THEME: Female poverty and workload is a factor in the transmission of poverty to the next generation.
Female-headed households (FHHs) constitute a significant proportion of households in some countries, such as Cambodia (35%) and in parts of Nepal. The out-migration of men is one major cause. Women remain as household heads and the main farmers. In many countries, such households are poorer than households with male heads. In Bangladesh, for example, FHHs constitute 16% of the landless and marginal households. In all, 96% of FHHs are poor, and 33% are hard-core poor. Whereas FHHs are usually smaller in countries such as the Philippines, Viet Nam and the Lao People's Democratic Republic, they are actually larger in countries such as Papua New Guinea and Mongolia. Women household heads are faced with constraints on all sides. Put succinctly, their situation is usually one of too many responsibilities and not enough time or help. They usually have less access to assets, lower educational levels, and more limited work opportunities. When they do obtain work, they earn less than do men. Poor rural women are usually self-employed or they work in the lowest-remunerated categories of casual wage labour. It has been estimated that female heads of households make up 60-70% of the total rural labour force. In Bangladesh, women's wages are 40% less than those of men, and in India, wage rates for women in agriculture were found to be 30-50% less than those for men. In the case of women heads of households who rely on farming for survival, their own time constraints and lack of access to animal draught power and to male labour (unless they have older sons or can pay for labour) place them at a severe disadvantage. IFAD's poverty assessment for Asia underlines the important implications of the gender-poverty issue for the next generation. Survival strategies for female-headed households, and often for poor male-headed households, usually deprive the girl child. China is one example of this, but not the only one. Although China has some outstanding achievements in terms of gender equality, when women's work burden increases owing to male out-migration, it is a common pattern for the elder daughter to drop out of school to help with domestic tasks and to care for her younger siblings. Girls may also help in the fields and with livestock. One statistic (from 1990, so somewhat dated) showed that 80% of the children who dropped out of school in China were girls. Most often these were in the poorer parts of the country, in the rural and mountainous areas, and among minority groups. Studies quoted by the IFAD assessment also show that intra-household allocation of food and health care in countries in the region often favours males, including male children over female children. The workload of FHHs has effects not only on the next generation of girl children, but often also on the next generation of boys. Like girls, boys also sometimes have to drop out of school to help their mothers with heavier work, or miss school during peak periods in agriculture. The IFAD poverty assessment notes the marginalization and poverty of rural youth, and the problem common to this region (and to others) of youth not wanting to work in agriculture, but having few other options because of their lack of education. The IFAD poverty assessment for the Asia and Pacific Region quotes research that indicates that persistence of poverty is high among many of the poor, especially among the very poor. Such individuals and households receive little benefit from broad-based growth or "trickle down" benefits. The chronically poor are characterized by low levels of education and, often, poor health. Therefore, women's poverty and excessive workload can become a factor in passing on poverty to the next generation. The inter-generational poverty cycle in this situation can be viewed as follows: 1. Poverty results in out-migration of men to seek employment. Development projects have tended to have a one-generation viewpoint, and have therefore paid inadequate attention to the next-generation implications of female poverty and female-headed households. The risks are often particularly great for the next generation of females. Measures to reduce women's workload and improve productivity are therefore important in helping female heads of households cope without excessive reliance on children's labour. Adapted from: IFAD/PI. 1999. Rural Poverty Assessment: Asia and the Pacific Region (Draft for Discussion). Rome: IFAD, September. |
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Poverty
in Asia and the Pacific is primarily a rural problem. With the exception
of Mongolia, the majority of the poor in other countries live in rural
areas. IFAD's 1999 rural poverty assessment for Asia and the Pacific Region
recognizes the feminization of rural poverty and notes two key dimensions: