South-South sharing of policy experiences: Mainstreaming gender in national policies
Ladies and gentlemen,
Dear panelists,
Dear friends,
The world has started moving beyond the pandemic. The question is, will it be to a better place or back to business as usual?
Given the current situation, we are certainly not back to business as usual but neither on the way towards a better place.
The experiences of the last two years have taught us vital lessons about how a combination of unexpected shocks and growing inequality can generate economic fragilities and reinforce political divisions. Clearly, there is room and a need to build a more inclusive and resilient path forward. But positive change requires deliberate and strategic use of policy, at the national, regional and global levels.
We know that the COVID crisis has had a disproportionate negative impact on women. Often, women were the first to lose their jobs, and they had less access to social protection and finance to enable the survival of their businesses. They also faced a disproportionate burden of care work, and many girls were taken out of school to help at home.
The pandemic has become the glaring evidence of structural injustices in the existing social and economic system. A system which relies on taking advantage of many underpaid labourers, often without or little social protection: countless women and girls.
Gender inequality is the oldest, and longest-standing structural and systematic injustice. Throughout history and across countries, women have been responsible for the lion’s share of unpaid care and invisible work. This has been perpetuated with enshrined social norms and stereotypes which cause barriers, or at least hurdles, for women’s participation in the labour market and their empowerment through earning income and gaining financial independence.
In more recent history, inequalities, and gender inequality in particular, were exacerbated when state capacities were systematically shrunk from the 1980s onwards. The reduction in the public provision of health and education services, deregulation of markets and dissolving social-safety nets meant an increasing reliance on unpaid labour and good will, especially of women and girls.
Oxfam estimates that the economic value of unpaid care work is around US$11 trillion per year. To put this into perspective, it is three times more than the global tech industry, and about 10 percent of global GDP.
In some ways, COVID has helped to make invisible or undervalued work more visible. The phrase “essential worker” has been used often, but not to refer to the highly paid at the top of the career ladder, but to many in low or lower paid work – such as nurses and cashiers. Yet, it remains to be seen whether the crisis leads to societies that value more – and pay better - these jobs.
The problem does not stop here. Even in the economic sectors where women’s employment and contribution is actually acknowledged, we need to change things profoundly to ensure that women – and also men - can properly benefit.
So, what needs to be done to recover better and to a more equal world?
This question is at the core of today’s event, as well as integral to our work in UNCTAD. The study that will be presented today also contributes to this purpose.
The study looks at policies needed to advance gender equality in the context of the wider development challenges facing developing countries. It offers a framework for analysis which is applied in three countries: Ethiopia, Indonesia and Sri Lanka. The study highlights a number of important points, and suggests a way forward.
While an overview will be presented in a few minutes, I want to highlight one point which reflects the fundamental concern: As jobs become more intensive in terms of capital or technology, women tend to be excluded. In other words, women get stuck in jobs with lower pay and less growth potential.
To achieve better outcomes, the study provides a blueprint for mainstreaming gender into national policies. Let me highlight four points:
First, it suggests using gender as a lens into the social inclusion and development impact of industrial and trade policies.
Second, it proposes refocusing industrial and trade policies to target broad-based structural transformation and higher productivity employment generation for both women and men.
Third, it emphasizes the need to counter traditional gender norms and stereotypes that keep women from participating in trade and structural transformation on an equal footing with men. This is particularly important in the context of increasing technological intensity and the digital gender gap.
And four, it urges including explicitly social infrastructure and investments in the care economy as part of industrial policymaking.
Dear friends,
It is no coincidence that we are launching this report on International Women’s Day. The 8th of March is an important reminder of the unfinished business towards gender equality. In no country in the world is gender equality a reality today.
That is why on this day last year I launched the initiative “Les 8 du mois until we’re there”. There is still much progress to be made to create a world in which men and women share the same rights, have the same opportunities, and enjoy the same freedoms.
Today’s event is also a contribution in this context, and I thank you all for your engagement on this journey.