GoU-UN Deliver as One on Gender Equality & Economic

Growth

Buyana Kareem, PhD

TA-National Planning at UN Women, Uganda

UNDAF Workshop Protea Hotel, Entebbe

Rationale of the presentation

At the end of the presentation, we shall learn:

1. Whether gender equality should be central to transformational development?

2. What we loose and gain from gender equality in economic/competitive terms?

3. What we loose and gain from gender equality in sustainability terms?

4. What are the issues for take-up if GoU and UN are to deliver as one gender equality and economic growth?

Transformational Development: What DO Ugandans ASPIRE FOR , GRADUAL OR RAPID TRANSFORMATION? Robust – faster improvement in national incomes,

wedged employment and quality of public services

Resilient – able to survive/cope with uncertainty and vulnerability to disasters

Inclusive – priorities chosen by government are the priorities for all, gains made are gains beneficial to all

Is gender equality an essential part of transformation development? Policy issues Women constitute not less than half of our national population and labour

force, so neglecting their needs means sidelining half of the population and this makes plans non-inclusive.

International instruments including CEDAW (1979), Beijing +20, UN Millennium Declaration (2000) and the post-2015 development agenda.

The National Gender Policy (2007) and the National Planning Authority Act (2002) require gender responsive national and sector development plans.

These frameworks make gender equality concerns legally binding for all stakeholders in transformational development.

But is this convicting enough to prioritize gender But is this convicting enough to prioritize gender equality given the diverse and competing demands equality given the diverse and competing demands on our journey to transformation?on our journey to transformation?

5

What we loose and gain from gender equality in economic/competitive

terms?

The Gender Equality Situation in Uganda Women and men have equal representation in electoral politics and

commissioned ranks in state institutions with attendant laws and policies on gender equality

enrollment in primary school stands at 93.0%, but 1 in every 5 girls gets to complete school with good grades compared to 3 in every 5 boys.

6 out of every 10 women are either micro-business employees or subsistence farmers; and 42% of women’s labour is unpaid family work; and 88% of men’s labour is formal.

60% of women in Uganda and 59% of married women, have experienced physical violence since age fifteen mostly perpetuated by their intimate partner, currently costing households USD 6.3 million per year in out-of-pocket expenses.

Women have a presence of 70 to 80% in non-monetized agriculture, which accounted for 39.0% of agricultural value added in 2011; and men occupy 70% of the monetized agricultural jobs (extension services, processing, transportation, export)

Men access 91% of commercial credit and women access 9%, despite a reasonably sound financial sector with commercial banks’ total assets growing by 15% per year

In tourism-based industries, women account for 12.4% of the labour force and men constitute 16%, yet the sector contributes 6.6% of total employment and has grown by 20.6% since 2011

Women make up between 40 and 100 percent of the workforce in artisanal and small-scale mining and are mostly part-time workers, relegated to labor-intensive processing activities, with direct exposure to dangerous substances; men constitute 50 to 70% of the workforce in large-scale mining operations.

Investment in quality reproductive health services for women is low, making preventable child and maternal mortality reoccur at undesired rates (maternal mortality ratio in Uganda increased from 435 per thousand live births in 2005 to 438 in 2011, way above the MDG target of 131)

1 in 3 rural Ugandans can access an all-season community-access road, which tying up women’s & men’s agricultural produce, limits more frequent and less costly visits to health and education centers

Water production stands at 77.7 million cubic meters and supply has registered an increment of 11% but water-related hazards, such as early flash floods and long periods of droughts, are still driving up the price of staple foods and women are the least able to cope due to dependence on traditional farming practices

What we loose in economic/competitive terms Economic growth rises but remains below potential and therefore not robust

enough to foster the dramatic transformation we target in the next NDPs:

1. Gender inequalities, for example, fewer girls than boys completing school, reduce the average level of Uganda's human capital (% of population healthy and skilled).

2. Reoccurrence of high child and maternal mortality perpetually puts pressure on public expenditure, thereby lowering a country’s ability to borrow less and invest

3. Gender-based constraints, e.g. violence against children (VAC) and violence against women (VAW), limit growth in household revenues and assets by lowering girls’ years of schooling and women’s participation in productive work

4. Increased female education and employment accounts for 0.4 to 0.9 percentage point differences in annual per capita growth rates between East Asia and sub-Saharan Africa.

5. Gender gaps in access as to agricultural resources reduces production on women's farms by 20 to 30 percent, and could reduce total agricultural production in Uganda by 2.5 to 4 percent

What we gain in economic/competitive terms? Reversing these gender inequalities can potentially increase

Uganda’s GDP growth by 2 percentage points per year

A study undertaken in Tanzania in 1994 showed that reducing gender-based constraints in a community of smallholder coffee and banana growers increases household cash incomes by 10%, labor productivity by 15%, and capital productivity by 44%13.

More education & economic participation by women has increased “assortative mating” IN EUROPE

Notes: Equivalent household earnings are the sum of gross earnings from all household members, corrected for differences in household size with an equivalence scale (square root of household size).Source: OECD (2011), Divided We Stand (www.oecd.org/els/social/inequality)

Public investment in formal childcare can help generate high participation rates

Proportion of children aged less than 6 enrolled in formal childcare, 2008Public expenditure in formal childcare, 2007

Notes: Numbers do not reflect the intensity of participation; each child is counted regardless of hours of participation.Source: OECD Family database (www.oecd.org/social/family/database)

Childcare is a key driver of female labour supply and reduces pay gaps

The OECD gender report shows: Higher enrolment in formal childcare increases female employment on a full-time and part-time basis, and reduces pay gaps.

Increasing public spending on childcare does not necessarily lead to more PT employment as it facilitates moving into FT work and/or increases quality of care but not care-hours per week.

Source: OECD family database

AUS

AUT

BEL

CAN

CZE

DEU

DNK

FIN

GBR

IRL

JPN

KOR

NOR

NZL

SVK

USA

R² = 0.564

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

0 20 40 60 80Enrolment rates of children in formal care, 2008 %

Gender pay gap age 30-34 %

Gender pay gaps and enrolment rates in formal childcare 2008*

Countries with smaller gender gaps in unpaid work have higher female employment rates.

Unpaid work and female employment rates, recent years

AUS

AUTBELCAN

CHN DNK

EST

FINFRA DEU

HUN

IRLITA

JPN

KOR

MEX

NLD NZL

NOR

POL PRT

SVNZAF ESP SWE

TUR

GBR

USAAUS

AUTBEL

CAN

CHN

DNKESTFIN

FRADEU

HUN IRLITA

JPNKOR

MEXNLD

NZL NORPOL

PRT

SVN

ZAF

ESP SWE

TURGBR

USA

0

100

200

300

400

500

20 30 40 50 60 70 80Women employment rate, %

Minutes of unpaid work per day

Female: R² = 0.43 Male: R² = 0.21

The Chinese Case:

Rapid economic growth has lifted more than 400 millions of people out of poverty and substantially improved the living standards of Chinese people.

Rising Human Development Index

China's Human Development Index, 1975 - 2008

0.53 0.5330.556

0.608

0.657

0.7190.756 0.763 0.772

0.793

0.40.450.5

0.550.6

0.650.7

0.750.8

0.85

1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2006 2007 2008

Year

HD

I

Rising gender inequalities in the labor market

Rising gender gaps in labor force participation

Urban female labor force participation rates, 1993, 2000, 2006

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

16-25 26-35 36-45 46-55 56-65 65 +

Age

%

1993

2000

2006

Urbam males' labor force participation rates, 1993, 2000, 2006

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

16-25 26-35 36-45 46-55 56-65 65 +

Age

%

1993

2000

2006

Source: CHNS

A growing number of urban workers, predominately women, have been pushed into the informal sector (Yuan and Cook

2010) Share of informal employment, 1997-2006

20.5

24.2

33.9

39.9

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

Male Female

%

1997

2006

Source: CHNS

What do we lose or gain in sustainability terms? Gender inequality substantially lessens the resilience of economies and

increases the cost of adaptation and conflict resolution:

If women’s dependence on traditional farming practices and biomass fuels for home-food production continues unreserved, climatic risks including drought will heighten, which by 2100 could cost Africa about $350 billion a year to adapt its infrastructure and food systems

The development of mineral wealth−without special attention to gender and other human rights issues−can blur the promise of accelerated economic growth while increasing public expenditure on resolving complex civil conflicts; yet the current situation of war in Africa lowers GDP per capita by 2.2% points annually.

Gender inequality in education and employment worsens income inequality by class, region and community, thereby increasing the risk of violence and crime

Issue for take-up if GoU and UN are to deliver as one Gender equality is a cross-cutting issue in policy terms

But evidence demonstrates that gender equality is a cross-cutting enabler in economic and sustainability terms:

1. Better-informed mothers – lower child mortality rates and malnutrition – less pressure on public and household expenditure.

2. Rise in educated women – feminization of the labour force - lowers fertility rates and dependency ratios

3. Norway, which is often referred to as the prime example of a country that has achieved high growth rates with less inequality, spends part of her mineral revenues on quality education and health services for women and girls; and strengthening the quality of its governance systems

Gender inequality is a structural bottleneck for countries that seek robust, resilient and inclusive transformation