the decision-making sphere. Part of this challenge is political, requiring policies and frameworks that would enable women’s increased participation. The other part is cultural, demanding a change in mind-set that would challenge the current attitudes and practices that obliterate women’s potential as a decision-making partner. However, while change in the government bodies may be slow, change in the women’s movement and civil society organizations is not and at least in the short term, it is these groups on which women must rely throughout the region to lobby for policy changes in their favor.

Quick wins would come through providing greater support to women’s groups and movements at both national and local levels and from implementing affirmative action policies to ensure representation by women. Given the demonstrated impacts of women’s movements throughout East Asia there would seem to be very positive and cost-effective impacts to be had from building their capacity further. There is potential for them to participate more formally in policy dialogue, analysis of policies and budgets, as well as implementation of activities dedicated to closing gaps. With regard to formal representation in government, attention needs to be placed on electoral systems and the limited application of laws, which can inadvertently undermine women’s chances of getting elected. In Cambodia, a party list system has placed women lower down the party lists than men, and reduced their chances of getting elected. In the Philippines and Timor, the opposite is true, and this system has helped women

Women’s participation in decision-making can also be through appointed positions or through representation in higher levels of the civil service, neither of which shows encouraging trends in the East Asia region. One has to search hard to find a woman who has been appointed provincial or district governor in the region – for example, there are only seven women district heads in Indonesia and no women provincial governors. Also in the civil service, women are disproportionately represented at the lower levels and rarely end up in positions of authority, although the presence of women in key central-level positions in Thailand, Malaysia, and Philippines can convey a rosier picture. In the Philippines, women outnumber men significantly at the middle levels, and yet the majority of senior level positions are held by men.

East Asia Update 67 climb up the representation ladder. Such support would entail increasing opportunities for political training for women as well as the implementation of existing quotas and other measures. Efforts must be made to ensure decentralization protects women’s hard fought gains and protections. Many of the region’s active and vocal women – whether in elected bodies, civil service, or civil society – tend to be at the central level, in the capital cities. It is less likely that there will be active participation of – or lobbying by – representatives of women at the local level, and decisions made or laws passed risk being gender-blind or even openly discriminatory towards women. Community Driven Development projects that set out to increase and develop the participation of women in village or sub-district decision-making offer the best opportunities to develop the capacity of local women to participate effectively and build understanding of government systems from the bottom. The ability to reach large numbers of women through these projects has the potential to build a cadre of women at local level with the skills and experience to stand for local level elections. Over the long term, policies and efforts must take into account the changing political and economic role of women in the region and support it through fostering a more conducive environment for them in policy making. Despite women’s accomplishments, female stereotypes that portray women as weak and inferior to men continue to prevail in East Asia, be it through textbooks, proverbs, or practices. Citing women’s physical and intellectual limitations, a survey in the Philippines showed negative attitudes towards women’s role in politics. In Vietnam, one of the reasons that women’s presence at the local level is low relates to the fact that historically they could not vote or be candidates as they did not own land. While today they can own land, these notions persist. Though there is no quick fix, efforts targeting the educational curriculum and the media, relevant training for women and awareness-raising campaigns are needed to nurture women’s political aspirations and dispel female stereotypes.

Legal and Institutional Mechanisms Probably the most noticeable progress that can be largely attributed to the Beijing meeting has been in the area of institutions, policies and laws concerning women, or gender equality. Table 2 shows the progression in this area in selected countries, and highlighting legal reforms in the areas of land, labor and violence against women, and institutional reforms and policies for mainstreaming gender. Labor laws with provisions to ensure gender equality were amongst the earliest of the laws to have been enacted. However, gaps still exist; some laws take a protectionist approach that removes the element of choice for women and

in the informal sector where women predominate, there are still no legal frameworks in place to provide security. Gradually, countries are adopting formal land laws or policies that protect women’s right to land and security of land ownership and use. This has been especially important in countries that have undergone land reforms and privatization of state assets. There are still concerns about the rights of women in this respect in Mongolia where the privatization of land is still on-going. More recently the countries of East Asia have put in place the legal frameworks to protect women against gender-based violence, including trafficking of women and children. Cambodia and Timor are now among the last to adopt a law on domestic violence. However, implementation of the laws is still a long way off, particularly in rural areas, and will need concerted efforts on the part of law enforcement agencies and civil society advocates engaged in increasing women’s legal awareness. All countries now have some kind of state mechanism with responsibility for women, and/or for mainstreaming gender. The last decade has seen changes in the philosophical position of governments, from that of protecting the role of women as wives and mothers to promoting gender equality. Throughout the last decade, departments for women have been elevated to Ministries, such as in Indonesia and Cambodia, and high level inter-sectoral coordinating bodies formed. However, the institutions are still weak, lack resources and capacity, and are almost uniformly struggling to define their role vis a vis the more powerful sectors. Although action plans prepared for the 1995 Beijing meetings have been updated, and a policy dialogue is informed by better sex-disaggregation of statistics and increasingly sophisticated analysis there is a long way to go to achieve the desired impact. Quick gains can be made through legal aid and awareness, access to conflict resolution and informal or alternative justice mechanisms. Important gains can be made by ensuring that women are aware of their rights and have access to people and resources that can help them access formal justice systems. A recent study in the Philippines highlights a significant gender bias in the court system, deterring many women from taking their cases to court (ADB 2004b). While it is critical for formal legal systems to make changes so that they can respond more appropriately and justly to women’s complaints, this may take many years in some countries. In the interim alternative dispute mechanisms – such as labor arbitration councils or cadastral commissions – can serve a vital role in solving disputes. Policy making needs to be informed by good research, budget analysis and policy impact analysis. Much work and effort has gone into the collection of gender disaggregated statistics which would allow better analysis. Though important, the value of gender analysis lies in the

East Asia Update 68 nuances and in unpicking layers of complexity which often go beyond what statistics can offer. Focused research on the impacts of different policies is needed, along with better analysis of budgets and their implications for men and women.

Concluding remarks The trend to increase social indicators had started long before the Beijing meeting, with huge progress being made through increased provision of services and improved access. Primary education levels were generally at parity, all but a few countries had brought down maternal mortality, and women were already active in the workforce. Other than in a few countries the low-hanging fruit was already rapidly disappearing and the region was getting to the point where further progress depended on dealing with structural and cultural constraints to equality. Since Beijing the rate of progress has actually slowed in many countries despite the concerted efforts to get in place institutions, legal frameworks, and specific action plans for promoting gender equality. However, in the region as a whole, there are still quick wins to be made to reduce gender gaps. In particular, projects and programs that increase and improve access to services

in rural areas, and that target rural women with specially adapted services to respond to their needs, will reap incremental benefits. So too will providing support for business women and female entrepreneurs, and greater protection for women workers – especially migrant workers. Increasing support for women’s civil society groups will undoubtedly reap returns based on their impressive record so far, and working through the increasing number of community driven development programs which have an immense coverage at local level in the region, offers opportunities to build capacity of local level women. Affirmative actions that strengthen women’s representation should be expanded to accelerate the pace of change. A greater challenge lies in implementing laws and policies that have been put in place, and in increasing the sophistication of analysis of budgets and policy impacts so that policies can be fine-tuned to achieve maximum benefits. Improving gender sensitivity of curriculum and of the media will contribute to positive socio-cultural change, though ultimately the change will be inevitable, as a greater number of women become empowered to challenge stereotypes in the home, the school, the workplace, and community.

This Special Focus was prepared by Gillian M. Brown, Laila Al-Hamad and Carmen de Paz Nieves of the World Bank’s East Asia and Pacific Region Social Development team

East Asia Update 69

Table 2. Gender-related Legal and Institutional Mechanisms in East Asia (1990-2005)37

New Laws/ amendments acknowledging gender issues

passed

Women's Institutions Created or upgraded

Labor Land VAW

Ministries/offices

for women

Inter- ministerial

councils

Action Plans

launched

Government instructions on gender

mainstreaming

(a) CAMBODI

A X China X X Indonesia X Lao PDR X Mongolia X X Philippines

1990

-199

5

Vietnam X X Cambodia X X X China X Indonesia X X Lao PDR X Mongolia X X X X Philippines X X X X

1995

-200

0

Vietnam X Cambodia X O* X X X China X X Indonesia X X X Lao PDR X X X Mongolia X X X X X Philippines X X

2000

-200

5

Vietnam X O* X X

37 In table 2, X refers to action passed while O refers to action in progress.

East Asia Update 70

References ADB and World Bank (2005). Mongolia Country Gender Assessment.

ADB (2004a). Lao PDR: Gender, Poverty and MDGs.

____ (2004b). Philippines Gender Assessment.

____ (2002). Women in Vietnam.

China Daily (2004). More Village Women Getting Political. http://www.china.org.cn/english/2004/Sep/106537.htm

Cooke, Fan Lee (2001). “Equal opportunity? The Role of Legislation and Public Policies in Women’s Employment in China.” Women in Management Review, Vol. 16, No. 7, 2001. pp. 334-348.

Du Jie and Nazneen Kanji (2003). Gender Equality and Poverty Reduction in China. DFID.

Gender & Development Group (2004). Rural Domestic Violence and Gender Research: Lao PDR.

Gender Resource Information & Development Center (2004). Lao Gender Profile.

ILO (2004a). Economic Security for a Better World.

___ (2004b). Global Employment Trends for Women.

Liu, Amy C. (2004). “Sectoral Gender Wage Gap in Vietnam.” Oxford Development Studies, June 2004, vol. 32, no. 2, pp. 225-239(15).

OXFAM Int’l (2004). Trading Away Our Rights: Women Working in Global Supply Chains.

Phav, Ing Kantha (2005). Speech of HE Dr Ing Kantha Phav, Minister for Women’s Affairs of Cambodia, 49th Session of the Commission on the Status of Women, NY, March 2005.

Rozelle, Scott, Xiao-Yuan Dong, Linxiu Zhang, and Andrew Mason (2002). “Gender Wage Gaps in Post-reform Rural China.” World Bank.

UNESCAP (2003). Women in Local Government in Asia and the Pacific.

UNIFEM, WB, ADB, UNDP, and DFID (2004). Cambodia Gender Assessment.

World Bank:(1999a). Cambodia Public Expenditure Review.

__________(1999b). Gender Dimensions of the East Asia Crisis.

__________(2000). Vietnam: Attacking Poverty

__________(2001). Engendering Development.

__________(2002a). China Country Gender Review.

__________(2002b). Mongolia Public Expenditure and Financial Management Review

__________(2003). Indonesia Country Gender Profile

__________(2004a). Working Overseas: Who Gets the Benefits? Who Bears the Cost?

__________(2004b). Gender and Regional Autonomy in Indonesia.

__________(2004c). World Development Indicators.

Yueh, Linda Y. (2004). “Wage Reforms in China During the 1990’s.” Asian Economic Journal, vol. 18, no.2, 2004, pp. 149-164.

Remarks by Ms. Ronnie L. Goldberg

Executive Vice President and Senior Policy Officer United States Council for International Business

Pan-African Forum on Women’s Entrepreneurship Development

October 27, 2009 I am honored to be with you this morning, speaking on behalf of the International Organization of Employers (IOE). With a membership of 148 national business organizations in 142 countries, IOE is the voice of business at the International Labor Organization (ILO). I am grateful to the ILO, represented here by the Regional Director for Africa, for involving the IOE in this important event. And I am pleased to see so many employer representatives in this room -- a testament to the commitment of our organizations to women’s entrepreneurship development. Thank you also to the African Development Bank for working with the ILO to make this forum a success. Finally, I would like to express our gratitude to the Egyptian Government and to the First Lady for supporting this initiative. Introduction I have been asked to share with you Employers’ perspectives on the subject of women’s entrepreneurship development. Women’s entrepreneurship is both about women’s position in society and about the role of entrepreneurship in the same society. What I hope to do this morning is to briefly discuss the role of women in economic development, to touch on the role and importance of entrepreneurship to such development, and then to turn to women’s

entrepreneurship in particular, making the case for why this subject deserves specific program and policy interventions. Here is the argument: At least half the brainpower on earth belongs to women. Countries that do not capitalize on the full potential of one-half of their society are grossly misallocating their human resources and compromising their ability to compete in the global economy. An important part of capitalizing on human potential lies in fostering entrepreneurship. This fact has been well recognized by the ILO, which references the importance of entrepreneurship development in its Global Jobs Pact. Indeed, ILO Director-General Juan Somavia himself has said that “no decent work strategy can be successful without encouraging entrepreneurship, innovation, and productivity.” The ILO Global Jobs Pact was negotiated last summer by governments, workers, and employers to address the economic and financial challenges that now confront nearly every country in every region. Women workers and women entrepreneurs are the backbone of many industries that have been hard hit in recent months. And of course women are the backbones of families struggling to manage in difficult circumstances. The good news is that while women are hard hit by the problem, we are also a huge part of the solution. And while our challenges and circumstances may differ widely, we share a surprising number of common concerns – which means we have an enormous opportunity to learn from and help each other. This is why events such as this one are so important. So let me take a step back and draw some connections between development, entrepreneurship, and women.

Women and Economic Growth A recent article in The Economist put it this way: “Forget China, India, and the Internet. Economic growth is driven by women.” The article goes on to say that an increase in female employment, in both the developed and developing world, has arguably been the biggest engine of global growth in recent decades. Moreover, there is clear evidence that enabling women to develop their skills and qualifications and to join the labor market boosts incomes and well being throughout the society. In particular, educating girls boosts prosperity. Not only are better-educated women more productive, they raise healthier, better-educated children. Putting more resources in the hands of women has a multiplier effect, raising the welfare of the entire family. By the way, if the mantra these days is “jobs, jobs, jobs” the key for creating jobs is “education, education, education,” particularly for women and girls. Yet, despite some gains and despite these demonstrable impacts, women remain perhaps the world’s most underutilized resource. In short, not only is equal opportunity in the area of economic empowerment not a reality. Its absence is a drag on growth, development and poverty alleviation. Entrepreneurship And as DG Somavia has pointed out, entrepreneurship, productivity and innovation are also key to growth and development. The IOE has done considerable work in the name of encouraging entrepreneurship, innovation, and productivity. In its interventions in the ILO, and in the work it does at the national

level with its member Employer Organizations, it promotes recommendations on the actions that governments must take -- through economic policy measures and promoting the reform of laws, regulations, and other barriers to growth -- to unleash entrepreneurship and create an enabling environment for sustainable enterprises and employment creation. Such work on entrepreneurship in general is important and relevant to our subject. It is necessary, but it is not sufficient. And so, let me narrow the focus to the specific subset of women’s entrepreneurship. Women’s Entrepreneurship: Definition and Scope The world of women’s entrepreneurship is large, diverse, and of great economic significance. Women-owned enterprises exist everywhere. They populate all sectors of the economy and they come in all sizes. In the U.S., there are approximately 6.2 million women owned firms, employing 9.2 million people, generating $1.15 trillion in sales. Worldwide, women-owned businesses are said to comprise between one-quarter and one-third of all businesses. And this estimate is almost certainly understated: first, because available data does not always distinguish by gender; and secondly, because women are more likely to run businesses in the informal economy, where data is hard or impossible to capture. For example, in Africa, women are responsible for between 60-80% of food production. In Ghana, women working in the informal sector contribute up to 46 percent of the agricultural GDP. More broadly, it has been estimated that in sub-Saharan Africa, 84 percent of women are informally employed (compared by the way to 63 percent of men). This informal work accounts for over 50 percent of the GDP in Benin, Chad, Kenya, and Mali.

Worldwide, women are most heavily represented in micro and small businesses. This is almost certainly due to legal, social, and/or cultural factors, the specifics of which may very widely around the world, but the effect of which is to constrain the potential for women entrepreneurs. What do women themselves perceive as their biggest obstacles? Of course the specifics vary enormously among countries with different levels of development. But listen to the list of issues most often cited by women entrepreneurs in the U.S.: they cite access to capital, trade, affordable health care, taxes, access to government procurement, gaining media exposure, work-life balance, trends in technology, and retirement security. In sum, these concerns are about accessing the capital and markets needed to grow a profitable and sustainable business, and about securing essential social protections. These are concerns common to all entrepreneurs in many countries. They are small business issues, not particularly women’s issues. None of this should be surprising. Women comprise approximately half the human race. That their enterprises should be numerous and diverse, that they should have an impact on their economies, and that they share the problems of all small business owners should be obvious. So why does the subject of women’s entrepreneurship deserve separate consideration? Why does it deserve separate and specific policy responses, both from governments and from organizations such as our own? The concerns and needs of women entrepreneurs are distinct and need to be studied separately for two reasons:

-- Women’s entrepreneurship constitutes an important untapped source of economic growth, often for gender-specific reasons, and -- The topic remains largely neglected. Mainstream research, polices and programs often do not capture data about women or take into account the specific needs of women entrepreneurs and potential entrepreneurs. And even where the issue has been studied extensively, the policy follow-up is often lacking. These points are interconnected. Let’s consider them in turn: Gender-Specific Policy Issues Many differences occur because women’s life experiences contrast with those of men in terms of the education they receive, their involvement with their families, the social spaces they occupy and the circles in which they mix. The details differ around the world, but this is a universal phenomenon. As a result of their experiences, women may lack the confidence, skills and resources to successfully start and run a business. Perhaps there exists a societal or cultural resistance to women in business. Perhaps the major issue is a women’s traditionally more significant role relative to men in balancing work and home responsibilities, or women’s overlapping productive and reproductive roles. Let me say a word about each of these -- Socio-cultural resistance to women in business: Such resistance may be well engrained in otherwise very different societies, at all levels of development, and the effects may begin from childhood. Limited or inadequate access to education may limit a woman’s business potential, as may the notion that certain fields of endeavour are inappropriate or off-limits.

These attitudes may have a number of potential consequences. A woman may not consider business as a career option or lack the confidence to start up and run a business. If she does start up a business, social attitudes may affect her choice of sector and her investment behaviour. The evidence indicates women-run enterprises tend to be smaller than those of men both in terms of number of workers employed and in terms of the presence and value of fixed assets. Women’s enterprises also tend to be concentrated in low investment, less remunerative sub-sectors which build on traditional skills, while men tend to be concentrated in more dynamic sub-sectors. Lastly, women engaged in economic activities may not perceive themselves as “business women” and therefore not register their business, restricting access to business development services.

-- Balancing home and work responsibilities: Women’s potential in business is often limited by their traditionally (indeed, I would say universally) more significant role relative to men in balancing work and home responsibilities. The demands of motherhood and the division of labour between men and women in the household may reduce the amount of time, energy and concentration women have to expend on their business. Women may prefer businesses that maintain close links between the personal and business. Women may invest less in their business and more in their family than men. On top of these differences (and perhaps reflecting them), laws that discriminate on the basis of sex – directly or indirectly – can be constraints to entrepreneurship. For example, in some countries women lack the legal status to establish a contract, represent themselves in legal cases and/or hold property in their own name. A recent IFC Africa survey of legal and regulatory impediments to the growth of women’s enterprises illustrates this point. It found:

-- Only 7% of the female respondents surveyed could own land; -- Many women respondents lacked legal property assets to serve as collateral; -- 30% of women operated their businesses from registered premises, as opposed to 51%of men. At the same time, a legal framework that does not provide for the overlapping productive and reproductive roles of women may also indirectly discriminate against women. Laws can facilitate the ability of women to participate in the labour force, for example by ensuring equal treatment (and safety) in the workplace. Governments may also be able to address concerns such as the availability of affordable childcare. We need to encourage our governments to listen to the voices of women entrepreneurs, and to mainstream and incorporate a women’s entrepreneurial dimension in the formation of all entrepreneurship and SME-related policies. To do this effectively, they and the international organizations that assist them (such as the ILO) need to improve the factual and analytic underpinnings of our understanding of the role of women entrepreneurs in the economy. In short, gender-specific constraints to entrepreneurship require well-supported specific policy responses. These responses need to be both practical and political. Women need targeted training in how to start, manage, and grow their businesses. But they also must lend their voices to efforts to identify and address laws and policies that do not adequately consider the needs of women entrepreneurs and sometimes further exacerbate gender-specific constraints to entrepreneurship.

How Can the ILO and IOE Help? Let me say just a final word about where ILO and IOE may fit into these efforts. The ILO is actively engaged in promoting women’s entrepreneurship globally through its program on Women’s Entrepreneurship Development and Gender Equality (WEDGE) within its Small Enterprise Development program. WEDGE seeks to develop a knowledge base on, innovative support services and products, and an advocacy voice for women entrepreneurs. Through the WEDGE Office in Addis Ababa, the ILO runs a number of technical cooperation activities in Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia. I trust we will hear a great deal more about these programs. Employers Organizations exist both to inform and advise governments and international bodies such as the ILO on appropriate policies, and to provide useful services to our business members. It is important that such services consider the needs of both women and men entrepreneurs. As we’ve discussed, for example, women entrepreneurs may require specific services to increase their business confidence and/or specific mechanisms for increasing their access to credit. Women’s entrepreneur networks are major sources of knowledge and valuable tools for the development and promotion of women-owned businesses. This room is full of women from across Africa who, often operating through or in cooperation with national employer organizations, have come together in highly effective local, national, and regional associations and networks precisely to address both practical and policy concerns. I’m certain that over the course of this conference, we can look forward to learning a great deal about just these kinds of tools, resources, and services.

Conclusion I want to conclude with another quotation from The Economist magazine article I referred to earlier: “Despite the increased economic importance of women, they could become more important still. More of them could join the labour market and more could make full use of their skills and qualifications. This would provide a sounder base for long-term growth. It would help to finance rich countries’ welfare states as populations age and it would boost incomes in the developing world… There is a saying that women must do twice as well as men to be thought half as good. Luckily that is not so difficult.“ Thank you for your attention, and for your generous hospitality here in Cairo. I look forward to learning a great deal in these meetings and to working with you.

Promoting Gender Equality in Muslim ContextsWomen’s Voices Must Not Be Silenced

By Noeleen Heyzer

A question that is sometimes posed is whether women in Muslim contexts are entitled to equalrights. Are their culture and religion opposed to women having equal rights? To answer this, let usrecognize the fact that nearly all the countries with Muslim majorities are signatories tointernational agreements advancing women’s rights. These include the Convention for theElimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), the Declaration on theElimination of Violence against Women, the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and otherrelevant agreements1. Most recently, on the occasion of the International Day for the Eliminationof Violence against Women (25 November 2007), the Secretary-General of the Organization of theIslamic Conference issued a statement that said: “The observance of this day serves as a reminderto the entire international community of the 1999 UN General Assembly resolution 54/134,motivating the need to increase the status of women. Respect and upholding of women’s rights inIslam are enshrined in its most valuable principles because Islam recognizes the religious, social,economic, legal and political rights of women. … Unfortunately, a great majority of women inmost societies, in particular in the developing and least developed countries, continue to facediscrimination and suffer social injustice, and violence2.”

Bamyan, Afghanistan, 2007. Three young girls in the Bam Sarai village prepare for exams as partof an effort in which the United Nations Children’s Fund and the Government of Afghanistan aimto increase girls’ primary school attendance by 20 per cent by the end of 2008. (Photo: UNPhoto/Shehzad Noorani)

The public commitments of States with Muslim majorities explicitly contradict the stereotype ofMuslim women as choiceless, voiceless victims of their culture and religion. Such a stereotype,which is unfounded, in fact becomes pernicious when it is institutionalized in policy and law, forexample, when women in Muslim minorities are denied equal rights as citizens, on the grounds oftheir supposed culture and religion.

The UN Secretary-General’s 2006 report, In-depth study on all forms of violence against women,notes that “violence against women is not confined to a specific culture, region or country, or toparticular groups of women within a society3”. This point was highlighted when the report waspresented to the General Assembly’s Third Committee, noting that at least one in three women issubjected to violence at some point in her lifetime4. Indeed, gender-based violence anddiscrimination are global problems, not uniquely Muslim problems.

There is an urgent need to make visible initiatives for gender equality for women in Muslim

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contexts, so that their right to have rights is not discounted, a priori, by fallacious ideas about theirculture and religion. As Chair of its Consortium Advisory Group, I am proud to introduce the workof the Research Programme Consortium on “Women’s Empowerment in Muslim Contexts”(WEMC). This is a multi-country initiative focusing on women’s empowerment—indigenousassertions of and struggles for rights in diverse Muslim contexts—and upholding women’s rights asan unequivocal principle5. Furthermore, women’s assertions of rights are not merely modernphenomena, but have been well-documented throughout Muslim history6.

Unfortunately, at this historic juncture, women’s right to gender equality is being challenged inboth Muslim and non-Muslim contexts, by the rise of modern extremist political agendas,commonly called religious “fundamentalisms”. Opportunistically using religion to disguise politicalagendas, these extremists seek to disempower women by means of constructing closedconstituencies. At the same time, fundamentalist agendas are reinforcing existing patriarchies thatare also disempowering women. Women who resist these converging impositions are condemned,ostracized, threatened, abused and dehumanized, with culture and religion used to excuse thesystemic violence inflicted on them.

Therefore, as WEMC and the UN Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) have pointed out, itis particularly crucial at this time to reject the use of culture and religion as a means to legitimizethe disempowerment of women. As part of this endeavour, UNIFEM has a major campaign on“Say No to Violence” and WEMC observed the International Day for the Elimination of Violenceagainst Women, with the theme “No excuses for violence against women”. These campaigns seekto garner public opinion on strategies for mobilizing the State, society and the internationalcommunity to reject cultural justifications for violence against women7.

As noted in the Secretary-General’s In-depth study on all forms of violence against women:“Tension between cultural relativism and the recognition of women’s human rights, including theright to be free from violence, has been intensified as a result of the current heightened attention toState security issues. The resort to cultural relativism has been made worse by the policies adoptedsince 11 September 2001 by many groups and societies that feel threatened and under siege. Thistension poses a notable challenge in ensuring that violence against women is kept firmly on theinternational and national agendas with the priority it requires.”

In this context, it is therefore of utmost importance to ensure that women’s rights advocates andwomen asserting their rights are not silenced. Such silencing would make acceptable spuriousclaims that women’s rights and gender equality are alien and illegitimate in Muslim contexts andwould condone the use of violence as a mechanism of control over women. It is more importantthan ever before to amplify women’s voices and give support to their national strategies forindividual and collective empowerment in ways that would promote democratization from theinside out. This will promote the right to gender equality as the inalienable right of the 600 millionwomen who constitute half of the Muslims in the world.

Notes

Lists of the signatories of these agreements are available on various websites; see, forexample, WomenWatch.

1.

Saudi Press Agency, Jeddah, 25 November 2007.2.Report of the Secretary-General: In-depth study on all forms of violence against women.United Nations General Assembly, Sixty-first session (6 July 2006).

3.

“Violence against women not confined to specific culture or region, Third Committee told,as debate begins on advancement of women”, United Nations Sixty-first General AssemblyThird Committee, 8th and 9th Meetings (AM PM), (New York: UN Department of PublicInformation, 9 October 2006).

4.

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For more information on WEMC, see www.wemc.com.hk.5.F. Shaheed, Great Ancestors: women asserting rights in Muslim contexts (Lahore: ShirkatGah/WLUML, 2007).

6.

See WEMC.7.

Biography

Noeleen Heyzer is former Executive Director of the United Nations Development Fund forWomen and Chair of the Consortium Advisory Group, Research Programme Consortium onWomen’s Empowerment in Muslim Contexts: Gender, Poverty and Democratisation from theInside Out. She is Under-Secretary-General at the United Nations and Executive Secretary of theUN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific.

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Poverty Number 13, January 2008

International Poverty Centre

Gender Equality

2 International Poverty Centre

F R O M T H EE D I T O R

Dag Ehrenpreis

Poverty in Focus is a regular publication of theInternational Poverty Centre (IPC). Its purposeis to present the results of research on povertyand inequality in the developing world. Supportis provided by the Swedish InternationalDevelopment Cooperation Agency (Sida).

EditorDag Ehrenpreis

International Advisory Board

Desktop PublisherRoberto Astorino

Front page: Photo by Radhika Chalasani, IFAD.A local savings and credit group meetingin Powerguda village, Andhra Pradesh, India.Women have taken a leading role in promotingsavings in tribal communities. The woman withthe book is keeping records of savings and loantransactions

Editor’s note: IPC is grateful for the supportby Naila Kabeer, both as editorial planningconsultant and lead article author, and forthe inspiring ideas by Miranda Munro,representative of the UK Department forInternational Development (DFID) in Brazil.Thanks also to all the authors for generouslycontributing their intellectual products withoutany monetary remuneration.

IPC is a joint project between the United NationsDevelopment Programme and Brazil to promoteSouth-South Cooperation on applied povertyresearch. It specialises in analysing poverty andinequality and offering research-based policyrecommendations on how to reduce them.IPC is directly linked to the Poverty Group of theBureau for Development Policy, UNDP andthe Brazilian Government’s Institute for AppliedEconomic Research (IPEA).

IPC Director (acting)Terry McKinley

International Poverty CentreSBS – Ed. BNDES, 10º andar70076-900 Brasilia DF Brazil

povertycentre@undp-povertycentre.orgwww.undp-povertycentre.org

The views expressed in IPC publications arethose of the authors and do not necessarilyreflect the views of IPC, IPEA or UNDP.

Oscar Altimir, CEPAL, Santiago de ChileGiovanni A. Cornia, Università di FirenzeNora Lustig, Universidad Iberoamericana, MexicoGita Sen, Indian Institute of Management, BangaloreAnna Tibaijuka, UN Habitat, NairobiPeter Townsend, London School of EconomicsPhilippe van Parijs, Université de Louvain

A s with overall equity concerns, gender equality is important for both intrinsicand instrumental reasons. It has a bearing on family harmony and on wellbeing

in many dimensions. It involves policy-making with respect to society as a whole,i.a. education, labour and financial markets, economic and political empowerment,institutions, and economic growth.

The prospects for achieving the Millennium Development Goals are both directly andindirectly improved by enhancing gender equity. Thus, there are close links betweenthe reduction of both gender inequalities and multidimensional poverty. The empiricalevidence suggests that developing countries with less gender inequality tend to havelower poverty rates.

Gender inequality represents an untapped source for stimulating economic growth andpromoting social development. This is particularly true in the developing world, wherewomen are often systematically deprived from having equal access to social services aswell as to physical and social capital. Hence, empowering women by improving theirliving conditions and enabling them to actively participate in the social and economiclife of a country may well be the key for long-term sustainable development.

This issue of Poverty in Focus highlights the importance of improving gender equity forpro-poor growth and improved wellbeing of poor families, with references to recentresearch literature and sharing of important and policy-relevant results.

Naila Kabeer leads with a summary of current knowledge about the relation betweengender, labour markets and poverty, explaining why there are no easy generalisationsabout the poverty implications of women’s paid work.

Gita Sen approaches poverty as a gendered experience that has to be addressedwith due consideration to its various impacts, responses and policy implications.

Joana Costa and Elydia Silva underline the burdens of gender inequalities for societyas a whole and show how paid work by women reduces overall poverty and inequality.

Denis Drechsler, Johannes Jütting and Carina Lindberg focus on the links between gender,institutions and development; better data can help improve policy analysis.

James Heintz considers the ‘feminisation of labour’ that sees women concentrated inlower quality, more precarious forms of paid work, increasing household vulnerability.

Ruth Alsop and Paul Healey find that gender inequality is a major barrier to economic growthand poverty reduction, calling for bold policy action to challenge social institutions.

Andrew Morrison, Dhushyanth Raju and Nistha Sinha summarise a World Bank study showinga robust relationship between gender inequality and poverty; poor women’s paid workplays a key role in getting their families out of poverty.

John Sender presents data indicating that when women in rural Mozambique havegreater autonomy, daughters are less likely to be neglected; rural wages provide anescape route from poverty for a new generation of women.

Ranjula Bali Swain and Fan Yang Wallentin use evidence from India that microfinance maylead to increased empowerment, self-confidence, respect and esteem for women.

Irene K B Mutalima reports on the experience of microfinance in Africa and warns thatgender concerns often take a secondary role to the financial sustainability of thecredit instititutions.

Marcelo Medeiros and Joana Costa examine the claims of a ‘feminisation of poverty’ makingthe distinction between static levels and dynamic change, and argue that currentpoverty measure underestimate the real levels of women’s poverty.

Sylvia Chant also finds that the scant data on intra-household inequalities preventcertain knowledge about the ‘feminisation of poverty’ and that the focus should beon women’s privation beyond incomes.

This collection of articles should contribute to a better understanding of the importanceof recognising the crucial role of gender inequalities as barriers to economic and socialdevelopment, and thus of undertaking policy and institutional reforms that will moreeffectively reduce poverty and social injustice.

Poverty in Focus January 2008 3

The pro-poor potential of labour-intensive growth is based on therecognition that labour power is theprimary asset at the disposal of the poorand hence labour markets the keytransmission mechanism through whichthe benefits of growth can be distributedto the poor.

However, it is also premised on a numberof implicit, often unexamined, assumptionsabout the ease with which the poor cantransform their labour into paid workand paid work into improved levels oflivelihood, security and accumulation.

A gender analysis of labour and labourmarkets suggests that this ‘transformation’process not only cannot be taken forgranted but that it is also far moreproblematic for women than for menbecause of the existence of variousgender-related constraints.

These constraints relate to social normsand values which govern the genderdivision of labour in production andreproduction in different regions ofthe world. In general, these tend toassign primary responsibility for thereproduction and care of the familyto women and overall decision-makingauthority to senior males, but allowconsiderable variation in the roles andresponsibilities assigned to menand women in the productiveefforts of the family.

Some regions have stricter constraintsthan others, curtailing women’s mobilityin the public domain and confiningthem to the domestic domain andreproductive responsibilities. Women’slower than average rates of labour forceparticipation in South Asia and MENAreflects widespread adherence to thenorms of female seclusion in theseregions; see the charts on pages 4 and 11.

Primary responsibility for care workcreates a close interdependencybetween women’s activities and familywellbeing. It explains why there isgreater life course variation in women’slabour force participation than men’s,particularly in more formalisedeconomies and occupations wheresuch responsibilities cannot be easilycombined with economic activity.It explains why those who continue inpaid work through their reproductiveyears are most likely to be found informs of self-employment or piecework that allow greater flexibilityin the use of time. And it also explainswhy women’s income, when they work,is more likely to be allocated to thewelfare of their children.

These constraints mean that womenface greater difficulties than men intranslating their labour into paid work.Moreover, they also face greaterdifficulties in translating their paidwork into higher incomes, a reflection ofgender inequalities in the resources thatmen and women bring to the labourmarket. Gender norms and practicestend to exacerbate the effects of scarcityso that poor women enter the labourmarket with lower levels of health,nutrition, education and skills than poormen and with fewer productive assets.Gender differentials in pay and workingconditions partly reflect these genderdifferentials in capital and capabilities.

Yet, women’s disadvantaged positionin the labour market also reflects thecombination of active discrimination andunconscious biases that they encounterfrom other market actors. Unfoundedbeliefs about women’s aptitudes, skillsand dispositions, assumptions that allwomen have mothering responsibilitiesand widespread adherence to theideology of the male breadwinner on

Gender, LabourMarkets and Poverty:An overview

by Naila Kabeer,Institute of Development Studies, Sussex

Gender analyses of labourmarkets suggest that it ismore difficult for womenthan men to escapepoverty through paidwork and higher incomes.

Women face variousconstraints related tosocial norms and valuesthat govern the genderdivision of labour inproduction andreproduction.

Yet, women have beenentering the labour marketin increasing numbersat all age groups.

This has led many toquestion the unfair divisionof roles and responsibilitieswithin their homes.

The rising number offemale-headed householdspartly reflects anunwillingness tocontinue accepting theinjustice of the situation.

4 International Poverty Centre

implications of increasing rates of femalelabour force participation for the povertyof women workers and their households?And how does this phenomenon squarewith claims about the growing‘feminisation of poverty’1?

Cross-country regression analysis of therelationship between economic growthand gender equality indicate thatwomen’s labour market participationplays an important role in mediatingthis relationship but not automaticallyor in expected ways.

For example, a World Bank researchreport in 1999 suggested that higherlevels of economic growth have beenassociated with improvements in genderequality as measured by women’ssecondary level education and lifeexpectancy relative to men and by thelegal recognition of women’s rights.However, this positive effect only kickedin for countries that had achieved lowermiddle income levels. For countriesbelow this threshold, increases in percapita GNP had little effect.

In addition, the report found thatcountries with majority Hindu andMuslim populations, which largelycorrespond to the MENA region andSouth Asia, reported lower than averagelevels of gender equality.

As we noted, these are regions with lowerthan average levels of female labour forceparticipation than others. However, itshould be noted that increasing levels ofboth economic growth and female labourforce participation have failed to‘normalise’ gender differentials in lifeexpectancy in the East Asian economiesof China, South Korea and Taiwan.

In India, the most adverse sex ratiosamong children are reported by someof its fastest growing states.

Gender discrimination in access to healthcare and increasing resort to sex selectiveabortions are leading to increasinglevels of excess female mortality amongchildren, to male-biased sex ratios at birthand contributing to what Amartya Sencalls the phenomenon of ‘missing women’.

The World Bank report also explored theeffects of gender equality on economicgrowth, adjusting for the possibility ofsimultaneous causality. They found that,controlling for male education, increasesin female secondary education ledto increases in economic growth. Onceagain, however, there was a threshold tothis effect: it only occurred in better offcountries in which female secondaryeducation represented at least 10 per centof the population.

The study suggested that this absenceof a relationship between gender equalityand economic growth in poorer countriesprobably reflected the fact that returns toformal education in less developed,primarily agrarian economies were likelyto be restricted. Educational qualificationstend to be used in these economies asa primary screening mechanism in thecompetition for scarce formal sectoremployment, with gender acting as afurther form of screening, giving menpreferred access to these jobs.

Different kinds of gender discriminationmay come into play when womenbecome the preferred labour forcein the course of labour-intensiveindustrialisation. The relationshipbetween gender equality and economicgrowth in semi-industrialised, export-oriented lower and middle incomeeconomies has been explored byStephanie Seguino. She found that,

Source: Global employment trends for women by S. Elder and D. Schmidt.Employment Strategy Paper No. 8, 2004 Geneva: ILO. @

the part of employers, state officials andtrade unions, regardless of the realityon the ground, all serve to assigningwomen to less well paid jobs or payingthem less than men. The consequencesof such behaviour shows up in findingsthat gender differentials in wages cannotbe explained away by differentials ineducation, skills, experience or locationin the labour market. There is anunexplained residual which reflectsgender discrimination.

Women have been entering the labourmarket in increasing numbers at all agegroups. The employment elasticity ofgrowth in recent decades has been higherfor women than men in most regions ofthe world as shown in the table. Thisposes interesting questions.

If labour markets are indeed the keytransmission mechanism through whichthe benefits of economic growth aredistributed to the poor, what are the

Countries withhigher levelsof gender inequalityin wages reportedhigher levels ofeconomic growth.

Poverty in Focus January 2008 5

controlling for male secondary education,female education was positivelyassociated with economic growth. It alsomade a stronger contribution over timethan did male education.

She also found that countries with higherlevels of gender inequality in wagesreported higher levels of economic growth.This relationship held, even when thegender wage gap measure had beenadjusted for educational differentials.

Labour-intensive growth in thesecountries was the product of specialisationin the manufacture of commodities withhighly price-elastic demand so that profitlevels reflected the ability to keep labourcosts low. The preference for womenas the primary labour force in theseindustries reflected the existence of agender wage gap, even for more educatedworkers. This phenomenon has beendubbed ‘the comparative advantageof women’s disadvantage’.

Has the preference for female labourin processes of globally-competitive,labour-intensive industrialisation ledto a gradual improvement of women’sposition in the labour market, as modelsof the labour market would predict?Support for this hypothesis is to befound in evidence from cross-countryregression analysis that increased tradeand FDI net flows have led to a fall ingender wage gaps, mainly among lowerskilled occupations and hence amongthe working poor.

However, there are a number of reasonswhy this cannot be taken as prima facieevidence of reductions in female poverty.

First of all, cross-country findings arenot always consistent with in-countryfindings. Time series data tells us that thelast 40 years since economic take off inthe East Asian economies of Taiwan andSouth Korea have seen women’s wagesand income levels grow in absolute terms,but the overall gender wage gap remainslarge. It began to decline in the 1990s withthe passage of gender equality legislationin Korea but has widened in Taiwan wherethere has been no equivalent legislation.And as we noted, rising female incomeshave not eradicated discriminationagainst daughters.

1. See below, pages 24-27.2. See below, page 26.

Secondly, reductions in gender wagegaps cannot, on their own, tell us a greatdeal about either female or householdpoverty. Women and men do notgenerally participate in the labourmarket as individual earners but asfamily breadwinners. It is difficult togeneralise about the poverty of eitherwithout taking account of the existenceand extent of all contributions tohousehold income.

If, as seems to be the case in someregions, women have gained access tolabour markets in a period when malewages have declined sharply or maleemployment is declining or stagnating,the positive income effectof women’s access to paid work islikely to be offset by the loss or declinein male earnings.

Nor is it clear that increased access topaid work by women will translate intoimprovements in family wellbeing ifwomen’s increased workloads in themarket are not accompanied by acommensurate increase in men’sshare of unpaid domestic labour2.

The overwhelming evidence from acrossthe world suggests that this increasehas not occurred and that the mainburden of adjustment has fallen onpoorer working women who cannotafford to pay for domestic help. Somehave coped by increasing their workinghours, with adverse consequencesfor their own wellbeing. Others haverelied on their older children, usuallydaughters, to look after youngerchildren, often at the expense of theformer’s educational prospects. Stillothers have taken their children towork with them in fields, roadsidesand market place.

1991-1995 1995-1999 1999-2003

Male 0.30 0.34 0.29

Female 0.40 0.44 0.33

GDP growth 2.9% 3.6% 3.5%

Global employment elasticities by sex

Source: The employment intensity of growth: trends and macroeconomic determinants by S. Kapsos.Employment Strategy Paper No. 12, 2005. Geneva: ILO. @

Women’s increased access to paid workhas also allowed many to question theunfair division of roles and responsibilitieswithin their homes. The rising numberof female-headed households in manyregions of the world partly reflects theirunwillingness to continue acceptingthe injustice of the situation. It is thisphenomenon that has given rise to claimsabout the ‘feminisation of poverty’but there is no necessary associationbetween female headship and poverty.

A better indicator of female poverty—and of continuing female disadvantagein the labour market—relates to theeconomic situation of female-maintainedhouseholds, those which rely solelyor primarily on female earnings. Thereappears to be strong evidence fromstudies of Africa, Asia and LatinAmerica that these households areoverrepresented in the ranks of the poor.

Female heads of these households worklonger hours and earn less on averagethan households largely reliant on maleor joint incomes. At the same time, theirgreater control over their incomes maytranslate into higher levels of investmentin their children.

There are no easy generalisations aboutthe poverty implications of women’s

paid work.

N. Kabeer: Marriage, motherhoodand masculinity in the global economy:reconfigurations of personal and economiclife, IDS Working Paper No. 290, 2007. @

N. Kabeer: Mainstreaming gender equalityin poverty eradication and the MilleniumDevelopment Goals, CommonwealthSecretariat, IDRC and CIDA, 2003. @

6 International Poverty Centre

Policy discussions about theinteractions between poverty and genderinequality have tended in the last twodecades to use the idea of the feminisationof poverty to explain differences betweenmale and female poverty in a givencontext, as well as changes over time.Typically, this approach has fed theperception that female-headed households—however defined¯tend to be poorerthan other households. Recent empiricalwork has, however, cast doubt on thisgeneralisation and sent analysts of genderand poverty back to the drawing board.

It is clear now that, not only is theempirical generalisation inaccurate,but that a single-minded focus onfemale-headed households narrowswhich households we focus on andhow we understand what goes onwithin them. Focusing on female-headedhouseholds is of course much simpler,since this avoids having to address themessy complexities posed by genderrelations within households, or theways in which development policies andprogrammes affect them. But it is clearlyinadequate to the task.

Viewing poverty as a genderedexperience allows us to broaden thescope of analysis to include all poorhouseholds¯however headed. It alsodirects us to a wider range of issuesbeyond simply asking whether womenor men are poorer in income terms. Theseinclude the ways in which poverty ismade a gendered experience by normsand values, divisions of assets, work andresponsibility, and relations of powerand control. Gendered experiencesinclude (i) the differential impacts ofpoverty on girls versus boys, and womenversus men within the household;(ii) the gendered ways in which poorhouseholds and their members respondto poverty; and (iii) the gendered impact

of the design and implementation ofanti-poverty policies and programmes.

Understanding how gender relationswork to define the experience ofprogrammes requires focusing on:

Who gets or has access to resources;How roles and relationships of work,responsibilities, cooperation, sharingor conflict define both women’s andmen’s living and working conditionswithin households;How structures and programs of thestate and other actors, e.g. the privatesector and civil society, reinforce ortransform those roles andrelationships; andHow normative frameworks affectingdifferential entitlements andresponsibilities are challenged orreinforced by policies and programmes.

The generalisation that girls and womenbear greater work burdens andresponsibility for the care of humanbeings through unpaid work withinhouseholds is well grounded empiricallythrough numerous time-use andqualitative studies. However, theexperience of care work variesprofoundly between poor versus non-poor, rural versus urban, or landed versuslandless households. Evidence from theNational Sample Survey in India showsthat care work in the poorest ruralhouseholds is likely to include mainlyfuel and water gathering, while insomewhat better-off households,it includes the care of livestock andkitchen gardens, or fodder collection.In households that are even better off,women are also more likely to engagein activities such as embroidery andsupervision of household workers.

The care work done by women and girlsin the poorest households tends

by Gita Sen,Indian Institute of Management Poverty as a Gendered

Experience:The policy implications

The poverty experience isgendered by the differentialimpacts on women and men,girls and boys, and by theirdifferent responses.

This should be consideredmore in the design andimplementation ofanti-poverty policiesand programmes.

For poor women, time isoften the most valuableresource; it is so muchtaken up by caring workthat they can remain caughtin a vicious circle of poverty.

Collecting more gender-based data can improvethe functioning of socialpolicies and helpensure the reductionof gendered poverty.

Poverty in Focus January 2008 7

therefore to be extremely time- anddrudgery-intensive, but critical tohousehold members’ ability to sustainbasic daily consumption. As a result, itdrastically limits women’s choice ofcompatible income earning opportunities,their ability to take time off forgovernment programmes, socialexchanges or minimal leisure, and theirpossibilities for acknowledging their ownneeds for rest, recuperation or health care.

The gendered impact of poverty not onlydistinguishes between women and men,but also differentiates how care workburdens and responsibilities areexperienced by different women.Evidence suggests that, where suchburdens are reinforced by strong gendernorms that define the ‘good’ womanas self-sacrificing, poor women inparticular are likely to receive much lessacknowledgement of—or attention to—their needs for nutrition or health care,not only by other family members buteven by themselves.

Poor households cope in a variety ofways, some of which are gendered.In doing so, they react not only toinsufficiency of incomes but alsoto insecurity and risk. As householdincome rises above poverty levels, riskmanagement often dictates behavioursthat appear more appropriate to lowerincome levels, at least until the newhigher level becomes more secure.Well known are such responses asincreased time spent on work, reducedconsumption levels, increases in debt,debt-peonage, migration, and fosteringin or out of household members.Less understood are such strategiesas maintenance of socio-economicnetworks through ceremoniesrequiring consumption, spreading riskand borrowing potential by takingon multiple jobs, desertion orabandonment of the family, and selectiveeducation or rationing of health careamong family members.

At least three of these responses aregendered, although with variationsacross cultural and economic contexts.While men may take on more paid work,partly to buy items such as tobacco andliquor, women often face difficult timeallocation choices between paid and

unpaid work with home-made or freelygathered consumption items like food,clothing, and fuel. These tensions areoften resolved by sacrificing the leisure,play-time, or education of daughters,who are expected to take on additionalcare work including kitchen tasks,foraging, and looking after siblings,as well as other responsibilities.

Another gendered response is desertionor abandonment of families, a strategyoften used by poor men to escape theresponsibilities of contributing tohousehold consumption, particularlywhen their partners or spouses becomepregnant. A third phenomenon noticedparticularly in South Asia is selectiveeducation and health care with sharplylower entitlements for women andgirls relative to men and boys. Suchdifferentials in entitlements are reinforcedthrough gendered norms and valuesthat permeate across the economicspectrum.While they tend to be lower inintensity for better-off households, theydo not completely disappear.

The gendered impacts of povertyand of household responses toimpoverishment are often missed inthe design of anti-poverty policies andprogrammes. Women’s responsibilitiesfor care fundamentally affect theirability to participate in socialprogrammes, in labour markets,and to derive benefits from householdresources. For poor women, time is oftenthe most valuable resource, and poorwomen’s time is so much taken up bycaring work that they can remain caughtin a vicious circle of poverty. Even worse,social policies often profit from thisgendered division of work and itsassociated norms, thereby reinforcingthe gendered norms and roles that areat the root of women’s poverty andwithin-household inequalities.

Putting mothers ‘at the service ofthe state’ represents a convenientmarriage of new social policies builton downsizing and decentralising thestate while ensuring ‘community’responsibilities—largely women’s—for the success of programmes. Recentexamination of conditional cash transferprogrammes through a gender lensreveals that they can make significant

additional demands on poor women’stime if designed in this way. Althoughwomen may be willing to pay this ‘timetax’ in order to improve their children’shealth, nutrition or education, it isnonetheless a costly burden and mayinvolve other hidden sacrifices andburdens. The hidden gendered cost ofprogrammes also raises questions aboutprogramme sustainability.

How can these insights be used forprogramme assessment? The collectionof more gender-based information canbe a way to improve programmefunctioning, e.g., the Observatorio deGenero y Pobreza as a complement to theOportunidades programme in Mexico.Such information can be used tounderstand better the way in whichthe care economy and gendered povertyare affected by and affect social policies.Programme development based on suchinformation can help to ensure thatgendered responsibilities for care arenot reinforced, as these are at the coreof gendered poverty.

Such approaches can be complementedby programmes to transform masculinistnorms and behaviours in relation to carework and responsibilities. Schools,public education, child and adolescentprogramme should focus gendereducation not only on girls but alsoon boys and young men. Consistentattention has to be paid to violenceagainst women and girls withinhouseholds which is often triggeredby women’s not meeting male demandsin relation to food, keeping the houseclean, taking care of children, sexualityor reproduction. Such changes inanti-poverty programmes may requireas a pre- or at least a co-requisite,the transformation of mindsets withingovernment bureaucracies towardsgreater awareness of the genderedconsequences of policiesand programmes.

M. Molyneux: Mothers at the Serviceof the New Poverty Agenda: Progresa/Oportunidades, Mexico’s conditionaltransfer programme, Social Policy andAdministration, 40 (4): pp 425–49, 2006. @

G. Sen & C. Sen: Women’s Domestic Workand Economic Activity: Results from NationalSample Survey, Economic and PoliticalWeekly, April 27, 1985, ppWS49-55.

8 International Poverty Centre

Women face barriers to enterthe labour market; if theyfind a job, their earningsare lower than those of men.

Reducing gender inequalitiesimplies benefits not only forwomen but also for men,children and the elderly,for both poor and rich.

Simulations show thatremoving entry barrierswould have a much strongerimpact on growth, povertyand inequality than endingwage discrimination.

Paid work for womeneffectively reducespoverty and inequality.

Gender inequalities are present inmany ways in the labour market. Tworelevant indicators of these inequalitiesare the ratio between female and maleparticipation in the paid workforce andthe ratio between female and malehourly wages. These indicators reflectthe fact that women face barriers toenter the labour market and, when theyfind a job, their earnings are lower thanthose of men.

The gender gap indicators among urbanadults in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, ElSalvador and Mexico are shown in thechart below. In each of these countries,the rate of economic activity amongfemales is below 62 per cent while themale rate is higher than 84 per cent.The ratio between female and malelabour market participation is not morethan 0.6 in Chile and Mexico. The femalehourly wage is around 80 per cent ofthat of males for all countries, exceptArgentina with a ratio of 92 per cent.

The disadvantages faced by women in thelabour market have negative economicconsequences for the society as a whole.The elimination of the various barriers theyface would result in an increase in theirearnings and consequently an increasein the income of the households. It mightalso result in the economic empowermentof women, economic growth and thereduction of poverty and inequality.Therefore, reducing gender inequalitiesimplies benefits not only for women butalso for men, children and the elderly, andfor the poor as well as the rich.

It is difficult to know exactly whatwould be the impact on society ofa reduction of gender inequalities.However, some techniques allowestimates of what society would gainwith less gender inequality. Simulatingwhat would happen to poverty, socialinequality and the total level of incomein society gives an idea of the directionand magnitude of what would happenif the gender gaps in participation andwages were eliminated.

In order to draw scenarios withoutgender bias in the labour market ofthese five Latin American countries, weconstructed counterfactuals based ontwo separate static simulations. The firstone calculates what might happen if wesuppose women enter the labour marketto the same extent as men. In otherwords, the assumption is that the barriersto women’s entrance in the labourmarket are the same as those for men,while ignoring any changes in thegender wage gap.

In the second simulation we keepparticipation rates constant andeliminate the gender wagediscrimination. In other words, weeliminate the gender discrimination byassuming that women with the same

by Joana Costa and Elydia Silva,International Poverty Centre The Burden of Gender

Inequalities for Society

Poverty in Focus January 2008 9

characteristics as men receive the samewages and salaries.

Each of these simulations generates anew level and distribution of income insociety. This allows us to estimate theirimpact in terms of economic growth,poverty and inequality. The resultspresented here must be consideredwith the caveat that these simulationexercises are essentially partialequilibrium effects. Nonetheless,they provide important empiricalevidence that gender inequalitiesact as barriers to pro-poor growth.

The simulated gender gap indicatorsare very different from the real ones,as shown in the lower part of the charton the previous page. Applying the maleparticipation structure to women resultsin an increase of female labourparticipation rate in all five countries.Only in Mexico was the increase notenough to approximate the femaleeconomic activity rate to the male one.

Moreover, without wage discrimination,the earnings of women would increasesubstantially in all five countries.Actually, in Argentina, Brazil and Mexicothey would even be higher than thoseof men because, on average, workingwomen in these countries are betterqualified than men. In a few words, itmeans that it is not the characteristicsof women but gender discriminationthat put females in a worse positionin the labour market.

To avoid difficulties related to the choiceof a specific poverty line we made oursimulations for different lines andmeasures of poverty; the substantiveconclusions always converged. The resultsshown in the chart above are based onthe impacts on poverty incidence for theinitial poverty lines defining the 20 percent poorest households in each country.

Eliminating barriers to participationwould have a much stronger effecton poverty than ending wagediscrimination. If women faced nobarriers to enter the labour market, theincidence of poverty would be reducedby at least 25 per cent in Argentina andBrazil and by as much as 41 per cent inChile. On the other hand, if only wage

discrimination was eliminated, the fall inpoverty incidence would vary from 1.1per cent in Chile to 10 per cent in Brazil.

While the simulation of no wagediscrimination shows little impact oninequality, the participation simulationhas a strong effect. There would be areduction by around five per cent in theGini inequality measure of the familyper capita income for the five countriesif women increased their labour marketparticipation to the level of men.

Reducing gender inequality would alsopromote economic growth. The growthof the mean income level would varyfrom 6 per cent in Brazil to 11 per centin Chile and El Salvador if there wereno differentiated gender barriers toenter the labour market; and from2 per cent in El Salvador to 8 per centin Brazil without any genderdiscrimination in wages.

Most important of all, this growthwould be very pro-poor since it has animportant impact on poverty.In the outstanding case of Chile, inthe simulation of no barriers toparticipation, the relation betweengrowth and poverty would be aroundone to four, that is, for each percentagepoint of growth due to improvedgender equity there would be a

decrease of four percentage pointsin the incidence of poverty.

Although these figures are not exactand must be used with caution, theiroverall direction and magnitude canhardly be disputed. At least twoimportant conclusions arise fromthese simulations.

First, gender inequalities in the labourmarket represent a burden to theentire society, not only to women.A reduction of gender gaps in wageand participation can result in highereconomic growth as well as reducedpoverty and inequality.

Second, the reduction of the discrepancybetween the female and male economicactivity levels has more impact in thesethree areas than the reduction of thegender wage gap.

Gender discrimination among paidworkers is important but it seems thatincreasing the female participation inthe labour market would be a priorityin order to have faster and strongereffects in the reduction of povertyand inequality.

J. Costa, E. Silva and M. Medeiros:The Growth Equivalent of ReducingGender Inequalities in Latin America.IPC Working Paper, forthcoming.

10 International Poverty Centre

Gender equality represents anuntapped source when it comes tostimulating economic growth andpromoting social development. This isparticularly true in the developing world,where women are often systematicallydeprived from having equal access tosocial services as well as to physicaland social capital. In fact, increasedgender equality promises significantreturns. Apart from being an importantgoal in itself, empowering women byimproving their living conditions andenabling them to actively participate inthe social and economic life of a countrymay well be the key for long-termsustainable development.

According to the World Bank’s WorldDevelopment Report 2000/01, closingthe gender gap in schooling would havesignificantly increased and sometimesmore than doubled economic growth insub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, and theMiddle East and North Africa. Despiteinternational declarations on genderequality, as examplified by theMillenium Development Goals, onlyfew countries have actually achievedgender equality in primary andsecondary education. The differencesare even more pronounced in highereducation. In South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, for example, girls onlymake up half of the number of studentsin tertiary education.

Equally alarming are labour marketindicators, which clearly highlight thatcountries do not adequately use theiravailable human resources, in particularthose of the female population. In manydeveloping countries, women’seconomic activities are marginalised tothe informal sector, small-scale farmingand/or domestic work. Cases in point areSouth Asia and the Middle East andNorth Africa: in both regions only

around 20 per cent of all wageemployment outside agriculture isheld by women.

As illustrated by these figures, womenface serious inequalities in manyregions of the world. Althoughdiscrimination against women hasmultiple facets, most research in thisarea exclusively focuses on examininga) the economic status of women;b) women’s access to resources such aseducation and health; and/orc) the political participationand empowerment of women.Less attention, however, is given tosocial institutions that impact on genderequality such as informal family laws,cultural traditions and social norms.In order to address this importantinformation gap, the OECDDevelopment Centre introduced theGender, Institutions and DevelopmentData Base (GID-DB) in March 2006.

The data base suggests a frameworkthat groups twelve individual socialinstitutions indicators into fourmain categories:

i) Family Code, including informationon marriage customs (age of marriage,inheritance practices, and existence ofpolygamy) and decision-making powerwithin a household (parental authority,repudiation);

ii) Physical Integrity, capturing violenceagainst women through traditionalpractices such as female genitalmutilation or other attacks (e.g. rape,assault, harassment);

iii) Civil Liberties, measuring the extentto which women can participate in sociallife (e.g. moving freely in public withoutthe obligation to wear a veil or beescorted by male relatives); and

by Denis Drechsler,Johannes Jütting and Carina Lindberg,

OECD Development CentreGender, Institutionsand Development:Better data, better policies

Enabling women to activelyparticipate in social andeconomic life may well bethe key for long-termsustainable development.

Gender inequalities are stillhuge in most developingcountries both in educationand in labour markets.

They are generated bysocial institutions such asinformal family laws, culturaltraditions and social norms.

A new international database provides systematicempirical evidence onthe socio-economicstatus of women.

Poverty in Focus January 2008 11

iv) Ownership Rights, indicating thequality of women’s most basic economicright—to hold property, whether in theform of bank loans, land, or othermaterial assets.

The GID-DB covers a total of 161countries and has been compiledfrom various sources. It combines ina systematic and coherent fashion thecurrent empirical evidence that existson the socio-economic status of women.The social institutions variables have allbeen coded (on a scale from 0 to 1, where1 indicates full discrimination) in order toallow for cross-country comparisons.

The impact of restrictive social normson women’s social and economicdevelopment is easy to imagine:even if economic opportunities mightexist, restrictive social norms willprevent women from taking advantageof them. Women neither lack interestin paid work nor are they shortof entrepreneurial ideas, but whensociety and family members discouragewomen to engage in economicactivities, it is not easy to pursue aprofessional career.

In sub-Saharan Africa, the majority ofwomen work in the agricultural sector,but patriarchal traditions often denythem the right to own and manage the

land they cultivate. Some countriesin the Middle East and North Africarequire women to have male companywhen leaving the house, making itdifficult for them to attend educationalfacilities and engage in businessactivities independently. The region’sbanks and lending institutions alsooften ask female clients to obtain theirhusband’s permission or co-signaturebefore granting them a credit. In someinstances, social norms such as femalegenital mutilation or any other type ofviolence against women—within oroutside of the household—not onlyviolate women’s basic human rights,but they seriously impair their healthstatus and future chances in aprofessional career.

Preliminary analyses using the GID-DBclearly indicate the relevance of socialinstitutions for understanding theeconomic role of women. There arestrong indications that high inequalityin social institutions is associated withlower rates of female participation inthe labour market. What is more, thecommon assertion that economicgrowth alone will eventually accomplishgender equality seems too simplistic:growth is often a necessary, but far fromsufficient condition for improving thestatus of women. This is a robust resultof an in-depth econometric analysis

regressing female labour forceparticipation on growth, socialinstitutions and a set of controlvariables such as access to educationand health.

Information on restrictive socialinstitutions and their impact onwomen’s social and economicdevelopment is vital to understandgender equality. Better data areurgently needed to design meaningfulpolicies that can address the rootcauses of gender equality. A schoolbuilt exclusively for girls might seemto be an important step towardsachieving gender equality. But if socialnorms prevent girls from attenting thisfacility, the school does little to improvethe status of girls and women.

Social norms that impact on genderequality are hard to observe and evenmore difficult to measure and quantify.The GID-DB is a first attempt to introducesocial institutions into the debate, but itcannot provide a comprehensive accountof all traditions and cultural practicesthat affect the role of women.

In view of these challenges, the OECDDevelopment Centre is currentlyconstructing an Internet platformthat will allow people to report theirexperiences and share their perceptionsof social norms that impede genderequality. This initiative, Wiki-Gender, willprovide an open resource for peopleinterested in finding out more aboutgender equality around the world.It will allow users to modify andimprove data provided therein, invitingthem to challenge existing informationand to provide new entries that willincrease the common knowledge base.

Only then will we have a betterunderstanding of the manifold waysin which social institutions affectwomen’s development and canconstruct policies that effectivelyaddress the current situation.

J. Jütting, C. Morrisson, J. Dayton-Johnson,and D. Drechsler: Measuring Gender(In)Equality: The OECD Gender, Institutionsand Development Data Base;Journal of Human Development,forthcoming, March 2008. @

Note: The explanatory variable uses the arithmetic average of all sub-sectors of social institutions;

a value of 1 (0) indicates the highest (lowest) level of inequality in social institutions.

12 International Poverty Centre

Fundamental and far-reachingchanges have taken place in the worldeconomy over the past several decadesthat have had a profound impact on thelives of women and men.

Two key aspects of the transformationare (i) the heightened and growingdegree of global economic, social andcultural integration—i.e. the process of‘globalisation’—and (ii) a shift in policystance towards deregulated markets,privatisation, a smaller role for the stateand a relatively narrow focus onreducing inflation.

These changes impact employment andpoverty outcomes for women and men.Gender dynamics are central to thisdiscussion. Whether households stayout of poverty in this changing globalenvironment may hinge on whetherwomen participate in the labour force andhave access to decent paid employment.

Women’s measured labour forceparticipation has been increasing in manyregions around the world, a processsometimes described as ‘the feminisationof labour’. However, these global changeshave a fundamental impact on theallocation of labour time and economicresources in the household. Moreover,employment opportunities are unequallydistributed, with women concentrated inlower quality, more precarious forms ofpaid work. Taken together, all these factorshave enormous implications for thevulnerability of households, the risk ofpoverty and achieving sustainable humandevelopment. Therefore, the analysis mustincorporate a gender perspective wheninterpreting how global policy changesimpact employment and poverty.

Gender relations determine the ways inwhich market and non-market work isorganised. Women often have primary

by James Heintz,Political Economy Research Institute,University of Massachusetts Amherst

Poverty, Employmentand Globalisation:A gender perspective

responsibility for unpaid, non-markethousework and caring labour. Thisconstrains their choices in terms oflabour force participation and theiraccess to paid employment, both formaland informal. The allocation of time tonon-market as opposed to market worklimits the household income that womencontrol directly. Furthermore, with moretime allocated to non-market work,women frequently have less paid workexperience or have to interrupt theiremployment, factors which oftentranslate into lower earnings.

Gender segmentation is endemic inlabour markets around the world, withwomen often concentrated in low-paid,unstable and poor-quality employment.Wage labour markets might not be theonly, and often not the most important,market exchange relating to these formsof employment. For instance, quasilabour markets exist in which workerssell a product or service, but within aset of dependent relationships that limittheir authority over the employmentarrangement. Examples includesub-contracted production, or home work,in which workers produce or assemblegoods for a set of specification givenby the work provider within a longersupply chain.

Often social benefits and protection areabsent for these types of precarious andinformal employment, raising theeconomic risk that women working inthese activities face, as they are undertakenoutside the ambit of labour legislation.

This type of labour force segmentationreduces women’s earning potential. Withlower expected earnings, investment infemale education is frequently neglected.

Similarly, perceived lower earningpotential of women reinforces the gender

Globalisation and neo-liberalpolicies impact the genderdynamics of employmentand poverty outcomes.

With ‘feminisation of labour’women are concentratedin lower quality, moreprecarious forms ofpaid work; householdvulnerability is increasing.

Access to paid employmentdoes not always translate intocontrol over a portion of thehousehold’s income.

It is critical to incorporatethe gender dimension intothe growth-employment-poverty nexus.

Poverty in Focus January 2008 13

division of labour within the household,since the opportunity cost, in terms offoregone income, of specialising inunpaid care work is lower for womenthan for men.

Women who specialise in providingunpaid care work face enormouseconomic risks. Such specialisation notonly lowers their earnings potential andreinforces dependencies on a male‘breadwinner’. Often women do not havethe same access to social protections,such as pensions for old age, therebyincreasing their risk of falling into poverty.

The gender division between marketand non-market work, the unequaldistribution of employment opportunities,and women’s lower earnings potentialreinforce established gender dynamicsat household level. For example, women’sinfluence over the distribution ofresources and labour within the householdis weakened when opportunities to earnincome through employment are limited.Increasing women’s access to paidemployment has the potential to changegender roles and household dynamics,depending on the resilience of gendernorms in society and the type ofemployment to which women have access.

The relationship between paid marketwork and prevailing gender relationsis complex. Access to remunerativeemployment does not always translateinto control over a portion of thehousehold’s income. Similarly, labourmarket participation may involve costsas well as benefits. These factors influencethe extent to which women’s access toemployment alters gender dynamics.

Labour supply decisions are oftendetermined at both household andindividual levels. Women’s labour forceparticipation has been shown to increasewith economic crises and policies thattrigger labour displacement, jobinstability and higher rates ofunemployment. Women also increasetheir labour force participation inresponse to sustained structuralunemployment. For instance, researchinto the determinants of women’s laboursupply in post-apartheid South Africahas shown that women’s labour forceparticipation responded to increases in

household joblessness, thereby placingfurther upward pressure on the country’saverage unemployment rate.

Structural changes that threatenhousehold living standards alsodemonstrate the impact of establishedgender norms on men. Not all menoccupy identical positions withinthe global economy. Many men areemployed in precarious activities withlow earnings. In addition, racial andethnic identity frequently circumscribesthe economic opportunities available toboth men and women.

Growing earnings inequality, an erosionof the quality of paid work, or greaterjoblessness disproportionately affectsthose in more unstable forms ofemployment. The entire household—men, women and children—becomessusceptible to poverty. Such pressuresaffect men who have been socialised tothink of themselves as ‘breadwinners’. Inparticular, established gender roles maycause men to see the deterioration inemployment as a personal failing,instead of a systemic economic problem.

The coping strategies adopted at thehousehold level in response to negativeeconomic shocks underscore theimportance of taking these dynamics intoaccount when considering the linkagesbetween growth, employment andpoverty. For countries with well-developedsocial welfare systems, government policiesmitigate these negative consequences.However, for countries without publiclysupported systems of social protection,households and communities become asafety net of last resort.

An additional link exists between paidemployment, non-market work andhuman development. The ability totranslate access to paid employment intonew capabilities, greater freedom andimproved investments in childrendepends on the nature of relationshipswithin the household and the process bywhich decisions are made concerning theallocation of labour time and economicresources. Indeed, increased genderinequalities, even in the short-run,can have long-term consequencesfor economic growth and humandevelopment. Therefore, it is critical to

incorporate the gender dimension intothe growth-employment-poverty nexus.Otherwise, the picture will not be fullyunderstood and the implementation ofan effective development strategywill be compromised.

The two ‘feminisations’—of labour andof poverty—do not provide an adequateframework for understanding theconnections between employment andpoverty risk. For example, the ‘feminisationof labour’ may be a response to, insteadof a cause of, increases in precariousemployment around the world. Similarly,the gendered dynamics of poverty arecomplex and also have implications forthe well-being of children and men.

Therefore, poverty risk cannot bereduced to simple indicators, such asfemale headship. Instead, we need aframework for linking employment andpoverty, which takes into accountgendered interactions at three levels:(1) the household level; (2) at the levelof intra-household dynamics; and (3) theindividual level. Only by analysing theemployment-poverty nexus at each ofthese three levels, will an adequateanalysis be produced.

Despite this call for a more complexanalysis of the connections betweengender relations, employment andpoverty, one fact remains clear:women’s paid employment is anessential factor determining the riskof poverty that families face.

Women’s employment contributesto total household income; women’sparticipation in the labour marketcan affect intra-household bargainingoutcomes, conditional on decision-making processes and who controls theincome; and access to employment hasimportant implications for individualfreedoms, capabilities and dignity.

Exactly how women’s employmentaffects social and economic wellbeing willdepend on the institutional context andthe specific prevailing gender relations.

J. Heintz: Globalization, Economic Policyand Employment: Poverty and genderimplications. ILO Employment StrategyPapers, Geneva 2006:3. @

14 International Poverty Centre

Analysis indicates that investmentsin gender equality can accelerateeconomic growth and poverty reduction.However, despite increasing interest inthe growth effects of inequality and aresurgence of concern over genderdiscrimination, there is little to suggestthat gender differentiation is consistentlyor effectively addressed in growth policyformulation or implementation.

The evidence suggests that genderinequality and women’s limited capacityto respond to economic opportunityinhibits growth via three main channels:

Education affects women’s capacityto make effective choices aboutemployment, family planningand investments in children.Labour market participation impactsproductivity, income and savings.Institutions govern women’s assetuse, time burden, and intra andextra household bargaining positions.

There are serious limitations in currentanalysis resulting partly from lack ofdata and partly from the difficulties inexamination of complex information.Creating better data and improvinganalysis are obviously priorities forwell informed growth policy. In additionthough, and even prior to betterinformed policy development, thereis sufficient proof currently availableto begin the process of addressing thedetrimental growth and poverty effectsof gender inequality.

Gender discrimination in labour, land,credit and technology markets is acommon phenomenon. There is a wealthof evidence showing that: women haveless choice about and lower returns toengagement in labour markets; fewerwomen ‘own’ land or access otherproductive assets; women’s choices areconstrained by an opportunity structure

that limits their choice in relation tothe State, markets and society. Thiscombination of factors perpetuateswomen’s reduced capacity to move outof poverty and contribute to growth.It points to key policy and programmeoptions for women’s economicempowerment, viz.: addressing thegender gap in human capital; reducingwomen’s time burdens; providingopportunities and incentives for women’sequal employment outside of thehousehold and promoting genderresponsive budgeting.

Women’s education levels correlate withwages and per capita income. Higherearnings potentially also increasehousehold savings and investment forgrowth. Women’s level of education,bargaining power within households,economic status and control overhousehold resources are all strongdeterminants of fertility and the humancapital outcomes of their children—all ofwhich have a positive effect on growth.

The link between investment in humancapital and growth is not news, but whatthe evidence indicates is that moreattention to reducing gender inequality ineducation, and across different types ofeducation—including health education—will result in significant growth effects.

For a variety of reasons educationremains high on the agenda of manygovernments, so education will continueto be a key factor in equalisingrelationships between men and womenand in giving women access to incomeearning opportunities. As educatingfemales makes good economic sense,growth policy can continue to supportefforts towards equal educationalopportunities, particularly in terms ofpost-primary education for girls where thehighest returns to investment are found.

Gender Equality andEconomic Growth—for poverty reduction

by Ruth Alsop and Paul Healey,Department for International

Development, UK

Investments in genderequality can accelerateboth economic growthand poverty reduction.

Gender discrimination iscommon in labour, land,credit and technologymarkets; it needs to bespecifically addressed.

Reducing the time burdenof women enables them toengage in paid employment,improve the productivity offarm labour or increaseentrepreneurial activity.

Gender budgeting mehodscan be applied to better targetgovernment expenditures tomaximise their impact ongender inequality.

Poverty in Focus January 2008 15

It is widely believed that reducing thetime burden of non-paid or domesticlabour is critical for women’s economicempowerment. Policies designed topromote growth have failed to elicit theexpected market response from womenin part because women are time-poorand locked into activities for which thereis little or no substitute labour.

Commonly classified as tasks belongingto the reproductive sector, these activitiesessentially involve reproduction andmaintenance of the future and currentlabour force and include activities suchas fetching water, cooking, collectingfirewood, childcare. Across the worldwomen take greater responsibilitythan men for maintaining domesticenvironments, child care and non-casheconomy activities.

Reducing the time burden of womenenables them to engage in paidemployment, improve the productivity offarm labour or increase entrepreneurialactivity. Key interventions that would—in addition to reducing drudgery—freewomen to make the choices aboutengaging in activities with a more directcontribution to growth include:

targeted infrastructure such as roads,wells, energy that improve access,reduce time burdens and/or increaseease of use of domestic servicesreducing the cost of existinginfrastructure and domestic servicesto increase usage, and childcareschemes, which are often essentialfor labour market participation byreducing time burdens.

Patterns of gender equality generallyimprove as economies grow, diversifyand mature. The transition to marketeconomies creates employmentopportunities for women across sectors.At higher overall income levels,manufacturing and service sectorstend to support more gender equality,as do higher levels of urbanisation andeducation. More open and competitiveeconomies are less tolerant of certainsorts of discriminatory practices, which ineconomic terms represent an inefficientuse of human resources.

Many countries have ratified internationalconventions supporting women’s equal

participation in the labour force. Yet, anumber of these countries have notestablished policies and practices whichreflect these conventions and providelittle in terms of the welfare provisionthat would aid women’s entry andparticipation in the labour market. Whilewage and labour inequalities remain ineven the most sophisticated economies,employment discrimination is moremarked in poorer countries, suggestingthat this is an area of promising actionto address the effects of genderinequality on growth.

Women and men enter the labour force aseither employees or as entrepreneurs. Keyareas for policy and practice—addressingboth forms of engagement—includeformalising the informal sector, ensuringequal pay and benefits, giving equalaccess to business assets, and providingnatal and maternity welfare support.Equality in the terms of employment ofwomen and rules governing women’scapacity to develop as entrepreneursis of particular importance for povertyreduction in countries in whicheconomic growth is taking off througha transition to a market based economy.

The barriers women face whenestablishing and managing businessesare common and limit growth. Women-run businesses are frequently unableto respond to emerging economicopportunities, as regulations relating tothe right of women to own assets andoperate businesses in their own nameprevent them from doing so. Informalbarriers and costs, such as much greaterexposure than men to official harassment,enforcement of ‘nuisance taxes’ and socialrules governing women’s behaviour andbargaining position, limit the free andequal operation of asset and productmarkets for women.

Action can also be taken to better targetgovernment expenditures to maximisetheir impact on gender inequality.Gender budgeting integrates genderanalysis into economic policy, offeringthe opportunity to reduce genderinequality and improve expendituresthat target growth promoting initiatives.

Common to both better analysis andeach of these action areas is the simple—

but surprisingly poorly addressed—issue of the determinants of genderinequality. Gender inequality is rootedin beliefs and norms of male/femalebehaviour and all evidence points to thefact that formal institutions—legal andregulatory—as well as informal ones—social and cultural—are weighted againstwomen’s equal participation in privateand public life, including markets.

Formal institutions comprise legislationand regulations. Informal institutionscomprise customary law and socialnorms. Both govern gender relations andbehaviour, as well as women’s ownershipof and access to productive assets.

Getting the formal legal and regulatorystructure right is critical, but enforcementby the state is often undermined bycustomary law and norms. Manycountries have passed or are in theprocess of putting in place legislationand policies that seek to equalise genderrelations. However, it is common practicefor traditional social institutions tooverride these formal, state imposedinstitutions in the household, in themarket and in relation to the state.

Changing culture, particularly the powerrelationships and behaviour that culturedefines, is a sensitive issue for donorsand most governments. However, changein some social institutions may be pre-requisite to gender equality.

States seeking to enhance women’scontributions to growth have proved thatthey can take action towards this end byproviding a formal enabling environment.When well monitored—and governmentfunctionaries and citizen provided withincentives—such efforts have provided aframework for social change.

The growth effects of gender inequalityindicate that governments can no longerafford to dismiss social institutions asbeyond their remit or too difficult tomanage in practice or for analyststo ignore as explanatory variables.

Gender Equality and Growth. Evidenceand Action, DFID, UK, 2007;

R. Alsop, M. Bertelsen and J. Holland:Empowerment in Practice: From Analysis toImplementation. The World Bank, 2006. @

16 International Poverty Centre

The relationship between theincidence of poverty and the levelof gender equality as measured byvarious alternative indices suggests thatdeveloping countries with higher genderequality tend to have lower povertyrates. The chart presents a scatter plotof poverty headcount ratio (for the $2 perday poverty line) and gender equality, asmeasured by the female-to-male ratio ofsex-specific Human Development Indicesfor a set of 73 countries circa 1997. Theinverse relationship between genderequality and poverty shown in thisscatter plot is quite robust to othermeasures of poverty and other measuresof gender equality.

Bivariate correlations, of course, cannotestablish causality. One could easilyargue, for example, that increases inwealth drive increases in genderequality—rather than the other wayround—since discrimination may becomeincreasingly costly to firms in developedeconomies with tighter labour markets.In fact, cross country correlations andeven more rigorous regression analysisare unlikely ever to allow us to establishdefinitive relationships between genderequality and poverty; the simultaneitiesare too great and we do not havesuitable econometric instruments tosolve this problem.

It is considerably easier to examinethe links between gender equality andpoverty at the household level. It is oftenthought that female-headed householdsare more likely to be poor than male-headed households. Empirical evidenceon this score, however, is mixed.One review of 61 studies on headshipand poverty found female-headedhouseholds to be disproportionatelyrepresented among the poor in only38 cases; another finds that therelationship between female headship

Developing countries withlower gender inequality tendto have lower poverty rates.

Less gender inequality inresources such as educationand access to employmentcan reduce the likelihood ofa household being poor.

Female labour forceparticipation, in particular,plays a key role in cushioninghouseholds from the impactof macroeconomic shocksand keeping them outof poverty.

Other major factors aregender inequality in access toland titles and, as a result,to credits. Microfinance canreduce gender inequalityand poverty.

and poverty is strong in only two outof ten countries examined.

One reason for these mixed results is thatit is not easy to define headship. Studiesapply a variety of techniques includingdefinitions of headship used by nationalsurveys, self-reported headship status bysurvey respondents, and definitions basedon contributions to household income.

There is also substantial heterogeneityamong female-headed households.Depending on the country and region, thepopulation of female-headed householdsmay be primarily composed of elderlywidows, divorced women, single womenwith children, or women whose husbandsare migrants. Some of these groups, suchas the elderly and widows, are morevulnerable to falling into poverty thanothers, such as women who receiveremittances from migrant husbands.

Why might female-headed households bemore likely to be poor than male-headedhouseholds? A study from Brazil examinesthree possible explanations: (1) feweradults have positive income, (2) the labourincome of principal earners is low, and(3) the dependency ratio is high. The studycomes to the conclusion that the lowlabour income of the principal earnersis the primary reason why female-headedhouseholds in Brazil are poorer.

Simulations show that if the earnersin female-headed households had theaverage incomes of earners in male-headed households, their average percapita expenditure would be higher thanthat of male-headed households. This isprimarily because female-heads are morelikely to participate in the labour marketrelative to male-heads.

Are female-headed households morelikely to be chronically poor than male-

by Andrew Morrison,Dhushyanth Raju and Nistha Sinha,

The World BankGender EqualityIs Good for the Poor

Poverty in Focus January 2008 17

headed households? That depends on thedifferences in their respective abilitiesto adopt and manage risk. Empiricalanalysis of poverty dynamics showsthat household heads’ education,household demographics and averagewealth are important determinants ofchronic poverty. To the extent thatfemale household heads tend to haveless education and their householdscontain a higher proportion ofdependents, their households are morelikely to be chronically poor than maleheaded households.

Ample evidence suggests that greatergender equality in resources such aseducation and access to employment canreduce the likelihood of a householdbeing poor. Female labour forceparticipation, in particular, has beenshown to play a key role in cushioninghouseholds from the impact ofmacroeconomic shocks and keepinghouseholds from falling into poverty.

At the same time, barriers to femalelabour force participation remainsignificant in some countries. Barriersfrequently identified include: the timeburden associated with child-rearingand other domestic tasks, loweducational levels vis-a-vis men insome regions of the developing worldthat make women less competitive forquality jobs, the role of existing wagemale-female wage gaps in generatingan ‘underinvestment’ in femaleeducation and lower female labourforce participation rates than would bethe case in the absence of such wagegaps, and laws and customs that inhibitwomen’s participation in labour markets.

Constraints to women’s participation inother markets also matters for povertyreduction. The existing research oncredit markets in developing countries—admittedly scarce—suggests that byand large women receive unfavorabletreatment not because of discriminatorytreatment per se, but rather becauseof gender differences in individualcharacteristics that are relevant forloan qualification, e.g. holding land titles.

One institution that has had a majorimpact on relaxing credit constraints forthe poor in general and for poor women

in particular has been microcredit.Microcredit programmes, by providingsmall loans mainly for non-agriculturalmicroenterprise activities, have had asignificant positive effect on householdincomes and assets, child schooling,child and maternal health, and theempowerment of female borrowers.Consequently, microcredit programmesare found widely around the developingworld and are considered to be animportant, cost-effective instrumentfor helping the poor transform theireconomic circumstances by enablingthem to pursue more lucrativelivelihood opportunities.

With regard to land markets, data onlandholdings disaggregated by sex arewoefully lacking in many regions of theworld. The scant existing evidenceappears to show that the distributionof land ownership is heavily skewedtowards men. In Latin America, between70 and 90 per cent of formal owners offarmland are male and conditional onland ownership, men on average ownmore farmland than women.

Land ownership and tenure are crucialfor a number of reasons. Land ownershipis often the primary source of transferableand inheritable wealth; it is alsofrequently a requisite for participatingin formal credit markets in rural areas.Careful studies show that tenureinsecurity impairs investment incentives

in general. Coupled with higher levelsof tenure insecurity for women in manysettings, this suggests that women’sagricultural productivity relative tomen’s is likely to be lower due to highertenure insecurity.

Several studies in Sub-Saharan Africashow that women have lower agriculturalproductivity than men on same-sizedplots growing the same crops. Whateverlimited land rights women possess maybe precisely because men do not workon women’s individual plots, and thereallocation of labour and other inputsfrom men’s plots to women’s plots maythreaten these rights.

There are a host of interesting policyresearch issues related to gender equalityand poverty reduction. For some of theseissues, the accumulated body of researchis impressive; for others it is scant indeed.Surprisingly, there are many areas ofcrucial importance to policy—such asgender issues in the functioning of creditand land markets—where quite basicquestions remained to be answered.These questions are of centralimportance to the design of povertyreduction policies and projects.

A. Morrison, D. Raju and N. Sinha: GenderEquality, Poverty and Economic Growth.Policy Research Working Paper 4349.The World Bank 2007. Background paperfor the Global Monitoring Report 2007. @

18 International Poverty Centre

by John Sender,Development Studies,

University of CambridgeReducing the GenderGap in Education:The role of rural wage labour

Research results from ruralMozambique show thatwhen women have greatereconomic autonomy,daughters are less likelyto be neglected.

Divorced and separatedwomen clearly achievebetter results in educatingtheir children than doother women.

Rural wage employment canprovide an escape routefrom poverty for a newgeneration of womenin Mozambique.

Yet, the share of both aidand public expendituredevoted to agricultureand rural wage labourin Africa has remainedremarkably small.

Analysis of research results fromrural Mozambique offers some importantnew insights into gender relations andthe inter-generational transmission ofpoverty. The Mozambican Rural LabourSurvey (MRLS) underpinned the researchand covered many of the poorest ruralhouseholds in the country. In someof these households, especially inhouseholds where women have greaterautonomy in making resource allocationdecisions, the welfare of youngdaughters is less likely to be neglectedthan in other households.

This finding confirms patterns foundin the international literature on thedeterminants of gender gaps in educationand in nutrition between sons anddaughters. However, the estimates of‘autonomy’ in this literature have notconsidered divorced and separated statusas an unambiguous indicator of women’sability to act independently.

The MRLS contains a remarkably highincidence of divorced, separated andwidowed women. Many women in thesurvey told the researchers that theybecame wage workers following thedeath of or desertion by their spouse,or said that they left the labour marketas soon as they married or began tocohabit. These statements highlight theneed to examine interactions betweenlabour market participation and maritalstatus; and the major objective here isto assess the implications of theseinteractions for rural girls.

In much of the literature, the focus ison maternal education as predictingthe level of child education, particularlythe education of girls, rather thanon the types of wage employment opento women and their effects on girls’schooling. In a paper commissionedfor a 2003 UNESCO report, Naila Kabeer

suggested that wage employment forwomen “is generally associated withlower levels of education of girls, mostoften the oldest girl who substitutes forher mother in the domestic division oflabour”. In contrast, the argument hereemphasises the positive impact ofwomen’s access to decent rural wageemployment opportunities, as the basisfor investment in their daughters’ future.

Many non-divorced/separated womenwere found to be employed in ‘bad’ jobs,often working for pitifully low wageson nearby small farms as seasonal casuallaborers. Part of the explanation for thisfinding may be the fact that men—husbands or fathers—are forciblypreventing them from travelling towork in the better types of job offeredby larger-scale employers. Divorced andseparated women in the MRLS were morelikely than other women to succeed infinding a decent job.

At the same time, divorced and separatedwomen clearly achieve better results ineducating their children than do otherwomen. Divorced and separated mothersare especially good at investing in theirdaughters’ education compared to non-divorced/separated mothers and to malewage workers. Thus, in absolute terms,the daughters of divorced and separatedwomen have achieved more schooling—in terms of the mean and mediannumber of years of schoolingcompleted—than the daughters ofnon-divorced/separated women, asshown in the table.

Moreover, the education gap betweendaughters and sons of divorced andseparated mothers is lower than thecorresponding gap between thedaughters and sons of non-divorced/separated mothers, i.e. divorced andseparated mothers favour their sons far

Poverty in Focus January 2008 19

Variable Stat

Children 16 yrs + Years of schooling Mean 4.62 4.25 4.36Median 5.00 4.00 4.00

Sons 16 yrs + Years of schooling Mean 5.29 4.89 5.39Median 5.00 5.00 5.00

Daughters 16 yrs + Years of schooling Mean 3.93 3.40 3.23Median 4.00 3.00 3.00

Education of sons and daughters of female and maleprincipal respondents in the MRLS

Female Male

DS NDS

less than non-divorced/separatedmothers. The chart shows that the size ofthe gender gap, measured by the ratioof the mean or median years ofeducation achieved by sons comparedto daughters, is much higher for non-divorced/separated than divorcedand separated mothers.

It is not surprising that the sons of themale principal respondents in the MRLShave had more years of education—amean of 5.39 years—than other childrenin the MRLS, since their fathers are moreeducated and earn higher wages, onaverage, than female wageworkers.It is, however, surprising that, as shown inthe Table, the children of divorced andseparated female principal respondentsare, on average, better educated thanthe children of male principalrespondents—because the daughtersof divorced and separated women boostthe average by being significantly bettereducated than the daughters of maleprincipal respondents.

The median number of years ofeducation completed by the daughtersof divorced and separated women is4 years, compared to 3 years for thedaughters of male principal respondents.Although the sons of divorced andseparated women do complete 35 percent more years of education thantheir daughters, 5.29 years compared to3.93 years, the sons of male principalrespondents are much more privileged,receiving 70 per cent more years ofeducation than the daughters of theprincipal male respondents.

Thus, as shown in the chart, the size ofthe gender gap between the educationof sons and daughters is particularlylarge for the children of the maleprincipal respondents, very much largerthan the gender gap for the childrenof divorced and separated women.

Some divorced and separated womenappear to have gained in self-confidencenot only through schooling, but also as aresult of the emancipatory experience ofa successful struggle to survive on theirwage income without a male partner.As a result, they appreciate that theirdaughters would be unwise to rely onmale support, especially if men continueto restrict women’s access to the labourmarket. Instead, they believe that theirdaughters’ welfare and, less altruistically,their ability to care for them in their old

age, will be greater if their daughtersremain at school for as long as possible.

Rural wage employment has thepotential to provide an escape routefrom poverty for a new generation ofwomen in Mozambique. Therefore, it isunfortunate that donors have done solittle to develop effective policies topromote the massive investments inagri-business and rural infrastructurerequired to increase the demand forfemale wage labour in rural Africa. Themost influential donor in Africa, theWorld Bank, has only very recentlyin the World Development Report 2008recognized that “Making the rural labourmarket a more effective pathway out ofpoverty is …a major policy challengethat remains poorly understood andsorely neglected in policy making”.

In fact, the share of both aid and publicexpenditure devoted to agriculturalinvestments in Africa has remainedremarkably small; and there has beenhardly any funding of research on ruralwage labour. Most donors, NGOs andgovernment agencies continue tobelieve as an article of faith that thepoverty of rural women and theirdaughters can be reduced significantlyby efforts to promote and subsidizeself-employment in micro-enterprises,rather than wage employment.

J. Sender and C. Oya: Divorced, Separatedand Widowed Female Workers in RuralMozambique. Feminist Economics,forthcoming 2008. @

Note: DS = divorced or separated; NDS = non divorced/separated.

Marital Status

Principal respondents

20 International Poverty Centre

Empowering Womenthrough Microfinance:Evidence from India

by Ranjula Bali Swain andFan Yang Wallentin,

Uppsala University

Microfinance programsaim to reduce incomepoverty while alsoempowering women.

Increasing women’sresources result in increasedwellbeing of the family,especially children.

The definition andinterpretation of womenempowerment andits measurement variesacross different studies.

Robust empirical evidencefrom India shows significantempowerment impact of amajor microfinance programvia women’s self-help groups.

Microfinance programmes havebeen increasingly promoted fortheir positive economic impact and thebelief that they empower women.We investigate the impact of the SelfHelp Bank Linkage Program in Indiaon women empowerment, defined as aprocess in which women challenge theexisting norms and culture to effectivelyimprove their wellbeing within thecontext of the society they live in.

Women in poor households are morelikely to be credit constrained, and henceless able to undertake income-earningactivities. Microfinance programmes offeraccess to credit to low-income households,specifically targeting women, and thusmay meet poverty reduction and women’sempowerment objectives.

Most microfinance programmes targetwomen with the explicit goal ofempowering them. However, theirunderlying premises are different. Someargue that women are amongst thepoorest and the most vulnerable ofthe underprivileged. Others believethat investing in women’s capabilitiesempowers them to make choices, which isvaluable in itself, and also contributes togreater economic growth and development.

Another motivation is the evidence fromresearch showing that an increase inwoman’s resources results in higherwellbeing of the family, especially of thechildren. Further, an increasing numberof microfinance institutions preferwomen members as they believethat they are better and more reliableborrowers thereby contributing to theirfinancial viability. Finally, a morefeminist point of view stresses thataccess to financial resources presents anopportunity for greater empowerment ofwomen. Though many agree that womenempowerment is an important

development objective for microfinanceprogrammes, it is still unclear whatwomen empowerment means.

Given the complexity of defining womenempowerment it is not surprising thatonly a few empirical studies have tried toexamine the impact of microfinance onwomen empowerment. For the most part,empirical research on microfinance’seffect on women’s empowerment hasbeen conceptually ungrounded andtends to estimate an over-extendeddefinition of empowerment or atruncated aspect of it. A number of thesestudies also suffer from methodologicalbias and flaws; only a few studies havesuccessfully investigated this impact in arigorous manner.

The interpretation of womenempowerment and its measurement variesacross different studies. Some studiesconstruct an index/indicator of womenempowerment. However, measuringwomen empowerment by constructingindices is an inappropriate technique asit allows the use of arbitrary weights.

Most researchers, for instance, will agreethat impact of a women’s decision to buycooking oil for the family is different innature from her participation in adecision to buy a piece of land. Boththese decisions have differentimplications and magnitude of impact onher empowerment. As such giving equalweight to both these decisions does notmake sense. At the same time suggestingan arbitrary weight for these decisions isalso inappropriate, as it is not for theresearchers to decide the factor by whichthe latter decision contributes more towomen empowerment.

Other studies use Item Response Theory(IRT), where the element of analysis is thewhole pattern of a set of binary indicators

Poverty in Focus January 2008 21

that proxy for woman’s autonomy,decision-making power, and participationin household and societal decision making.They have found that credit programmeslead to women taking a greater rolein household decision making, havinggreater access to financial and economicresources, having greater access tofinancial and economic resources, havinggreater social networks, more bargainingpower vis-à-vis their husbands andhaving greater freedom of mobility.

Additional services like training,awareness raising workshops and otheractivities over and above the minimalistmicrofinance approach—with provisionof financial services only—are also animportant determinant of the degree ofits impact on the empowerment processof women.

A study of women in rural Kenya foundthat in direct bank-borrower minimalcredit, women do not gain much in termsof decision-making power withinthe household.

However, when loans are channelledthrough women’s groups and arecombined with more investmentin social intermediation, substantialshifts in decision-making patterns areobserved. This involves a remarkableshift in norm-following and maledecision-making towards morebargaining and sole female decision-making within the household.

The effects are even more striking whenwomen have been members of a groupfor a longer period and especially whengreater emphasis has been laid ongenuine social intermediation. Socialgroup intermediation further graduallytransformed groups into actors of localinstitutional change.

Another issue that needs furtherinvestigation is whether, without changein the macro environment, microcreditsreinforce women’s traditional roles orpromote gender equality.

A woman’s practical needs are closelylinked to the socially defined genderroles, responsibilities, and socialstructures, which contribute to a tensionbetween meeting women’s practical

needs in the short-term and promotinglong-term strategic change. By helpingwomen meet their practical needsand increase their efficiency in theirtraditional roles, microfinance may in facthelp women to gain respect and achievemore in their socially defined roles, whichin turn may lead to increased esteem andself-confidence.

Although increased self-confidence doesnot automatically lead to empowerment,it may contribute decisively to a woman’sability and willingness to challenge thesocial injustices and discriminatorysystems that they face. This implies thatas women become financially better-off,their self-confidence and bargainingpower within the household increasesand this indirectly leads to theirempowerment. Finally, given thatempowerment is a process, the impactof the microfinance programme may takea long time before it is significantlyreflected on the observable measuresof women empowerment.

Given the measurement problems, we useda technique to estimate empowerment as alatent rather than an observed variable.The general structural model estimatesthe mean women empowerment for 2000and 2003, to measure the impact of theSelf Help Group (SHG) programme onwomen empowerment.

The empirical analysis is based on datacollected in 2003 from five differentstates of India. About 1000 householdswere surveyed and their responses wererecorded by recall for the years 2003and 2000. To investigate the impact ofmicrofinance participation on womenempowerment the data was analysedover two sub-samples namely: SHGsmembers group and a control groupcomprised of non-SHG members.

The results are especially robustindicating that on average there is asignificant increase in the womenempowerment of the SHG membersgroup. No significant change is observedon average for the members of thecontrol group. The elegance of the resultlies in the fact that even though thedegree of change and the pace ofempowering women is likely to vary,nevertheless the results clearly show that

the group of SHG members experiencea significant and higher empowerment.

While our results clearly indicate theevidence for a general increase in womenempowerment for SHG members overtime, this does not imply that each andevery woman who joined the SHGprogramme was empowered to thesame degree or they all progressed at thesame pace. Some of the women membersmight have been more empoweredthan other members within the SHGprogramme, prior to their participationin this programme. But on the averagethe SHG members were empoweredover this time period. However, a similarempowerment process cannot beobserved for the control group.

It is difficult to say which factors aremore important for empowering women.The differences in pace of empowermentmight be a result of various factors:household and village characteristics,cultural and religious norms within thesociety, behavioural differences betweenthe respondents and their family members,and the kind of training and awarenessprogrammes that the women have beenexposed to. All these factors together areresponsible for the empowerment process.

The nature and types of activities andprogrammes that the women areexposed to critically determine howempowering the impact of the SHG ison women. The minimalist microfinanceapproach is not sufficient. An importantdirection for future research, that we arecurrently working with is to find which ofthese factors have a greater impacton empowering women.

R. Bali Swain and F. Yang Wallentin:Does Microfinance Empower Women?Evidence from Self Help Groups in India.Uppsala Universitet, Dept. of EconomicsWorking Paper 2007:24. @

By helping women meettheir practical needs,microfinance maylead to increasedself-confidence,respect and esteem.

22 International Poverty Centre

The discussion on empoweringwomen in microfinance often attractsopposing views. The debate tends tocrystallise at the point of clearlyattributing impacts to microfinance andin particular women’s empowerment.Two seemingly separate issues emerge:impact on the client and impact on themicrofinance institution (MFI).

It is a fact that microfinance does impactboth the MFI and its clients. Over theyears, tension has been created in termsof prioritising between these twoimpacts. The essence of microfinanceis to create access to useful financialservices for the ultimate purpose ofimproving livelihoods. The targetingof women is important in order toachieve maximum impact on the family.

MFIs generally agree that genderdimensions are crucial for designingand implementing effectivemicrofinance interventions forimproving livelihoods in a sustainablemanner. Yet, some institutions have notfully integrated gender issues in theirpractical operations largely because ofconflicting priorities.

The priority impact for MFIs is financialand institutional sustainability. Someargue that MFIs can reach sustainabilityby using the advantage of critical massand still empower women, therebyensuring congruency of purpose.However, the question remains to whatextent strategic gender interests can beachieved while MFIs are focusing ontheir own viability.

With the waning of donor funds, MFIsare under pressure to cover theiroperational costs in order to remain inbusiness. Furthermore, state regulationhas pushed MFIs into the regular

financial sector realm where rules aremore defined and non-compliancecan be severely penalised to thedetriment of the institution. Issuesof the right operational systems,professionalism and a strong businesscase thus come to the fore.

MFIs that have not reachedsustainability are often under pressureto deliver primarily to that goal suchthat gender dimensions take abackground role. Lip service is paid tothis discussion regardless of the othercompelling factors that suggest thatgender-sensitive financial productscan actually improve the bottom lineof the institution.

The older MFIs were often donor-driven;they focused on the impacts on theclient and therefore on outreach, asillustrated in the chart. However,some did not espouse strictaccountability and operational rigour.

Regulation and commercialisation thennecessitated significant changes in theway MFIs operate. These involveenhancing a culture of sustainability,embracing professionalism and securingfunding from commercial sources forcontinued business.

The main concern of poor women isto provide a livelihood for the family.They often lack the entrepreneurial skillsneded to make it in the marketplace.In some cases, they have positionedthemselves in saturated markets withscanty preparation for their work. Mostbusinesses involve petty trading withvery short term prospects; theperformance is often dismal.

A study in Zambia showed that thoseentrepreneurs who had the necessary

Microfinance has separateimpacts on the client andon the microfinanceinstitution (MFI).

A tension has been createdin terms of prioritisingbetween these two impacts.

MFIs that have not reachedsustainability are oftenunder pressure to deliverprimarily to that goal;gender concernstake a background role.

Donor engagement isneeded to help strugglingMFIs adopt a mutuallycompatible focusof gender differentiationand organisationalsustainability.

Microfinance forGender Equality:A dilemma?

by Irene KB Mutalima,Christian Enterprise Trust of Zambia

Poverty in Focus January 2008 23

training and business know-howmanaged to grow their businesses.On the other hand, women-runbusinesses in Zambia showed theshortest life cycle, averaging four years.This was attributed largely to the loweducation and experience levels of theentrepreneur. This could be true in otherenvironments as well.

There are also contextual connotationsto this aspect. Where culturally thehusband is expected to go off to workand earn a living for the rest of the family,a woman’s contribution is regarded asmerely supplementing that effort. Evenwhere a husband is no longer in gainfulemployment, the woman’s effort may stillnot be viewed as a long-term means ofsustaining the family.

Hence, the woman’s business is drivenby that level of ambition: as a stop-gapmeasure. It is almost as if there is a glassceiling and the business can only go so far.

Some clients rarely take time to reflecton how best to utilise borrowed funds.This often leads to delinquency,reducing their chances of getting newloans. Most MFIs lend mainly to women,who have higher default and drop-outrates. In this case, business development

services might be the logical process toget clients more focused on growth.MFIs who are focusing on their ownsustainablitiy may not integrate thisenough into their work.

General market conditions affectthe viability of the enterprise. In astagnating economy, market vibrancy islacking and the micro-businesses suffer.Where markets are seasonal, clients willlead a hand-to-mouth existence. Studiesshow that it is often the women clientswho will be most affected by marketinstability. Reducing lending does nothelp resolve this problem; it simplyhelps the MFI to manage its portfolio.

The microfinance sector in Zambia hasnot grown to expectation. A genderaudit of the two main microfinanceinstitutions in Zambia showed thatboth had received feedback from clients.But how useful was this for addressingorganisational as well as client issuesfrom a gender perspective?

Issues of weaning off donor support andreaching sustainability in the financialmarkets are topmost—not a combinedstrategy that includes genderdimensions. Since the Central Bankintroduced microfinance regulations,

MFI management tends to prioritisesustainability and regulatory observance.This limits the utility of gender audits,beyond providing useful information.

The key reason for this is that theirfindings call for efforts to improveoutcomes on clients’ lives, withoutmaking the link to how this willpositively impact the institution’s bottomline. Yet, management is often appraisedon their ability to develop the institutionand not so much on the client impact.Thus, the gender audit does not addressthe key institutional issues.

Studies from Ethiopia show thattargeting for specific impact can actuallyproduce desired results. Gender-disaggregated data show specificimpacts on women. The question ishow this information is used to informdecisions on how to serve poor peoplefrom a gender perspective that will alsoimprove the MFI.

For instance, although 83 per cent ofthe rural population of Zambia are poor,they have least access to microfinance.The incidence of poverty in female-headed households is significantlyhigher than in male-headed householdsThus, a large segment of poor womenare not served.

There is evidence that it is possibleto run profitable institutions that aretargeting women. To ensure this, MFIsneed to fully engage with gender issues;not merely promoting women’s issues,but taking a holistic approach todifferentiating product compositionand delivery to meet identified needsof both women and men.

Donor engagement is needed to helpstruggling MFIs adopt a mutuallycompatible focus of genderdifferentiation and organisationalviability. Those MFIs that have successfullyintegrated gender in their work and arehaving institutional bottom line successesshould be encouraged to provide learninglessons for those that are struggling.

I. Mutalima: Microfinance and GenderEquality: Are we getting there?The Southern African RegionalPoverty Network (SARPN), 2007. @

Donor driven andfocused on client

development

Donors callingfor sustainable

institutions

Regulation andcommercialisation

requiring robust MFIsfor wider financial

sustainability

Concerns focused more on outreach andimpacts. While institutional sustainabilitywas expected, slippages occurredand in some cases a trend/culturewas established.

Bottom line issues came to the foreand product ranges were examinedfor profitability. Products andprocesses that did not supportthe bottom line were not favoured.

As above, MFIs concentrate onimproving their operating processesto meet regulatory requirements.Following the waning of grant funding,MFIs definitely favour profitableproducts. Engagements with otherissues like gender are relegatedto the background.

24 International Poverty Centre

The term ‘feminisation of poverty’refers to an increase in the relative levelsof poverty among women and/or femaleheaded households. It deserves specialattention from policy makers since it isrelated to two negative phenomena:gender inequality and poverty. Giventhat the increase of poverty among asocial group tends to set priorities forpublic policies, in the last decade thediscourse on feminisation has had someimpact on the agenda to promotegender equality in the economic sphere.This, however, comes at the risk ofcollapsing the broader gender inequalityconcerns into a pure poverty agenda.

Based on the available evidence aboutLatin America and some developedcountries, this article briefly reviewswhether there really is a generalisedfeminisation of income poverty.Irrespective of this, we argue thatpoverty—as currently measured—capturesonly a small part of important genderinequalities in the economic sphere.

Much has been said about a feminisationof poverty in the world. But such afeminisation should not be confusedwith higher levels of poverty amongwomen or female-headed households.The term ‘feminisation’ relates to the waypoverty changes over time, whereas‘higher levels of poverty’ refers to thelevels of poverty at a given moment; itincludes the so-called overrepresentationamong the poor. Thus, feminisation is aprocess while ‘higher poverty’ is a state.

So, is there a generalised feminisationof poverty in the world? No one reallyknows. There are not many empiricalstudies about this subject and, ofcourse, a conclusive answer to thisquestion depends on a comprehensiveanalysis based on data including severalregions of the world. Yet the existing

information about the Americas andWestern Europe points in the directionof a negative answer.

The first study identifying a feminisationof income poverty was about the USA,covering a period from the 1950s to the1970s. Other studies followed, some ofthem arguing that such a feminisationdid not happen in the USA in the 1960s,‘70s and ‘80s. Likewise, studies of theUnited Kingdom found no evidence ofa relative increase in the poverty amongwomen or female-headed householdsbetween the 1970s and 1980s. In Canada,a worsening of the gender gap inpoverty indicators was found for theperiod 1973-1990 if one comparesfemale-headed with male-headedhouseholds, but not if the focus turnsto an overall women-men comparison.

Our study found no evidence of afeminisation of income poverty in the1990s in the countries that togetherencompass the large majority of thepopulation of Latin America. This resultholds for different definitions offeminisation of poverty and for variouspoverty lines and assumptions aboutintra-household inequality. Out ofeight countries, including all the mostpopulous ones, only in two—post-crisisArgentina and Mexico—a relativeworsening of poverty indicators forfemale-headed households was found,but even in these countries no relevantdifferences were identified in overallwomen-men comparisons.

Reviewing several studies we found thatthe overrepresentation of women orfemale-headed households amongthe poor is a much more commonphenomenon than the feminisation ofpoverty. However, although higher levelsof income poverty among these groupsoccur in many countries, this is not a

by Marcelo Medeiros and Joana Costa,International Poverty Centre

The international discourseon feminisation has had animpact on the agenda topromote gender equality.

Higher static levels ofpoverty among women ismuch more common than adynamic process offeminisation of poverty.

The real levels of povertyamong women are likelyto be higher than the onescommonly presented,which ignore intra-household inequalities.

Current poverty measurescapture only a small partof gender inequalities, butnot the important lack ofeconomic autonomyof women.

Is There Really a‘Feminisation of Poverty’?

Poverty in Focus January 2008 25

general rule. Even in developingcountries there is no rigid connectionbetween the sex of the head of thehousehold and poverty. In fact, povertyseems to be more correlated withthe presence of children in the familyand other characteristics of thehousehold members.

A review of studies about developed andtransition economies shows that therewas a high degree of over-representationof female headed households in povertyin Canada, Australia, Russia, USA andGermany in the 1990s; a higher incidenceof poverty among women was identifiedin the 1980s in USA, Australia, Germany,Canada and UK, but not in Spain.

In developing countries, studies indicatethat female-headed households aremore likely to be in poverty in Braziland in urban India but not in six Sub-Saharan African countries, three Asiancountries and thirteen other LatinAmerican countries. One reviewcomparing 61 country studies foundthat in 38 of them there was anoverrepresentation of female-headedhouseholds among the poor, and in15 of them some kind of relationshipbetween certain types of female headshipand poverty. However, in eight of thesecountries it did not find any such links.

The conclusion of another review, based onmore than one hundred country studies,is that only in certain countries do thefemale-headed households consistentlypresent worse poverty indicators.

Most studies are based on surveysof income or consumption at thehousehold level. Invariably they neglectany inequalities in the distribution ofincome within the households. However,from a gender perspective, such animplicit assumption of perfect distributioncan be disputed. There is no reason tobelieve that the factors that determinegender inequalities in the public spherewill not act within the families.

On the contrary, despite the scarcity ofdata to support such research, the veryfew studies available about this subjectpresent some evidence of significantintra-household inequalities. Theyidentified differences in the final

allocation of economic resources amongfamily members, usually favouring men.

If intra-household inequalities were takeninto consideration, we would probablyfind that the current figures of the levelsof income or consumption povertyamong women are underestimated.Everything indicates that the real levelsof poverty among women are higherthan the ones commonly presented.However, these data for developingcountries are so limited that one willhardly be able to correctly estimatehow much higher these levels are.

The inclusion of intra-householdinequalities in the analysis of thefeminisation of poverty seems to be anunlikely scenario for the near future, asthis would require the measurement ofthese inequalities in more than onepoint in time. But, differently from theissue of overrepresentation, such aninclusion would not necessarily showthat the feminisation is underestimated.

What matters for the feminisation is notthe level of intra-household inequalitybut an increase in the bias againstwomen. As the situation of womenin many developing countries hasimproved in the last decades relative tothat of men, the result of this inclusionwould probably be in the oppositedirection, that is, of a reduction ofthe feminisation of poverty if intra-household inequalities were considered.

This brings forward an important issue,both from the theoretical and practicalpoints of view: poverty as usuallymeasured should not be our priorityguide to gender equity actions.

Although we frequently conceive povertyat the individual level, our measurementin effect occurs at the household level.The practice among researchers is usuallyto measure total family income orconsumption, or the satisfaction of basicneeds by households, and then to divideit by the number of persons in thesehouseholds to come up with per capitaestimates. Thus, the unit of analysis ofpoverty is the household.

However, inequalities between men andwomen cannot be studied having only

the households as the unit of analysis,as it tends to mask much of thedynamics of the relations betweenindividuals. Even if we narrow thedebate of gender equity to theeconomic sphere, from the perspectiveof gender relations it matters not onlyhow much a woman can consume butalso how she achieves the power toconsume. Often, poverty research merelycalculates the expected consumptionper household member—more exactly,a simple or weighted average of thefamily income or observed consumption—thus neglecting how the economicpower within the household is structured.

Many have taken the feminisation ofpoverty as a global fact. Of course, theterm can be used to express differentconcepts, but in the sense of a worseningof the situation of women in relation tothat of men—or female-headed versusmale-headed households—there isno clear evidence of a widespreadfeminisation of poverty in the world.And while finding higher levels ofpoverty among women or female-headed households is far more commonthan finding a gender bias in theevolution of poverty over time, thisis not a universal phenomenon either.

Beyond that, we have to question thedegree of importance we should giveto these issues. There is no doubt thatpoverty should occupy a prominentposition in the political agenda, but theconcerns about a feminisation of povertyor the overrepresentation of womenamong the poor should not overshadowthe debate on gender inequality.

When we talk about poverty in the waywe currently measure it, we are using aconcept that captures only a small partof important gender inequalities. Itseems that both researchers and policymakers would gain from focusing onrelated but different issues, such as thelack of economic autonomy of women.

M. Medeiros and J. Costa: Is There aFeminization of Poverty in Latin America?In Press, World Development (2007),doi:10.1016/j.worlddev.2007.02.011.

A preliminary version is available athttp://www.undp-povertycentre.org/pub/IPCWorkingPaper20.pdf

26 International Poverty Centre

The ‘feminisation of poverty’ hastraditionally been viewed as a globalphenomenon, and associated with threeapparently intuitive notions. These arefirst, that women are poorer than men;second, that the incidence of povertyamong women is increasing relative tomen over time, and third, that growingpoverty among women is linked with the‘feminisation’ of household headship.

While a now quite substantial body ofresearch has cast doubt on the last ofthese assumptions, the other two are stilltreated as somewhat self-evident. This isdespite serious conceptual and/orempirical problems with both. Forexample, the first assertion—that womenare poorer than men—is static, andtherefore anomalous within a constructwhose very nomenclature impliesdynamism. While the latter is highlightedin the second tenet, it is virtuallyimpossible to establish whether gendergaps in poverty are widening given adearth of sex-disaggregated panel data.On top of this, no consistent trend inthis direction is verified by the limitedstatistical evidence actually available(see above, p. 24-25). Beyond these caveats,there is arguably a bigger problem stillwith the ‘feminisation of poverty’, namelyits implicit emphasis on incomes.

That the ‘feminisation of poverty’ hasbeen associated primarily, if notexclusively, with income, appears ratherat odds with the wider literature ongender and development, in which therehas been growing support for conceptsand measures which encapsulatepoverty’s multidimensionality, and,via participatory methods, attemptto incorporate the ‘voices of the poor’themselves. The relevance of moreholistic and subjective perspectivesis eminently apparent in recentinvestigation into the ‘feminisation of

poverty’ undertaken in The Gambia, thePhilippines and Costa Rica. In additionto examining statistical and policydocuments, this comparative researchdrew on interviews and focus groupdiscussions with over 200 low-incomewomen and men of different ages, andconsultations with 40 professionalsworking in international organisations,state agencies and NGOs.

Although there was no consistentquantitative or qualitative evidence tosupport a generalised tendency to a‘feminisation’ of income poverty, onestriking trend across the three case studycountries was what is perhaps bestsummed-up as a ‘feminisation ofresponsibility and/or obligation’.

This notion rests on three mainobservations. The first pertains togrowing gender disparities in therange and amount of labour investedin household livelihoods. While risingnumbers of poor women of all ages areworking outside the home, as well ascontinuing to perform the bulk ofunpaid domestic and care work, men arenot increasing their participation in suchwork despite a declining role as sole orchief earners in households. That thisgrowing unevenness in gendered inputsto household livelihoods is occurringin a context where neo-liberalrestructuring is frequently requiringgreater investments of time in all formsof labour, including self-provisioning,raises serious concerns about inequality,exploitation and sustainability.

My second main observation relatesto persistent and/or growing disparitiesin women’s and men’s capacities tonegotiate gendered obligations andentitlements in households. Despitewomen’s progressive movements to thefrontline of coping with poverty, they do

by Sylvia Chant,London School of Economics Beyond incomes:

A New Take on the‘Feminisation of Poverty’

Are women poorer thanmen? Are women-headedhouseholds poorer? Is thegender gap widening?

The scant data oninequalities withinhouseholds preventcertain knowledge.

Looking beyond incomes,field studies reveal largeand increasing genderdisparities in obligationsand responsibilities.

‘Feminisation’ should referto privation in manydimensions, not justto income poverty.

1. See Poverty in Focus No. 9:What is Poverty? — concepts and measures.

Poverty in Focus January 2008 27

not seem to have gained any ground fornegotiating greater inputs to householdincomes or labour on the part of men, letalone reductions in men’s resource-depleting activities.

Indeed, regardless of their decliningshares of household effort, many mencontinue to withhold earnings—and/orto appropriate those of wives or otherhousehold members—to fund extra-domestic, and fundamentally self-oriented pursuits such as spending timewith male companions, drinking, takingdrugs, engaging in extra-marital sex and/or gambling. Since women have littlechoice, especially where idealised normsof femininity continue to emphasisealtruism and the primacy of family care,men’s extra-domestic indulgences notonly reinforce women’s obligations, butcan, in the process, exacerbate them.For example, illness or incapacity inducedby risk-taking behaviour can deprivehousehold members of economicresources through losses in earningsand medical expenditure.

A third distinctive pattern across thecase study countries is an increasingdisarticulation between investments/responsibilities and rewards/rights.While the onus of dealing with poverty isbecoming progressively feminised, thereis no obvious increase in women’s rightsand rewards—whether of a material ornon-material nature. Gambian, Filipinoand Costa Rican women frequently stressthat they are working harder in andoutside the home. However, unless theyhead their own households, rarely dothey claim that this has entitled them toany benefits such as more personal overcollective expenditure, more freedom, orlicense to pursue goals which might beconstrued as individualistic.

Indeed, in most cases women appear tosee no justification to expect or demandmore as a result of giving more. This iseven the case with young womenwho are undoubtedly the biggestbeneficiaries of institutional attemptsto level the gender playing fieldin such areas as education andemployment. While young women’sgrowing personal asset base might beexpected to strengthen their bargainingpower and aspirations, potential gains

are frequently circumscribed by socialand familial constraints. Young women’shigher earning capacity, for example,does not necessarily enable them tonegotiate new deals within households,but can instead expose them to moreclaims. This is especially the case inThe Gambia.

On the other side of the fence, men,despite their lesser inputs to householdlivelihoods, are managing to retain theirtraditional privileges and prerogatives,including the exercise of authority,distancing from the time and labourefforts necessary for household survival,and recourse to resource-draining‘escape routes’. The scenario wherebyinvestments are becoming progressivelydetached from rights and rewards couldconceivably evolve into new and deeperforms of gender inequality, and, as such,is a matter of profound concern.

The above findings also raise importantquestions about the relevance of the‘feminisation of poverty’, which, inrespect of its current referents, does notseem to capture the essence of wherepoor women’s most significantcontemporary privations lie. Genderedpoverty goes far beyond the questionof income, with a broader perspectiveon poverty also indicating that the‘feminisation’ of privation may owemore to the actual and idealisedmajority position of male householdheadship than a rise in the numbersof households headed by women.

On balance, the notion that poverty is‘feminising’ might only be sustained ifinputs are given as much emphasis asincome, and due attention is paid to theirsubjective and objective corollaries. Themounting onus on women to cope withhousehold survival arises not onlybecause they cannot necessarily rely onmen and/or do not expect to rely on men,but because a growing number seem tobe supporting men as well—whetherthrough income or labour contributions.

This underlines the argument thatpoverty is not just about the privationof minimum basic needs, but ofopportunities and choices1. While onone hand female household heads couldconceivably be seen as an extreme case

of ‘choicelessness’ and ‘responsibility’—inhaving little option other than to fendfor themselves and their dependents,and on potentially weaker groundsgiven gender discrimination in societyat large, this needs to be qualified:a) because female-headed householdsdo not necessarily lack male members;b) free of a senior male ‘patriarch’, theirhouseholds can become ‘enabling spaces’in which there is scope to distributehousehold tasks and resources moreequitably, and c) women in male-headedhouseholds may be in the position ofsupporting not only children, butspouses as well, as an increasingproportion of men seem to be steppingout of the shoes of ‘chief breadwinner’into those of ‘chief spender’.

If classic conceptualisations of the‘feminisation of poverty’ aremethodologically and analyticallyinappropriate in depicting trends ingendered privation, this arguably leavesus with two choices. One is that existingterminology is abandoned, and perhapssubstituted by something akin to a‘feminisation of responsibility and/orobligation’. The second is that the termis retained with the proviso that thepoverty part of the construct refersnot just to income but other, albeitrelated, privations.

The latter is conceivably preferable: first,because the ‘feminisation of poverty’ issuccinct, well-known, and has alreadygone some way to ‘en-gender’ povertyreduction strategies, and secondbecause giving poverty a more explicitmultidimensional emphasis would bringit more in line with poverty discoursesin general. Provided it is made patentlyclear that poverty is not just aboutincomes, but inputs, the ‘feminisation ofpoverty’ would have greater theoreticaland empirical resonance. It wouldalso provide a better basis for policyinterventions which in the process ofdirecting poverty reduction programmesto, and or through, women, can simplyadd to the disproportionate burdensthey are currently carrying.

S. Chant: Gender, Generation and Poverty:Exploring the ‘Feminisation of Poverty’in Africa, Asia and Latin America(Edward Elgar, UK 2007). @

Jan

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International Poverty CentreSBS – Ed. BNDES, 10º andar70076-900 Brasilia DFBrazil

povertycentre@undp-povertycentre.orgwww.undp-povertycentre.orgTelephone +55 61 2105 5000

ST/ESA/326

2009 World Survey on the Role of Women in Development

Women’s Control over Economic Resources and Access to Financial Resources, including Microfinance

United NationsNew York, 2009

Department of Economic and Social Affairs

Division for the Advancement of Women

ST/ESA/326

ISBN 978-92-1-130275-2

United Nations publication Sales No. E.09.IV.7

Copyright © United Nations, 2009 All rights reserved

Department of Economic and Social AffairsThe Department of Economic and Social Affairs of the United Nations Secretariat is a vital interface between global policies in the economic, social and environmental spheres and national action. The Department works in three main interlinked areas: (i) it com-piles, generates and analyses a wide range of economic, social and environmental data and information on which States Members of the United Nations draw to review common problems and take stock of policy options; (ii) it facilitates the negotiations of Member States in many intergovernmental bodies on joint courses of action to address ongoing or emerging global challenges; and (iii) it advises interested Governments on the ways and means of translating policy frameworks developed in United Nations conferences and summits into programmes at the country level and, through technical assistance, helps build national capacities.

NoteThe designations employed and the presentation of the material in this publication do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of the Secretariat of the United Nations concerning the legal status of any country, territory, city or area or of its authorities, or concern-ing the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries.

The term “country” as used in the text of this publication also refers, as appropriate, to ter-ritories or areas.

The designations “developed” and “developing” countries or areas and “more developed”, “less developed” and “least developed” regions are intended for statistical convenience and do not necessarily express a judgement about the stage reached by a particular country or area in the development process.

Symbols of United Nations documents are composed of capital letters combined with figures.

iii

Preface

The 2009 World Survey on the Role of Women in Development addresses the important theme of “Women’s control over economic resources and access to financial resources, including microfinance”. The World Survey illustrates the importance of examining women’s access to economic and financial resources in a broad sense, including resources generated at national level through budgets, trade, and development assistance; financial services such as savings, credit, remittance transfers and insurance; employment; land, property and other productive resources; and social protection.

There are significant development gains to be made in ensuring women’s equitable access to and control over economic and financial resources, including in relation to economic growth, poverty eradication and the well-being of families and communities. The impact of inequality in access to resources represents a global challenge with implications at individual, family, community and national level.

The World Survey makes a timely contribution in the context of the current financial and economic crisis. It points out the need for an appropriate gender-sensitive response to the crisis which minimizes the negative impacts and takes advantage of the opportunity to develop positive trends.

The United Nations must demonstrate leadership in identifying and systematically and effectively addressing discrimination against women in relation to resources. Appropriate responses will facilitate both achievement of gender equality and empowerment of women and economic growth and long term prosperity.

It is my hope that the World Survey will contribute to an improved understanding of gender equality implications of economic development and will guide the design of gender-sensitive policy measures that will increase women’s access to and control over economic and financial resources. I commend it to a broad global audience.

In addition to its input to discussions on women and development in the General Assembly in October 2009, the World Survey also constitutes a contribution to the 15-year review of implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action in the Com-mission on the Status of Women in March 2010 and to the ECOSOC Annual Ministerial Review, focused on gender equality and empowerment of women, in July 2010.

Sha ZukangUnder-Secretary-General for Economic and Social AffairsOctober 2009

v

Overview

Women’s equal access to and control over economic and financial resources is critical for the achievement of gender equality and empowerment of women and for equitable and sustain-able economic growth and development. Gender equality in the distribution of economic and financial resources has positive multiplier effects for a range of key development goals, including poverty reduction and the welfare of children. Both microlevel efficiency results through increased household productivity and macroefficiency results through positive syner-gies between indicators of gender equality and economic growth have been recorded. Devel-opment rationales for enhancing women’s access to economic and financial resources include women’s role as “safety net of last resort” in economic downturns.

Long-standing inequalities in the gender distribution of economic and financial resources have placed women at a disadvantage relative to men in their capability to par-ticipate in, contribute to and benefit from broader processes of development. Despite con-siderable progress on many aspects of women’s economic empowerment through, inter alia, increases in educational attainment and share of paid work, deeply entrenched inequality persists as a result of discriminatory norms and practices, and the pace of change has been slow and uneven across regions. Women continue to be absent from key decision-making forums shaping the allocation of economic and financial resources and opportunities, which further perpetuates gender inequality.

The current financial and economic crisis is already threatening the progress made towards the achievement of internationally agreed development goals, including the Millen-nium Development Goals. The manner in which countries respond to the recession can have disproportionate impacts on women and girls, possibly reversing gains made, particularly through cuts in public spending on health and education and through inequitably designed safety nets. There is also increased risk of reductions in allocations to gender equality and women’s empowerment.

The international community has made strong, comprehensive commitments to gender equality and women’s rights in access to and control over economic and financial resources in United Nations intergovernmental contexts. Human rights treaties, mechanisms and instru-ments have also addressed the issues of women’s access to and control over resources. Govern-ments have the primary responsibility for implementing these commitments.

Macroeconomics and women’s economic empowerment

Macroeconomic policies impact on gender equality through markets and state interventions which distribute key economic and financial resources. Gender equality perspectives have, however, been largely ignored in formulation of macroeconomic policies. Development of gender-responsive policies requires an understanding of and attention to the distributional consequences of economic growth strategies and monetary, fiscal, trade and investment poli-

vi 2009 World Survey on the Role of Women in Development

cies, as well as the specific constraints to women’s economic empowerment, including in particular the unequal gender distribution of paid and unpaid work and its implications for access to economic resources and opportunities.

The impact of economic growth on gender equality can vary considerably, including in relation to employment, well-being and broader indicators of gender equality. The posi-tive changes in employment associated with changes in growth have been larger for women than for men. Economic growth has had, however, limited documented impact on women’s life expectancy and women’s participation in economic and political decision-making. The importance of gender equality in education and employment for economic growth is illus-trated by microlevel impacts and efficiencies generated by optimal use of human capital.

Monetary policies are likely to have gender-differentiated impacts through the labour market. Tight monetary policies, high real rates of interest and deregulated financial markets affect the supply of credit in the economy, including its availability to less privileged economic actors. Women smallholder farmers and small- and medium-scale entrepreneurs are deprived of access to credit. Tax systems can create and perpetuate gender inequalities through influ-encing the allocation of time to formal, informal and unpaid work and through the burdens imposed by direct taxes on consumption goods and services.

Budgets at national and other levels are important mechanisms for Governments to ensure women benefit from public-sector expenditures. Gender-responsive budget initia-tives can be instrumental in promoting change in budget policies, allocation and outcomes to ensure that resources are allocated to the implementation of commitments on gender equality.

Trade policies impact on women through employment, prices and incomes. Trade can create employment opportunities for women in export-oriented labour-intensive manufactur-ing. These opportunities may, however, not be sustainable because of the shift to more skill- or capital-intensive forms of production, the relocation of capital and the relocation of jobs from the formal to informal economy. The removal of tariffs and other trade barriers can reduce government revenues, leading to cuts in social spending or increases in excise taxes, which can disproportionately impact poor women.

Foreign direct investment has played a major role in employment generation for women in some regions, particularly in labour-intensive export-oriented manufacturing. Competition to attract foreign direct investment may, however, lead to a weakening of labour standards, particularly in export-processing zones, which can be disempowering for women. Although foreign direct investment is less internationally mobile, there is a risk of relocation to keep wages low and avoid labour regulation, particularly in sectors with low levels of capital invest-ment where women are primarily located.

Remittances are expected to remain relatively resilient during the current financial and economic crisis relative to other categories of resource flows to developing countries. Women make up an increasing percentage of international migrants, migrating independently in search of jobs and contributing to remittance flows. There are gender differences in the propensity to remit, reflecting differences in earnings, life cycle and family responsibilities. While migration and the possibility to remit may be empowering for women, the costs to the migrant women have to be considered.

Development cooperation has been a critical mechanism for women’s economic empow-erment, even though the majority of funds have gone to social sectors rather than productive sectors such as agriculture, energy and transport. Measuring progress and accountability in relation to official development assistance remains a challenge because of limited data and underdeveloped and inadequately utilized methodologies.

Overview vii

Access to full employment and decent workLabour is the most widely available factor of production at the disposal of poor people around the world and the primary means through which they earn a living. Although women’s share of employment has increased, a gender division of labour persists. The contraction of formal em-ployment and decent work and proliferation of “atypical” or non-standard work, which is gener-ally precarious, poorly paid and uncovered by labour legislation or social protection, has partic-ularly affected women. Lack of access to decent work is a major cause of poverty among women.

Constraints faced by women in the labour market include their disproportionate con-centration in vulnerable forms of work, occupational segregation—both horizontal and vertical, wage gaps and the unequal division of unpaid domestic work. These constraints reflect women’s disadvantage in education; lack of organized voice and bargaining power; constraints on labour market mobility; relatively high involvement in part-time or temporary jobs; concentration in employment where pressures of global competition keep wages down; and direct discrimination.

Despite women’s increased participation in the labour market, there has been no signifi-cant increase in the sharing of unpaid work, including caregiving, between women and men, which affects women’s employment choices. A number of countries have introduced policies on working arrangements, including reduction of working hours, flexibility of work-time and location, and the option of part-time work to assist both women and men in reconciling their work and family responsibilities. Part-time work, which is mainly taken by women, can, however, involve a wage-penalty and long term impacts on pensions.

Addressing the constraints women face in the labour market requires a range of policy interventions, including development of women’s capabilities to adapt to changing labour market conditions, support to reduce unpaid care work, gender-sensitive labour market regu-lations and enhanced capacity for collective action. Increased responsibility of all stakehold-ers—States, the private sector and civil society—for caregiving is particularly important.

Both gender-specific and gender-neutral labour regulations can be instrumental in elimi-nating gender inequalities and discrimination and ensuring access to decent work; and both can have unintended detrimental impacts. Gender-sensitive regulation that is properly enforced can protect vulnerable workers, help bridge the gap between formal and informal working conditions and create more unified labour markets. It is, however, increasingly difficult to ensure that all women benefit from labour market regulations because many women in devel-oping countries work in the informal sector which remains beyond the reach of regulation.

Access to land, housing and other productive resources

Women in many parts of the world continue to face discrimination in access to land, housing, property and other productive resources and have limited access to technologies and services that could alleviate their work burdens. Unequal access to resources limits women’s capacity to ensure agricultural productivity, security of livelihoods and food security and is increas-ingly linked to poverty, migration, urbanization and increased risk of violence. Population growth, climate change, the spread of markets and urbanization have created new opportuni-ties and new challenges in women’s access to land, housing and other productive resources. Attention to the resource challenges women face in agriculture is essential for addressing the food and energy crises and climate change in both the short and long term.

viii 2009 World Survey on the Role of Women in Development

Gender inequality in access to land and property is substantial due to discriminatory inheritance practices, unequal access to land markets and gender-biased land reform. Some progress has been made in legislative reform, but implementation is hindered by sociocultural norms and women’s lack of knowledge of their entitlements. Socio-economic contexts deter-mine the appropriateness of different types of rights to land and property—including indi-vidual rights, joint-titling and group rights. Continued efforts are needed to promote gender-sensitive legislation, enforce existing legislation, make judicial systems more accessible and responsive to women, and provide legal aid to women seeking to claim their rights.

Land reform processes, such as land-titling projects and resettlement schemes, can play an important role in addressing inequalities in access to land and property. Land markets have, however, not been an effective means of transferring land and property to women in many parts of the world.

Improved access to water and energy in developing countries can reduce women’s work-loads, increase productivity and provide more time for income generation, political participa-tion and leisure. Women face greater obstacles in accessing irrigation for crop production and livestock raising, due to insecurity of land tenure and their exclusion or marginal involvement in user associations. The user groups established to promote greater community management of natural resources, including forests, exclude women through discriminatory rules and social norms. Efforts to increase women’s participation must address inequalities in govern-ance structures and membership requirements.

Equitable access to infrastructure and services are critical for women’s economic empow-erment. Transport improvements can reduce women’s time-poverty in rural areas in many parts of the world, as well as increase access to markets, schools and services, with resulting improvements in productivity, health and well-being. Agricultural extension services in many countries have largely ignored women, in part due to the fact that most extension officers are men who target male farmers and focus information and inputs on their priorities and needs.

The work burden of women in many parts of the world could be alleviated through access to improved technologies, including electricity, which would increase health and well-being and free time and energy for other economic activities. Barriers to women’s access to improved technologies include lack of adaptation to local conditions, discrimina-tory norms and practices, limited dissemination and high costs. The potential of informa-tion and communication technologies (ICT) for benefiting women through time-savings and access to information, employment and income generation has not been fully realized and women’s access remains limited in many parts of the world, particularly in rural areas.

Housing is an essential asset for ensuring women’s independence and economic security. Lack of housing undermines women’s potential to secure health, education and employment and increases the risk of violence. An increasing proportion of those living in housing-poverty and homelessness are women and children, due to discriminatory laws, policies, and customs and traditions. The State can play an important role in facilitating equitable access to adequate housing through legislative change and policy development as well as direct involvement in provision of low-cost housing.

Access to financial resourcesWomen’s access to all financial services, including savings, insurance, remittance transfers and credit, is essential to allow them to benefit fully from economic opportunities. Legal, institutional and sociocultural barriers often, however, limit women’s access to these services.

Overview ix

Microfinance, which emerged in response to the failure of the formal financial system to reach the poor, has been successful in reaching poor women through innovative measures to address gender-specific constraints. Some organizations seek to redress gender inequali-ties in access to finance and other work towards broader gender equality goals. Many com-bine financial services with a range of social services. Most organizations use group-based approaches to service provision, with variations around the basic principle. Some organiza-tions combine group and individual lending since group lending, while useful for those start-ing up businesses, can act as a constraint on more successful entrepreneurs.

There is lack of consensus on the extent to which access to microfinance empowers women. While there is evidence that microfinance has a positive impact on income, there are limits to the income gains. Despite fewer studies on health, nutrition and education, positive impacts have been noted. There is also evidence of the positive role of microfinance in promoting new technologies.

Two trends dominate debates on the future direction of financial services. On the one hand, the call for an inclusive financial system stresses the need for an approach which can broaden coverage but preserve the principle of diversity of organizational practices to address the heterogeneity of the poor. On the other hand, there is increased focus on financial sus-tainability and the involvement of the commercial sector. Microfinance organizations are under considerable pressure to become financially sustainable, in part because the potential for mobilizing the savings of poor people around the world has attracted the attention of international investors. Data from several regions suggest that commercialization will lead to declining access for women. Microfinance organizations have been successful in the past in reaching poor women because they have specifically addressed the constraints women face, including through the focus on group lending.

While women are found in a range of entrepreneurial activities, many tend to be con-centrated in micro, small and medium businesses as a result of their responsibilities for unpaid work, limits on mobility, lack of collateral and limited financial skills. Women can be more disadvantaged than men in starting up enterprises, as they may be less able than men to afford long and expensive registration procedures. Initiatives have been taken by financial institutions and Governments at national and regional levels to increase the access of women entrepreneurs to financial instruments, including regular banking services, debt financing and equity financing.

Women are absent from top management positions in the banking sector in both devel-oped and developing countries. The significant constraints women face in accessing finance and in representation in decision-making in the formal sector must be explicitly addressed in financial-sector reforms. Reform is also necessary in the microfinance sector to ensure specific commitment to gender equality and women’s empowerment in organizational vision, mandates, objectives, policies and practice.

Access to social protectionWomen and men experience and cope with risk, insecurity and crisis differently. As a result of unequal property rights, interruptions to their working lives posed by childbearing, unequal sharing of unpaid care responsibilities, location in less well-regulated forms of work and lower levels of remuneration, many women are unable to insure themselves against contingencies arising from old age, ill-health, disability, unemployment and other life crises.

The insecurities generated by global competition, flexible labour markets and recur-ring financial crises have given rise to strong demands for State support for social protection.

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A basic level of security for all should be part of the social contract between the State and its citizens. While welfare regimes in developed countries underwrite the social security of their populations, social security in developing countries has been largely confined to those in formal employment. Provision shrank in many countries as markets were deregulated and the role of the State cut back.

Experimentation in social protection provides evidence that well-designed and broadly based social protection strategies offer benefits that go beyond crisis-coping functions. A uni-versal approach to social protection that all countries can afford—a global minimum social floor—is supported by the International Labour Organization (ILO) as a means to address insecurity and vulnerability in people’s lives. The four elements of the social floor—guaran-teed income security for all children, guaranteed access to basic means-tested/self-targeting social assistance for the poor and unemployed, guaranteed income security for older and disabled people, and guaranteed access to basic health benefits—can be designed in a man-ner which ensures responsiveness to gender-specific needs and interests across the life cycle. Research suggests that basic social security can be afforded by virtually all countries, and, if designed to play a developmental role, would pay for itself in the long run. Because of their current exclusion, women would benefit disproportionately if reforms were designed in a gender-sensitive manner across the life cycle.

Income security for children safeguards their well-being and improves their health, nutrition, school attendance, educational achievement and, later in life, labour market per-formance. Initiatives to promote income security include allowances in cash or kind and free or subsidized provision of basic goods and services. Allowances and subsidies may be targeted explicitly to women or men, or more generally to caregivers. Assumptions about women’s responsibilities for domestic and care-work, however, can translate into policies which under-mine their capacity to undertake employment outside the home.

Income security for the unemployed remains a major challenge, particularly in develop-ing countries where many low-income workers are outside the formal social insurance system, including the vast majority of working women. Strategies developed to expand coverage include cash transfer programmes and employment guarantee schemes, such as public works programmes. Gender-related constraints, which can be reinforced by programme design, including the type of work offered, have in some cases restricted women’s participation.

Disability and old age, while associated with declining physical activity and earning power, do not have to entail greater poverty or insecurity. However, poorer sections of the population, including in particular many women, who lack access to adequate support net-works, private savings, social insurance, pension schemes and assets, do not have sufficient social protection and are vulnerable to isolation and ill health.

Formal social security systems—both public and private—generally contain provision for pensions and disability allowances but vary considerably in the terms of provision. Many countries have undergone reforms of their pension systems, motivated by ageing populations and/or concerns about fiscal burdens. The extent to which pension schemes reproduce gender inequalities depends on how closely entitlements are linked to employment history. Most public and private pension systems apply primarily to workers in formal employment, exclud-ing an increasing section of the working population. Non-contributory pension schemes, representing more inclusive approaches, are being introduced in many parts of the world to reach previously uncovered groups, with positive poverty-reducing effects for whole families.

Deficits in health protection coverage and health inequities persist between and within countries. Large numbers of people lack sufficient financial means to access health services and millions of people worldwide are pushed into poverty by the need to pay for health care.

Overview xi

The lack of access to health care, including through cutbacks in public health provision as well as increased reliance on various cost-recovery mechanisms, has significant gender-specific social and economic repercussions, in particular in relation to health, employment and income generation. Substituting for services significantly increases unpaid work for women.

Social health protection provides benefit packages for protection against the risk of ill-health and related financial burdens, including through tax-funded national health services, vouchers and conditional cash benefits, and contribution-based health insurance—includ-ing mandatory public schemes, regulated private schemes and community-based non-profit schemes. The structure of health insurance schemes, and regulations on coverage eligibility, can create differences and inequality in the use of services and in health outcomes between men and women.

In conclusionEnsuring women’s economic empowerment and access to and control over resources re-quires an integrated approach to growth and development, focused on gender-responsive employment promotion and informed by the interdependency between economic and social development. Social objectives need to be incorporated into economic policies. Economic growth strategies should give attention to the real economy and focus on creating a gender-sensitive macroeconomic environment, full employment and decent work, access to land, property and other productive resources as well as financial services, and full coverage of social protection measures.

The World Survey on the Role of Women in Development outlines a number of concrete recommendations in these critical areas, which if adopted, will facilitate women’s equitable access to and control over economic and financial resources.