Gender, Trade and Development

1
Gender, Trade and Development

• Oxfam / Gender Action Network, Beijing, China
• 4 December 2006

2
Overview

• Introduction
• I. Trade, development and Gender Equality In
  conflict or in synergy?
• II. Gender and Trade frameworks, Empirical
  findings and Sectoral approach
• III.Towards a sustainable gender friendly
  trade-development agenda

3
Trade and development

• Issues
• Of social development social protection
• Social and gender equity
• Industrial development
• Employment, sustainable livelihoods working
  conditions

4
Tensions between the role of trade and
development

• developmental costs of trade include lack of
  attention to production capacity in the domestic
  economydue to discontinuities in industrial and
  development policies as a result of over focusing
  on trade reform etc, lack of attention to human
  resource development etc.

• social costs that can be linked to trade or that
  are trade related include included rising
  inequality, food insecurity, and trade
  liberalization induced fiscal revenue shortfall
  which endangered social sector spending.

5
Where does gender equality, poverty eradication
fits in?

• Current patterns of trade (and trade rule-making)
  present significant challenges for gender
  equality objectives, which may have significant
  untowards effects for long-term
  development. WHY? 
• Gender
• Gender and growth/trade debate
• Female led export growth limits and constraints

6
Defining gender

• gender as a relation of power, is a social
  stratifier that influences the distribution of
  output, work, income, wealth etc. (IWGEM). And
  since, gender also influences the behavior of
  economic agents it is critical to our
  understanding of the economy as well as the role
  of trade in the global economy. As noted by
  feminist economists, institutions, including
  free markets, that mediate between macro and
  micro levels of the economy bear and transmit
  gender biases so cannot be assumed to be gender
  neutral.

7
Trade, development and gender equality

• Mainstream economists take a glance at gender and
  trade/ growth, they tend to see nothing but the
  good trade liberalization creates employment
  that benefits women and or import competition
  diminishes gender discrimination in labour
  markets. (Bhagwati, In defense of globalization)

• Feminist Economics, trade impacts on
• household economy market economy
• division of labor in between men and women
• paid and unpaid work and its contribution to the
  market,
• access to resources, intra household distribution
  of income and resources and the condition under
  which entrepreneurs do business.

8
Trade, development and gender equality

• Gender issues and outcomes emanating from
  globalisation and trade liberalization include
• Feminisation of labour market
• ? or ? access to economic and social resources
  (land, credit, technology training) for women
  relative to men
• ? or ?unpaid work in home and community
• ? of tariff ? government budgets ? cuts in
  social programs or ? in regressive taxesimpacts
  women more so than men

9
Trade, development and gender equality

• The present pattern of trade (and trade
  rule-making) presents significant challenges for
  gender equality objectives and have implications
  for long-term development.
•  

10
Empirical evidence on GT

• UNCTAD 2004, UN 1999 argue that trade may impact
  gender equality through
•  a positive or negative impact on growth and
  employment opportunities. When trade results in
  increased income and employment, this can lead to
  reduction in gender inequality. This can be
  easily offset by problems with the condition of
  work and lack of health and safety precaution.

11
Empirical evidence on GT Relevant to South Asia

• Competitive pressures from trade and investment
  may reduce or encouraged gender discrimination,
  in particular wage differential.

12
Empirical evidence on GT

• Fontana and Woods 2000 found that in Bangladesh
  there was a rise in female wages to male wages.
  Battarchaya 1999 noted less wage discrimination
  in the export textile industry in Bangladesh
  compared to the other manufacturing sectors.

13
Empirical evidence on GT

• But later study by Begum argue that the gap
  between male-female earnings increased, 1990-1997
  after an initial decline between 1983-1990 and
  the earning gaps was widest, the higher the
  skilled category ( cited in FG 2005).

14
Empirical evidence on GT

• The point is that gender wage gap by itself is
  not enough need to also look at occupational
  segregation. So the trade-wage-gap is
  contradictory.

15
Empirical evidence on GT

• Facilitating or raising barriers to access by
  women to resources and services. (How can SMEs
  expand to the export market and or maintain
  domestic market share. Here the issue is
  financing and business incubation services,
  market knowledge, mobility, competitiveness and
  linkage to international production networks as
  suppliersin manufacturing as well as non
  traditional agricultural products). FG 2005.

16
Empirical evidence on GT

• Trade rules may facilitate or constraint
  government in applying policies or regulation
  that address gender equality.

17
Empirical evidence on GT

• There is also the issue of the quality trade off
  in employment

18
Empirical evidence on GT

• There is also the issue of focusing only or
  mostly on womens market participation and
  ignoring issues of well-being (in terms of loss
  of leisure activities and double burden between
  market work and reproductive work (FG 2005).

19
Empirical evidence on GT

• Study using Nepal shows that women are likely to
  increase market work, regardless of the amount of
  time males spend in domestic work, in response to
  tariff induced fiscal short value and imposition
  of value added tax.
• The increase in womens market activity showed up
  in expansion of Nepals agricultural sectors, The
  study concluded that (t)rade reform also
  increases the leisure time of men (FG 2005)

20
Empirical evidence on GT

• Trade in services in the region is also seen to
  be linked to socially reproductive service
  womens migrant work

21
Gender and the success of trade and growth
strategies.

• Female employment in agriculture (mainly non
  traditional agricultural exportsLatin America
  and South Africa) and non-agriculture can lead to
  increase income in export oriented industries.
  (Frances Perkins found that a 1 increase in the
  share of exports in developing countries may be
  associated with a 0.2 increase in female non
  agricultural employment cited in UN 1995.)

22
Gender, trade and growth

• Gender, trade and growth contd.
• However, recent work on Taiwan, Hong Kong, South
  Korea and Mexico show a decline or reversal of
  womens share in manufacturesde-feminization.
  Gender and the success of trade and growth
  strategies.

23
Gender inequality and growth problems

• Micro economic empirical evidence and
  macroeconomic analysis indicates that gender
  inequality directly and indirectly limits
  economic growth, due to gender differences in
  economic options, incentives and productivity.

24

• Micro studies show that gender differences in
  access to assets limit the options of women
  gender differences in labor remuneration lead to
  conflict and affect labour allocation at the
  Household level gender difference in labor and
  other factor productivity limits economic
  efficiency and output.

• Macro economic analysis on the determination of
  growth. Findings in SSA gender differences in
  education and employment, 1960-92, served to
  reduce the annual per capita growth by 0.8
  percentage points (which it is argued could have
  double economic growth over the last 30 years).

25

• Gender inequality seems to account for 15-20 of
  the difference in growth performance between SSA
  and East Asia (Klasen 1999). Klasen argues that
  Uganda could gain up to 2 points of GDP growth
  per year through addressing structural gender
  based inequalities in education (total years of
  schooling) and in formal sector employment.
• The 2004 PEAP put this at 5 of GDP
• (Sources Gender and Growth Assessment Uganda.
  Feb. 1, 2005.)

26

• In linear programming models that examined the
  implication of change in gender division of
  labour on productivity of output, it was found
  that if gender roles in farming was abandoned,
  farm cash income would increase by about 10 and
  productivity of labour by 15 and capital by 45
  (Keller 1999 cited in Blacken).
• Gender roles are not economic efficient
  necessity for the liberalization of division of
  labour. Blackden

27

• Gender differential in education and health are
  not an efficient economic choice. Societies that
  under-invest in women pay a price for it in terms
  of slower growth and lower income. Dollar and
  Gatti Are Good times good for women? 1999

28
 Why is gender important in trade agreements and
policy?

• Gender analysis offers a more comprehensive,
  in-depth and deeply integrative approach to look
  at trade and development.
• Gender analysis as developed within the body of
  feminist economic analysis focuses on the
  intertwine between the household sector, the
  productive sector and the informal sector.

29
Specific gender and trade issue in South Asia

• Francisco and Durano the linkages between gender
  and trade in the Asia Pacific is clustered around
  five areas of concern
• 1. Womens livelihood and food security
  (linking Agricultural products to NAMA)
• 2.Womens employment, income, micro enterprises,
  and cross broader trade in terms of industry

30
Specific gender and trade issue in South Asia

• 3.Womens care work and access to care services
  together with issues relating to Mode VI of GATS
• 4. Women access to food and essential medicines
  (TRIPS)
• 5.Restrictions on domestic regulations that
  impacts governments ability to respond to rights
  and development issues (linkages to SDT, NTB,
  Implementation and Accession).

31
 Why is gender important in trade agreements and
policy?

• It seeks to explicitly pinpoint the transfer
  costs and adjustment burden associated with trade
  liberalization-induced trade reforms on the
  household economy, unpaid labor, and the overall
  economic empowerment of men and women.

32
 Why is gender important in trade agreements and
policy?

• it highlights the feedback effect between gender
  inequality and the performance of trade reform
  geared towards the promotion of trade
  liberalization.
• Current research on gender and trade, highlight a
  two-way intertwine between trade liberalization
  and gender trade liberalization can increase or
  decrease gender inequality and gender inequality
  can lead to trade liberalization not achieving
  the desired results.

33
 Why is gender important in trade agreements and
policy?

• Recognition of the underlying and existing gender
  realities in the economy should compel policy
  makers to also develop gender sensitive and
  anti-poverty complementary policies or flanking
  measures in the context of trade reform.

34
 Why is gender important in trade agreements and
policy?

• Such Measures include child care provisions,
  changing or revising land and property rights,
  providing incentives that allow credit
  institutions to lend to women borrowers and or
  building infrastructure (road, storage
  facilities) closers to where women producers are
  located.

35
Gender consideration is also important for the
success of trade and growth strategies.

• female employment in agriculture (mainly non
  traditional agricultural exportsLatin America
  and South Africa) and non-agriculture can lead to
  increase income in export oriented industries.
  (Frances Perkins found that a 1 increase in the
  share of exports in developing countries may be
  associated with a 0.2 increase in female non
  agricultural employment cited in UN 1995.)

36
Gender consideration is also important for the
success of trade and growth strategies.

• Joekes 1995, Standing 1989 and UN 1999 found that
  industrialization in NIEs (Taiwan, Hong Kong,
  South Korea and Singapore) is as much
  female-led (the feminization of export) as it is
  export-led. This supports observations that
  (t) employment of large numbers of women in the
  low-value chains of global production networks
  often provides the stepping stone for a systemic
  industrial strategy.

37
Gender and trade liberalisation II

• gender-differentiated impacts of the interplay
  between existing gender inequality and trade
  policies include
• gender specific effects of trade-induced
  fiscal adjustment
• gender specific effects of trade-induced
  employment effect
• gender effects of internal market adjustment.
•  

38
Trade liberalisation and womens well-being
empowerment

• Trade liberalization is associated with the
  intensification of competition between and within
  economies in the MTS. This is often played out at
  the sub national level in terms of industrial
  restructuring that creates tensions and dilemmas
  around

39
Tensions Dilemmas

• Poor and uneducated women versus middle and more
  educated women over jobs, with the latter losing
  ground in uncompetitive manufacturing sector
  while the former may be experiencing greater
  access to jobs in the emerging service

40
Tensions Dilemmas 2

• Regional competition between women. When
  regional trade arrangements as well as
  multilateral agreements divert trade from one
  region to another or among countries in a region,
  women in one sector, say textile, in one country
  or region may lose jobs to their counterparts in
  the same sector in another country or region

41
Tensions and Dilemmas 3

• Sustainability of income and livelihood.
• Threats to the sustainability of income and
  wages. Low wage bias plague women workers in the
  manufacturing sector and industrial agriculture.
  Increase international competition in these
  sectors have implications for womens long-term
  economic viability.

42
Tensions Dilemmas 4

• Empowerment.
• Jobs and income may increase some womens ability
  to participate in decision-making in the
  household especially around expenditure, savings
  and investment decisions.

43
Tensions Dilemmas 5

• This may bode well for improvement in childrens
  and womens access to health and education.

44
Tensions Dilemmas 6

• Perception of girls and women as liabilities
  versus assets to family may shift to more
  positive ones engendering more education for
  girls at all levels (primary, secondary and
  tertiary) and womens autonomy in personal
  matters as well as contribute to reduction in
  domestic violence.

45
Core Questions from gender sensitive approach

• Does trade policy and agreements promote better
  access to services that are essential for social
  reproduction and sexual and reproductive health
  (medicines, water, electrification/fuel,
  sanitation etc), particularly for groups that
  have been traditionally disadvantage or
  vulnerable to poverty?

46
Core question 2

• 2. What are the prevailing assumptions in making
  the linkage between trade policy, social and
  other policies in the formulation of trade
  policy, trade negotiations mandate and
  complementary trade support programs?

47
Core question contd

• 3. Are differences between women and men in terms
  of access to tangible (economic and social
  resource) and intangible assets taken into
  account in the implementation of trade policy and
  trade agreements?

48
Towards a sustainable gender sensitive trade

• At the national level
• Implement land reform for better access and
  entitlement to land, especially for women.
• Incorporate gender sensitive provisions in
  domestic regulatory framework for services
• Pay greater attention to decreasing wage
  disparities

49
Towards sustainable gender sensitive trade

• Create an adequate level of social
  protection/universal service provisos/ safeguard
  cross subsidization of services in rural areas
• Strengthen the visibility of womens and mens
  unpaid labour        Performance requirement for
  foreign service provider (Riddle). This will
  benefit women-owned and other SMEs.
• Employment and pay equity legislation (Riddle).

50
Towards sustainable gender sensitive trade

• More systematic national treatment of
  remittances offers steady income and better
  quality of life pull up effect on wages in home
  country and increase womens skill quotient
  benefit women directly contributes to
  infrastructure development and improvement in
  access of the poor to essential services
  (transportation, water, electricity, education
  and health care) and overall living standards
  (UNCTAD 2004)

51
Towards sustainable gender sensitive trade

• Upwards harmonization and safeguards of workers
  rights
• Gender equity and gender analysis and gender
  indicators in assessing benefit gains, costs and
  losses from trade
• The promotion of comprehensive approach to human
  rights in all bilateral, multilateral and
  regional trade agreements
• Gender sensitive trade related capacity building
• Gender sensitive export promotion

52
Summing up

• The role of womens and mens location and
  participation in the economy and how directional
  shifts in trade orientation and trade reform
  impacts on existing gaps in mens and womens
  differential access to resources and the labor
  market must be a critical factor in determining
  the effectiveness of trade to the economy in the
  medium and long term.

53

• Good practices that will promote benefits for
  women from trade (liberalisation) policy must
  start with a trade policy that is oriented
  towards poverty elimination and the promotion of
  gender equality as explicit objectives.

54

• It must be centred in a gender aware model of the
  economy that specifically incorporates the
  reproductive and informal sectors of the economy.
  

55

• This means that attention must be paid to the
  institutional factors that affect the supply and
  demand for womens labour. These would include

56

•   Mens and womens time allocation
•  Womens bargaining power and control of
  household resources land and income.

57

• Recognise and take action to mitigate the fact
  that the economic activities of women are
  constrained by technological disparities, factor
  market rigidity, information bias, and the inter
  sectoral mobility of resources.

58

• The above points to the need for supportive
  policies at national and sector levels to create
  and enabling condition for women and men to
  adjust to price incentives and other changing
  economic circumstance brought about by trade
  liberalisation.
•  

59

• This would include mechanisms to promote more
  gender sensitive expenditure allocations for
  skill development, and skill upgrading, day care
  and family assistance etc.