Women Contribution to Economy in the SAR Daad Mousa

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Women Contribution to Economy in the SARDaad
Mousa Sawsan Zakzak
2
Overview

• Population 51 males, 49 females.
• Illiteracy (15 years old) rate 12.1 males,
  26.1 females.
• Dr. Najah al-Attar Vice-president (2006).
• Participation in the Cabinet 93 males, 7
  females.
• Participation in the Peoples Assembly 87.6
  males, 12.4 females (2007)
• Participation in administrative and
  organisational professions 82.2 males, 17.8
  females.
• Judges 88 males, 12 females.
• Land possession 95 males, 5 females.
• Beneficiaries of the Agency for Combating
  Unemployment loans till 31/12/2004
• 1. Household loans 45 males, 55 females.
• 2. Small loans 84 males, 16 females.

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General Environment of Women Activity

• Syria joined the seven major international
  conventions, including the CEDAW, with
  reservations on Articles 2, 9-2, 15-2, 16-1-C,
  16-1-D, 16-1-F, 16-1-G and 16-2.
• The Constitution ensures equality among citizens,
  and Article 45 states The state guarantees
  women all opportunities enabling them to fully
  and effectively participate in the political,
  social, cultural, and economic life. The state
  removes the restrictions that prevent women's
  development and participation in building the
  socialist Arab society.
• Most laws are not discriminative ones,
  particularly Labour Laws.
• Discriminative laws are the Personal Status,
  Penal and Nationality Laws.
• No Law of Parties and the Law of Associations is
  out-of-date and does not meet the needs of civil
  society work development, which affects
  negatively the participation in public life,
  particularly among women.
• Mandatory education stage have been prolonged
  until the end of the preparatory education stage.
  
• Habits and traditions constitute one of the
  barriers hindering increasing women participation
  in public life.

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Major Indicators of Women Economic Activity

• Unemployment among females increased from 18.5
  in 2000 to 22 in 2004, and among males from 7.3
  to 10.5.
• Women participation in the labour force decreased
  from 19.8 in 2000 to 17.3 in 2004, after having
  increased in 2002 to 21.4.
• Percentage of women working in agriculture
  increased from 58.8 in 2000 to 25.5 in 2004,
  while in services it increased from 21 to 56.3
  for the same period (increased percentage of
  female paid-workers but far from economic
  decision-making positions)
• Contribution of women working in the organised
  sector is concentrated in the public sector,
  particularly in services, while their
  contribution in the mixed and private sector is
  concentrated in agriculture.

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Indicators by Employment Status (Organised)
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Indicators by Salary Category (Organised)
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Major Reasons behind those Indicators

• Deflation of government employment.
• Weak private investments due to weak encouraging
  environment.
• Services sector feminization policies (education,
  nursing).
• Stereotyped education trend big gender gap in
  favor of females in theoretical faculties versus
  a gender gap in in favor of males in engineering
  and IT faculties.
• Women largely tend to public sector due to its
  social securities.
• Private sector evade applying the laws (a
  resignation is signed with the contract).
• Poor women accessibility to resources and real
  estate collaterals.
• Weak supportive services to reproductive role.
• Glass ceiling.

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Non-organised Sector

• Labour Forces Research (2002)
• 60 of the Syrias labour forces works in the
  non-formal sector, and most of them are women of
  which 56.2 are family unpaid worker. Percentage
  of female employers in this sector is only 0.5
  of the total female workers in it. Female
  self-employed percentage is no more than 11.1,
  while female paid workers percentage is 32.
• Women contribution in the non-organised sector is
  mainly concentrated in agriculture, small and
  medium crafts, home services, and home crafts.

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Major Developments before the 10th FYP

• The 9th FYP specified a chapter on Women.
• Set the Syrian Women Advancement Strategy beyond
  Beijing (2000-2005).
• Rural Women Development Strategy.
• Draft National Population Strategy (2001-2025),
  which specified a chapter for Women Empowerment.
• Amend Social Insurance Law, which gave women the
  right to devise their pension regardless of
  husbands situations.
• Establish the Syrian Commission for Family
  Affairs.
• Establish the Syrian Fund for Rural Development
  (FIRDOS) and MAWRID to support businesswomen.
• Vocational training courses (traditional) by the
  General Women Union.
• A rising women movement raising the objective of
  Women Empowerment in all fields.

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Major Changes in the 10th FYP

• Adopting indicative planning in the context of
  social market the State direct investment
  activity and market activity, but it does not
  dominate of possess it, instead it works to
  expand free work area and introduce it
  opportunities.
• The Plan adopts a participatory approach in
  formulating the objectives, with concentration on
  the role of non-governmental sectors and civil
  society organisations.

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Goals stemming from the Women Empowerment
objective in the 10th FYP

• Raise women percentage in the labour force from
  17.3 in 2004 to 21.3 in 2010, 25 in 2020 and
  30 in 2025.
• Raise women contribution to the crude economic
  activity rate from 9.2 in 2004 to 25 in 2020
  and to 30 in 2025.
• Raise the female/male percentage in the basic
  education stage (6-11) from 92 in 2004 to 100
  in 2015.
• Raise the female/male percentage in the basic
  education stage (12-14) from 88 in 2004 to 100
  in 2015

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Major Programmes Targeting Women Empowerment
National Women Empowerment and Poverty Reduction
Programme- Training Qualification- Regions
Infrastructure Development- Movable Funds-
Business Incubators.
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Risks

• The new orientation will negatively affect women
  economic empowerment at present due to women weak
  participation in the private sector as employers,
  also because they are the weak point in the
  private labour market employment due to their
  weak competitiveness stemming from their
  qualification, and also due the low level of
  social protection of all kinds, including some
  discriminative articles in the laws (subsidized
  fuel coupons) and the plastic glass ceiling.
• The final formulation of the Economic Reform
  Programme has not matured yet, which led to some
  confusion and non-well considered decisions.
• Failure to issue a modern law of associations
  that allow the associations to play their role in
  women empowerment regarding laws amendment,
  training and establishing economic enterprises,
  will affect negatively the role of those
  associations in women empowerment on all aspects.
  
• Deflation of government expenditure will affect
  social care services of education, health, etc.
  (university admission rates and private
  education).

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Major Impediments Facing Women in Organised Sector

• Declined government role in employment due to the
  deflated government expenditure and lack of
  budget allocations to create new job
  opportunities.
• Women encouraged to work in services sector.
  Women are far from the economic decision-making
  positions.
• No executive policies are adopted to increase
  women job opportunities due the belief that
  equality by law is sufficient alone to achieve
  quality on ground.
• Weak opportunities for women to get material and
  real estate assets that enable them to get loans
  (glass ceiling).
• Insufficient qualification and knowledge of
  private business, and big marketing problems for
  women.
• Weak supportive services to the reproductive
  role.
• Paralyzing collective negotiation principle and
  collective work contracts, which deprives groups
  of women from getting the commitments for better
  work conditions.

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Major Impediments Facing Women in Non-organised
Sector

• Weak statistics regarding work kinds, conditions,
  problems and places, and number of female workers
  and women contribution to this sector.
• Ambiguous economic role of this sector, poor
  potentiality to identify income value, no legal
  protection and no health social insurance, weak
  women awareness of their rights and duties.
• Hard work assigned to women in some sectors,
  which reflects on their psychological and
  physical health.
• Social underestimation of women work results in
  this sector.
• Value and impact of women unpaid work inside and
  outside the family are not recognized.

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Proposals

• Retract the CEDAW-related reservation, Amend the
  Personal Status, Penal and Nationality Laws to
  conform with women current status and to ensure
  full legal equality with men and strengthen women
  self-confidence, and add new article to the
  Labour Law to protect women in private sector.
• Build social protection network, and specify
  Support Funds to women.
• Provide and improve public services supporting
  women work.
• Improve women conditions regarding training and
  qualification. Link training to market needs. Pay
  more attention to train women on ICT and
  financial, administrative and technical skills.

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Proposals (continued)

• Interpret gender concepts to effective policies
  and activities, mainstream gender concept in all
  general and sector plans, and adopt
  gender-sensitive budgets.
• Bridge the gap between rural and urban women
  regarding accessibility to resources.
• Strengthen gender-based statistics in all
  development fields, and conduct researches to
  detect the new economic policies impacts.
• Activate the employment offices role, and
  consider the possibility of adopting temporary
  positive discrimination policies.
• Amen the Law of Associations to fit the
  sustainable human development needs, and to
  enable civil organisations to play their role.
• Conduct studies on women in non-organised
  economy, and adopt special programmes to ensure
  women rights and their change to organised
  economy.
• Conduct researches on women unpaid work and set
  criteria to evaluate it.