More women at work, but inequality persists: ILO
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-03-12 14:26

Women of the world have never worked as much, but are still saddled with wage inequality, rampant unemployment, poverty and precarity, says the International Labor Organization (ILO).

A report prepared for International Women's Day on Monday reveals that for all the 1.208 billion women across the globe who are economically active, 'true equality in the world of work is still out of reach'.

Global Employment Trends For Women 2004 finds more women at work than ever before -- 200 million more than in 1993 -- representing 40 per cent of the workforce.

The report says: 'Never before have so many women been economically active.... Still, in no region of the world is the gender gap anywhere near to be closed.'

Women on the whole are most affected by unemployment -- 6.4 per cent to men's 6.1 per cent in global statistics -- except in sub-Saharan Africa and East Asia.

But in those developing areas, according to the ILO, the numbers mask the precarious reality that women cannot afford not to work, and that their challenge was not in procuring employment, but decent employment.

Much of women's labour there is in informal sectors like agriculture, which offer little to no welfare benefits but tremendous vulnerability.

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'Whereas men are more likely to be hired in core or regular and better-paid positions, women are increasingly being hired in peripheral, insecure, less-valued jobs, including home-based, casual or temporary work. These jobs are normally characterised by very low pay, irregular income, little or no job or income security and lack of social protection,' the ILO summed up.

For women aged 15 to 24, the situation is more dire: at 35.8 million, they make up nearly half of all women who are involuntarily unemployed.

'Being female and being young can represent a double source of discrimination. Young women appear to have the greatest difficulty in entering the labour market and retaining their jobs in periods of economic downturn,' the report says.

Women make up 60 per cent of the working poor, it continues.

Despite their economic activity, 330 million of them cannot pull themselves above the dollar-a-day threshold that for many aid groups is a benchmark for poverty.

Equal wages for equal work remains an elusive goal across the board, the ILO also found.

'Women everywhere typically receive less pay than men,' its report reads, noting that at best, women could gain 90 per cent of a man's salary for identical tasks and lost out even in 'typically female' professions like nursing and teaching.

Only concerted government effort will help to combat inequality and ease the deadly insecurity which plagues millions of female workers, according to the Geneva-based UN organisation.

'Raising incomes and opportunities for women lifts whole families out of poverty and drives economic and social progress', ILO Director-General Juan Somavia said in a communique released on Friday.

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