Carrying the Burden
|
by supmarilore
CC-Lizenz |
Today over 1.5 billion people live on less than one dollar a day, a majority of whom are female. Experts are now speaking of the "feminization of poverty." This trend is due primarily to the discrimination deeply imbedded in the social fabric of many societies that hinders women from accessing power and education. Women are relegated to the household and are given little opportunity or tools for mobility. Two-thirds of the children not in school are girls. Instead, these girls are at home doing housework, looking after small children or already married themselves.
Outside of the household women face many risks, including gender-based violence, which makes moving around outside of one's home quite dangerous for women. Increasingly, women are taking on dangerous jobs, such as working with unsafe chemicals and technologies.
Finally, when women do work outside of the household, their livelihoods tend to be less secure than men's, so women and their dependents are vulnerable to sudden crises and repeated periods of impoverishment. |
| News and Events | | | | | |
| Women, Development, and Poverty |
| AIC Assembly on Women and Poverty
On 9 March 2007, 350 AIC volunteers (International Association of Charities) from 50 countries met in Rome for a 5-day meeting with the theme: "Women and Poverty--Diversity of Cultures."
Find out more and read the speeches at the website of [AIC] |
All these factors lead women to often become trapped in a cycle of poverty that reproduces itself through the generations.
Not only do women bear a disproportionate burden of the world's poverty, but in some cases, globalization has widened the gap, with women losing a majority of jobs, benefits and labor rights. There has been little relief for women, as the tax systems, economic policies and the dominant economic institutions fail to take gender disparities into account, often turning a blind eye. With too few seats at the tables where economic decisions are made, women themselves have little chance of rectifying the deepening of existing inequalities.
The effects of poverty differ between men and women. Poverty is particularly destructive of women's health, especially their reproductive and sexual health, which are only exacerbated when they are ignored because they are considered less important than other family matters. In addition, malnutrition disproportionately affects women and girls because they are often the last to eat in the family. In the struggle to escape poverty, girls may be sold into prostitution by their families and women are sometimes forced to prostitute themselves for money.
The Beijing Platform
Recognizing that women suffer the burden of poverty disproportionately, the Beijing Platform for Action (1995) urges the international community in all sectors to:
- Shape macroeconomic policies and development strategies to address the needs and efforts of women in poverty;
- Revise laws and administrative practices to ensure women’s equal rights and access to economic resources;
- Give women access to banking, savings and credit mechanisms and institutions;
- Conduct research to discover the causes, effects and possible cures for the "feminization of poverty".
In the past decade the number of women living in poverty has increased disproportionately to the number of men, particularly in the developing countries. In addition to economic factors, the rigidity of socially ascribed gender roles and women's limited access to power, education, training and productive resources . . . are also responsible....While poverty affects households as a whole, because of the gender division of labour and responsibilities for household welfare, women bear a disproportionate burden, attempting to manage household consumption and production under conditions of increasing scarcity.
Beijing Platform for Action, paragraphs 48 and 50
Resources
In this section we have compiled a list of resources, organizations, campaigns and literature to keep you informed on the issue of women in poverty and development. You can skip directly to the following:
Introduction
Oxfam
A comprehensive page with FAQs to poverty and gender inequality
United Nations
Fact Sheet on the Feminization of Poverty
Women & the Economy
Introduction to women and poverty in Canada
Women's Health USA
Introduction and statistics to female poverty in the United States
Official Documents
United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women Platform for Action
Beijing, China - September 1995. Action for Equality, Development and Peace
Organizations
Association for Women's Rights in Development (AWID)
International organization committed to gender equality and just sustainable development
The Hunger Project
Works to end hunger worldwide. Self-stated priority is the empowerment of women
International Women's Development Agency
Australian-based NGO supporting women suffering from poverty and oppression worldwide
Legal Momentum
Focuses mainly on poverty and other women's rights issues in the United States
Network Women in Development Europe (WIDE)
Monitors and influences international economic and development policy and practice from a feminist perspective
UNFPA
Works to implement the Beijing Platform of Action
UNIFEM
Works to reduce women's poverty and exclusion
USAID Women in Development
US Agency for International Development site dedicated to women
Women's World Banking
A network that gives the world's poorest entrepreneurs the means to lift themselves out of poverty by providing them with access to financial service and information
Recommended Literature
"Breaking the Chains: Eliminating Slavery, Ending Poverty" (PDF)
Report by the Department for International Development (DFID), UK
"Development has a Woman's Face | Insights from Within the UN" (Abstract as a .doc)
Written by Dr. Krischna Ahoojapatel, President of the NGO Committee on the Status of Women
Farmer, Paul, Margaret Connors, Janie Simmons (eds.). "Women, Poverty and AIDS: Sex, Drugs and Structural Violence." Common Courage Press. September 2006.
"The 'Feminization of Poverty' and Women's Human Rights"
UNESCO paper, July 2005
"Pro-Poor Growth and Gender Inequality: Insights from new Research" (PDF)
Article by Stephan Klassen in the UNDP International Poverty Centre's Journal Poverty in Focus
"Women's Economic Empowerment: Meeting the Needs of Impoverished Women" (PDF)
Publication by UNFPA, 2007
<< top
Aktualisiert: 30.08.2007, kra
