1. Promote women's economic rights and independence.

STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES:

You have the right to work and to freely choose your job. UDHR 23:1; ICESCR 6; ICERD 5e:i; CEDAW 11a; ERC 1b; EPC 2c

As far as possible, your state must take measures to enable you to have the freedom to choose employment as well as fair working conditions and social security. WFRC 4a,b

Part-time workers must receive the same protection as comparable full-time workers, and their wages must be calculated proportionately. PWC 4,5

You have the right to join or form trade unions. UDHR 23:4; ICCPR 22; ICESCR 8; ICERD 5e:ii

ACTIONS:

• Enact and enforce laws to guarantee the rights of women and men to equal pay for equal work.
  
  
• Establish labor laws which ensure protection of all women workers.
  
  
• Include a gender perspective on all economic restructuring.
  
  
• Help women gain equal access to resources, land and inheritance.
  

2. Give women equal access to resources, employment, markets and trade.

STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES:

You have the right to own, manage, acquire and dispose of goods, land, and other property. UDHR 17; CEDAW 16h; ICERD 5d:v

You have the right to bank loans, mortgages, and other forms of financial credit. CEDAW 13b

ACTIONS:

• Respect basic worker's rights including part-time, seasonal, migrant and home-based workers.
  
  
• Promote women's self-employment, small enterprises and cooperatives and develop financial support such as micro-credit schemes.
  
  

3. Provide business services, training, and access to markets,
information and technology, particularly to low-income women.

STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES:

As a rural woman, you have the right to agricultural credit and loans, marketing facilities, appropriate technology and equal treatment in land and agrarian reform. CEDAW 14:2g

ACTIONS:

• Provide business services, training and access to markets, information and technology, particularly to low-income women.
  
  
• Provide affordable child-care.
  
  
• Create a flexible work environment.
  
  

4. Strengthen women's economic capacity and commercial networks.

ACTIONS:

• Support indigenous women and traditional knowledge.
  
  
• Grant contracts on a non-discriminatory basis.
  
  

5. Stop all forms of discrimination in employment and occupational segregation.

STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES:

You have the same rights as men to work in fair and safe conditions and to be paid enough for an adequate standard of living supplemented by social protections if necessary. Women have the right to equal pay for equal work. UDHR 23:2,3; ICESCR 7a,b; ICERD 5e:i; CEDAW 11,14:2e; ERC 2:1; DC 2; CEDAW GR 13

Wages will be determined by an objective review of the work. ERC 3:1

Home workers are entitled to equal treatment as wage earners and should be included in labour statistics. HWC 4,6,7

ACTIONS:

• Discourage sexual harassment.
  
  
• Use collective bargaining to eliminate wage inequality and promote the election of women trade union officials.
  
  

6. Encourage harmony between work and family responsibilities for
women and men.

STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES:

Any worker who has dependent family members shall not be discriminated against on the basis of these responsibilities. WFRC 3:1

Your state must take measures to enable you to have community services such as child care and family services and facilities. CEDAW 11:2c; WFRC 5a,b

You have the right to maternity leave with pay or to adequate social security benefits without loss of former employment, seniority, or social allowances. ICESCR 10:2; CEDAW 11:2b; MPC 4

You are entitled to special protection at work if you are pregnant. CEDAW 11:2d

ACTIONS:

• Ensure that full-time and part-time work can be freely chosen by women and men on an equal basis.
  
  
• Support opportunities for women and men to take job-protected parental leave and benefits.
  
  ECONOMY: ACHIEVEMENTS
  
  
• Increased participation of women in the labour market leading to more economic autonomy.
  
  
• Some governments have introduced a variety of measures to address women’s economic and social rights, equal access to and control over economic resources and equality in employment.
  
  
• Some governments have ratified international labour conventions and enacted legislation to comply with them.
  
  
• Increased awareness of the need to reconcile employment and family responsibilities
  
  
• Governments have made provisions to address discriminatory and abusive behaviour in the workplace and prevent unhealthy working conditions.
  
  
• Funding mechanisms have been established to promote women’s entrepreneurship, education, science vocation, technical skills and decision-making roles.
  
  
• Research has been conducted on barriers to economic empowerment faced by women, including the relationship between paid and unpaid work.
  
  

ECONOMY: OBSTACLES

• The importance of a gender perspective in the development of macro-economic policy is not widely recognized.
  
  
• Many women work in rural areas and the informal economy as subsistence producers, and in the service sector with low levels of income and little job and social security.
  
  
• Women with comparable skills and experience are paid less than men and have less career mobility in the formal sector.
  
  
• Equal pay for women and men for equal work, or work of equal value, has not been fully realized.
  
  
• Persistence of gender discrimination in hiring and promotion and related to pregnancy, and sexual harassment in the work place.
  
  
• In some countries, women’s full and equal rights to own land and other property is not recognized.
  
  
• Lack of family-friendly policies regarding the organization of work and insufficient encouragement for men to reconcile professional and family responsibilities. Women bear a disproportionate burden in terms of care giving and other unpaid work.