An
alarming scenario is emerging in women’s employment in India. For nearly three
decades, the share of working women in the total women’s population has been
declining slowly. But the latest survey says that there has been a dramatic
decline in just the past two years. A report on employment and unemployment by
the government’s National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) covering the years
2011-12 revealed that since the previous survey in 2009-10, over 9 million
women had been lost from India’s workforce in the rural areas.
The
situation would have been catastrophic but for the fact that in urban areas
women’s jobs increased by about 3.5 million over the same period thus somewhat
balancing out the staggering decline in rural areas.
“Despite
very rapid economic growth in India in recent years, we’re observing declining
female labour force participation rates across all age groups, across all
education levels, and in both urban and rural areas,” said International Labor
Organisation (ILO) economist Steven Kapsos during a presentation of the Global
Employment Trends 2013 report in India, earlier this year.
These
figures are for what is called usual principal status (ups). This refers to
women who are usually doing a particular work (say, cultivation, or
construction) for the ‘major part of the year’. But women have always done more
than one type of work. In addition to their ‘principal’ work they may be doing
unpaid work like helping the man of the house in his work (say, blacksmithy) or
they may be tending to milch animals. These types of supplementary works are
called ‘subsidiary’ work, and they are also recorded by NSSO surveys.
A
better picture of the women’s world of work emerges if both ‘principal’ and
‘subsidiary’ work is counted and added up. According to the NSSO, the number of
women doing such work declined by 2.7 million in rural areas but increased by
4.5 million in urban areas.
What
is implied by the strange fact that principal status work declined by 9 million
but the more comprehensive principal plus subsidiary status declined by 2.7
million? It means that regular work which lasts for a longer time, and
presumably is better paying, is getting shot to pieces – hence the huge decline
in usual principal status. On the other hand, subsidiary work – short term,
marginal, low-paying – is still available although less than before. So the
decline is less.
This
also reveals the true nature of women’s work: a very large share of women’s
work is of ‘subsidiary’ nature. That is, it is not done throughout the year, it
is not too paying, often it may be unpaid, and it is usually unskilled. In
other words – it is a survival strategy for families under economic duress –
take whatever work is available for whatever time, and then look for other.
Declining
women’s employment in rural areas is a long term trend in India despite high
economic “growth” in recent years. In 1983, women’s participation in work stood
at 34 percent in rural areas. This dipped to about 30 percent at the turn of
the century, and in the first decade, it has further plummeted to just short of
25 percent. In urban areas women’s work participation has hovered around the 15
percent mark since 1983. In the latest survey, it is 14.7 percent.
In
India, there is a strong trend of occupational segregation – women are working
in certain industries and occupations, such as basic agriculture, sales and
elementary services and handicraft manufacturing in the rural areas, and in
personal services (teachers, health workers and maid servants, especially in
urban areas).
About
48 percent of women are working in cultivation related occupations, 33 percent
as laborers in agriculture, construction, mines etc., and 10 percent in
handicrafts related work. The rest are distributed over other types of work.
For
the past several years, agriculture and related occupations have had very small
job growth, forcing women out of traditional jobs. This makes up the bulk of
job losses suffered by women. Similarly, handicrafts have not been creating
many jobs.
While
education may explain a small number of women remaining out of workforce, the
argument of women dropping out of work because of increasing incomes of
households is not correct, experts say.
If
that was the case then urban areas should have witnessed an even higher decline
in women’s work participation because incomes have risen more in towns and
cities, and more women are attending schools or colleges. But it is the rural
areas which are seeing the biggest decline, where incomes are rising slowly.
But
what is the reason behind this jobs crisis in rural India?
A
decline in public investment in agriculture, severe cutback in extension work
for dissemination of knowledge and increasing mechanization are the main causes
of this crisis of jobs according to experts. Very slow expansion of irrigation
and supply of electricity to rural areas – both of which would cause growth of
employment by increasing crops and encouraging non-farm employment – is also
causing jobs to dry up.
The
relative rise of employment in urban areas also has a story to tell. It is
mostly in low paying, insecure jobs involving very tough working conditions,
and extreme fluidity. This includes construction, of which there was a boom
till very recently, and occupations like maidservants, cooks, governesses, and
other care-giving work.
According
to calculations done by researchers, the number of women working in
construction shot up by over 300 percent between 1993-4 and 2009-10, while
those working in services mostly including care-giving work increased by about
36 percent in the same period. Based on NSSO data, it is estimated that the
number of women employed as maids, cooks, baby-sitters or governesses in homes
is a whopping 2.5 crore – one of the largest employment segments for women!
Policymakers
in India need to pay a long hard look at this picture and reform their
prescriptions – the nation is losing out in a big way, and a big chunk of our
population – the women – are suffering because society and the economic
structures are unwilling to accept them as workers.
http://indiacurrentaffairs.org/women%E2%80%99s-employment/
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