Gender gap in Lanka’s labour market: UNDP

Sri Lanka’s labour market contains wide gender inequalities according to the recent report released by the United Nations Development Fund (UNDP) on the Gender Dimensions of the Millennium Development Goals in Sri Lanka.

Although women have significantly contributed to the country’s economic growth and migrant workers are a major source of foreign exchange, the majority of women are employed in low skilled jobs and in the informal sector, outside the protection of labour legislations moving from one low income low skill occupation to another or confined to unpaid family labour in agriculture, the report revealed.

In the garment industry where the majority are women employees, 80% of the factory workers are women, concentrated at the bottom of the employment structure in semi-skilled jobs without job security and opportunity for upward occupational mobility while 70% of those employed at management, technical and supervisory jobs are men.

In foreign employment, two thirds of migrant workers are women and 80% of the women are domestic workers who contribute substantially to the country’s foreign exchange earnings and to household income, but are often exposed to economic exploitation, physical assault and sexual abuse in the absence of adequate protection in their workforce.

Of 230,963 people who departed for foreign employment in 2005, 136,998 were women, out of which 125,054 were housemaids. Only 6757 females departed for skilled jobs in 2005 in contrast to 38,833 men. Women are also under-represented at senior decision-making levels, both in the public and private sector while women’s participation in the political sector is also low.

The unemployment rates of women have been double that of men with 11.9% of those unemployed being women in contrast to 5.5% of men. The rate of female participation in the labour force stood at 30.9% when compared to 67.1 male participation.

The report is a joint production of the National Council for Economic Development (NCED), UNDP and Centre for Women’s Research (CENWOR).