Urgent Call for Investing in ‘Care Economy’ in the Caribbean
SANTIAGO, Chile –Ministers of Women’s Affairs and other delegates attending the 61st Meeting of the Presiding Officers of the Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean have made an urgent call for investing in the region’s “care economy.”
Raúl García-BuchacaWith emphasis on creating decent jobs for women, senior government officials, along with representatives of international organizations, academia, women’s and feminist organizations have called for moving towards “a care society to achieve a transformative and sustainable recovery with gender equality in the region,” according to the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC).
The three-day virtual conference, which concluded on Thursday, was organized by ECLAC in coordination with the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women).
ECLAC’s Deputy Executive Secretary Raúl García-Buchaca, speaking on behalf of Executive Secretary Alicia Bárcena, stressed that the COVID-19 crisis has “deepened gender inequalities in the region.
He said women are “overrepresented in unemployment, labor informality, poverty, domestic and care work, and on the front lines of response to the pandemic in the health sector.”
“It is worth noting that six out of every 10 women in the region are concentrated in high-risk sectors affected by the pandemic, such as manufacturing, commerce, paid domestic work and tourism,” said García-Buchaca, warning that “we are facing a paradox in the recovery.
“Even though a 2.2 percentage point increase can be seen in women’s labor participation rate, the projections for 2021 estimate that only men will return to pre-crisis levels, while women will scarcely reach the labor participation rate seen in 2008 (49.1%). We will still be at levels from 13 years ago,” he added.
García-Buchaca urged regional countries to “sustain expansionary fiscal policies and promote a new fiscal compact with gender equality in order to contain the impact of the crisis on women’s lives and be able to invest in a strategic and revitalizing sector, such as the care economy.
“The care society must be the horizon for a transformative and sustainable recovery, with gender equality,” he said. “We need an urgent shift in the development pattern to move towards a care society in which there is recognition of the interdependence of people; of productive processes and social reproduction; and that puts the sustainability of human life and that of the planet at the center.”
María-Noel Vaeza, Regional Director for the Americas and the Caribbean of UN Women, indicated that “the impact of the crisis continues to be patent, along with the disproportionate consequences for women and girls.
“That is why we must urgently incorporate gender equality and women’s participation into all recovery plans, into all decision-making processes aimed at comprehensive solutions for recovering from the pandemic, and also ensure that public policies are put in place that would facilitate the fulfillment of women’s human rights,” she said.
“We at UN Women, and ECLAC, have been insisting on public policies that would be capable of responding to the crisis of care, work that already fell disproportionately to women before the pandemic and in which the gap has widened,” Vaeza added.
“We believe that investment in care has a triple dividend: in human capital, in employment and in women’s participation in the working world,” she continued, stating that this is about “a new industry that requires quality jobs in order to leave behind the informality that characterizes the sector.”
In the same vein, A Mónica Zalaquett, Minister of Women’s Affairs and Gender Equity of Chile, in her capacity as chair of the Presiding Officers of the Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean, said: “We have been witness to the fragility of the achievements on gender equality that had cost us dearly to make,” alluding to the plunge in female labor participation, the “crisis of care” and the increase in violence against women.
“If the pandemic has left something positive behind, it is that it shed light on the relevance of care work, which historically has been rendered invisible, as the cornerstone of our societies,” she said.
“Only through an injection of resources in the care economy, that energizes it and ensures its sustainability, can we overcome the structural constraints of gender inequality and move towards a care society,” Zalaquett emphasized.
After the opening session, ECLAC said it presented the work document, “Towards a care society: The contributions of the Regional Gender Agenda to sustainable development”, which calls for accelerating the pace towards economic, climate and gender justice.
The document also calls for moving towards a care society that would “prioritize the sustainability of life and caring for the planet; guarantee the rights of people who need care and of those who give care; counteract the precariousness of jobs in the care sector; and render visible the multiplier effects of the care economy in terms of well-being and as a driving force for a transformative recovery with equality and sustainability.”
During the Meeting of the Presiding Officers, ECLAC said delegates worked on preparations for the 15th Regional Conference on Women in Latin America and the Caribbean, which will be held in Argentina in 2022.
