The ManicaPost
The Covid-19 pandemic threatens to roll back gains in women’s economic opportunities, widening gender gaps that persist despite 30 years of progress.
Well-designed policies to foster recovery can mitigate the negative effects of the crisis on women and prevent further setbacks for gender equality. What is good for women is ultimately good for addressing income inequality, economic growth, and resilience.
Why has Covid-19 had disproportionate effects on women and their economic status? There are several reasons.
First, women are more likely than men to work in social sectors — such as services industries, retail, tourism, and hospitality — that require face-to-face interactions. These sectors are hit hardest by mitigation measures.
In the United States, unemployment among women was two percentage points higher than men between April-June 2020.
Because of the nature of their jobs, teleworking is not an option for many women. Globally, about 54 percent of women working in social sectors cannot telework.
In Brazil, it is 67 percent. In low-income countries, at most only about 12 percent of the population is able to work remotely.
Second, women are more likely than men to be employed in the informal sector in low-income countries. Informal employment — often compensated in cash with no official oversight — leaves women with lower pay, no protection of labour laws, and no benefits such as pensions or health insurance.
The livelihoods of informal workers have been greatly affected by the Covid-19 crisis. In Colombia, women’s poverty has increased by 3,3 percent because of the shutdown in economic activities.
The UN estimates that the pandemic will increase the number of people living in poverty in Latin America and the Caribbean by 15,9 million, bringing the total number of people living in poverty to 214 million, many of them women and girls.
Tackling the challenges
Austria, Italy, Portugal, and Slovenia have introduced a statutory right to (partially) paid leave for parents with children below a certain age, and France has expanded sick leave to parents impacted by school closures if no alternative care or work arrangements can be found.
Latin American women leaders have established the “Coalition of Action for the Economic Empowerment of Women” as part of a wider whole-of-government effort to increase women’s participation in the post-pandemic economic recovery.
In Togo, 65 percent of participants in a new mobile cash-transfer programme are women. The programme enables informal workers to receive grants of 30 percent of minimum wage.
As part of interventions to compensate for loss of income during the Covid-19 lockdown periods, the Zimbabwe Government unveiled a $600 million facility for SMEs, youths, women and the elderly.
The Government also rolled out cash transfers to cover one million poor and vulnerable households, many of which are women-headed. It also offered allowances and other incentives to the front-line health workers, most of whom are women.
Over the longer term, policies can be designed to tackle gender inequality by creating conditions and incentives for women to work.
These include gender-responsive fiscal policies such as investing in education and infrastructure, subsidising childcare, and offering parental leave. These policies are not only crucial to lift constraints on women’s economic empowerment, they are also necessary to promote an inclusive post-Covid-19 recovery. — imf.org.
