Presented by Marilyn Carr, Senior Economic Advisor
United Nations Development Fund of Women

Roundtable during International Women's Week, sponsored by the Women in Development and Gender Equity Division, Policy Branch, CIDA
Ottawa, March 10th 1998

1. The Context of Globalization
2. The Asian Financial Crisis
3. Conventional solutions
4. What are women's own responses?


The Context of Globalization

Globalization means many things to many people. At its simplest, it is about footloose corporations taking investment wherever labour is cheapest and most productive, and it is about the growing plight of unskilled labour. Much of the world's cheap labour is female, and in the case of Asia, much of the export-led economic boom of the past decade has literally been on the backs of women. (Interestingly, recent research by Diane Elson and others suggests that countries such as Pakistan - where women have been less able to enter the workforce - have been less able to seize growth opportunities presented by trade liberalization than have those such as Bangladesh - where thousands of women have entered factories producing garments for export). This rapid growth has provided many new jobs for women. They are badly paid, working conditions are not good and there are few if any benefits and rights for workers, but at least it is better than existing alternatives, and undoubtedly, life has been better for many Asian women and their families as a result of rapid growth. However, women's hold on these jobs can be short lived as capital moves on when ever it needs to in order to find even cheaper labour and to maximize profits. There are many examples of companies such as NIKE moving from country to country and leaving thousands of women unemployed. Wages are driven to a minimum with the result that there are startling statistics such as that of NIKE which pays Michael Jordan more to advertise its products than it pays its entire South East Asian workforce in one year.


The Asian Financial Crisis

The recent Asian financial crisis is an unintended impact of globalization and has resulted in part from too much money being thrown at the region so that investments have been made in less and less productive ventures. Much has been said about the financial aspects of the crisis, but there is little said about the social impacts, and even less about the specific gender aspects of this.

One major impact of the crisis is the rapid increase in unemployment as hundreds of small and large firms across the region have been forced to close their doors. Estimates include: the loss of 2 to 3 million jobs in Indonesia in the next year; the loss of 5000 jobs in one week in Malaysia; an estimated loss of 11 million jobs in China in 1998 if it does not devalue; and scores of small and medium industries closing daily in South Korea. Women have often been the first workers to be laid off - both because the industries in which they predominate (e.g. garments) are those most affected by the crisis and because women are less unionized and therefore easier to sack. The unemployment situation is being aggravated by increasing numbers of returning migrant labourers who are being expelled by countries which now have their own unemployment problems. There are thought to be in excess of 7 million migrant workers in Asia - many of whom are women. Reports include that Thailand is sending back 800,000 Burmese migrants workers and Malaysia is considering returning one million workers to Bangladesh and the Philippines. In most cases, unemployment is immediate and without compensation causing obvious distress for workers and their families.

Another impact is that of rising prices for foodstuffs and other basic commodities caused partly by increasing costs of imports, but compounded in many countries such as Indonesia by the effects of El Nino which has badly affected domestic food crops and driven up the prices of domestic food supplies. In addition, some governments have cut price subsidies on basic commodities as they have struggled to cope with the financial crisis. For example, Indonesia has cut subsidies on beans, sugar, flour, electricity and fuel. Loss of income, combined with price increases has led to widespread panic and social unrest in the region, and women - who have primary responsibility for balancing household budgets - have been the ones most directly affected by the changes. Women and girls are also more likely to go short of food than are men and boys.

Other impacts are perhaps less obvious. Research on patterns of expenditure in Asia show that one of the main things on which women have spent their newfound income has been school fees for girls. One can anticipate, therefore, that widespread cuts in women's income will result in cutbacks in girls' education with obvious adverse implications for the future well being of Asian economies. With respect to health, the rising prices of inputs for local pharmaceutical industries is leading to closures with resulting lack of essential drugs and inability to treat even the most basic health problems.


Conventional solutions

Some of the measures being suggested by the IMF and other international bodies are as likely to aggravate the social situation as they are to improve it. For example, the suggested solution of cuts in public expenditure on things such as health services would bring even more hardships, especially for women who have primary responsibility for care of the family. In addition, some governments are considering introducing measures which would cut the power of the unions even further so that wages can be driven even lower in an attempt to attract new foreign investment. In the current circumstances, this is unlikely to prove a viable solution.


What are women's own responses?

That women are anxious to take a lead in doing something about the crisis has been evident from their leadership role in the various initiatives throughout the region to surrender personal stocks of gold and foreign exchange to try to protect local currencies. But what else are women doing - or hoping to do - that would enable them to contribute to overcoming the worst effects of the Asian crisis; and - in the longer term - what is their role in guarding against the disadvantages of globalization and of seizing the opportunities involved?

Over the years, as companies have attempted to cut costs by sub-contracting work, the number of home-based workers in the region has increased by leaps and bounds. Most of these home-based workers are women, and many have now formed themselves into national associations in an attempt to bargain for better wages and working conditions. These nascent associations are an obvious source of information on how women workers in the region are being affected by the crisis and are attempting to cope with it. Initial responses from the associations indicate that many garment and footwear factories have closed as a result of rising prices of imported inputs. As a consequence, the amount of subcontracting has decreased and many home-based workers are without work and have no income. In an attempt to earn some income, many women are trying to diversify into alternative forms of self-employment such as horticulture, but they often lack the necessary technical skills to do so and have great difficulty in getting access to training or to credit. Many therefore are forced to settle for easy entry activities such as vending, but this generates very little return indeed. There is reported to be a great need to increase the access of women to credit and to generate ideas on what products women could diversify into in order to reach emerging markets. In schemes which are introduced to cope with the crisis, there will need to be careful attention given to enabling women to have equal access with men to opportunities provided in terms of credit, training, and market information.

In the longer term, women's organizations such as the associations of home-based workers can also play a role in the overall context of globalization. While labour remains unorganized, then capital will continue to be able to exploit workers by continuously moving from countries which are attempting to raise wages and working conditions to those where no such attempts are being made. The only effective way to deal with this would be to have global alliances of workers which would mean that corporations would be unable to make countries compete with each other to attract foreign investment.

Again, women are taking the lead in this respect. For example, many of the national associations of home-based workers have federated themselves into regional associations, and more recently, an international association - HomeNet - has been established. This international network - which grows out of the work of the Self Employed Women's Association (Gujurat, India) has strong branches in South and South East Asia, in Europe and in Canada, and is now seeking to build its membership in Latin America and Africa. At the moment, it is organized along geographic lines, but is now also seeking to organize around trades, so that eventually there will be global alliances of embroiderers, football makers, etc. The purpose of these alliances is: a) to increase the visibility of otherwise invisible workers and to thus increase the understanding of how large their numbers are; and b) to give an organized platform from which workers can bargain internationally for their rights. The issue of size and visibility is becoming more important as the numbers of home-based workers are expanding with increased globalization. No one knows exactly how many homebased workers there are in the world, but estimates include 40 million in China and 30 million in India. In other words, the numbers are large - too large to be ignored - and they are growing. In order to overcome some of the statistical problems in enumerating homebased workers, UNIFEM the UN Statistical Division and several other international agencies are working together to improve methods by which they can be counted in official statistical surveys. On the issue of an international bargaining platform, HomeNet has already succeeded in getting through the ILO a Convention on Homebased workers - the first ever Convention for workers outside of the formal sector. This is a major victory and one which bodes well for action by informal sector workers on the international front. Following on this success, other alliances of informal sector workers are now being formed. These include the International Alliance of Street Vendors which again has a predominately female membership. These are the Trade Unions of the future and are what promise to hold the transnational corporations accountable for their conduct.

Many other trade groups are being, or could be organized on a global basis. These and the existing alliances such as HomeNet need to be provided with assistance of various types by international agencies and donors. For example, there is a need for support with organizing and networking activities, training of members in advocacy and negotiating skills and business and technical skills, and provision of information and services needed - for example - to link directly with emerging markets. With respect to the latter type of assistance, UNIFEM has already started undertaking a series of international market research investigations on behalf of rural women producer groups, including shea nut collectors in West Africa, fish processors in South East Asia, and gum collectors in Africa and India.

Competing with globalization of markets and the economy will require the globalization of labour. In support of this is also required coordinated support on behalf of international agencies and donors. To promote this, a new alliance - Women in Informal Employment: Globalizing and Organizing (WIEGO) has just been formed with participation of several UN and international organizations, academics and grassroots membership organizations. This brings together research/statistics and international policy agencies in a forum in which they can listen to the voices and needs of women workers and translate these into policy and programmes, thus helping to strengthen and support women's own responses to globalization. CIDA's own paper on Globalization and Gender has drawn attention to the fact that 'globalization implies a shift in power from mediating institutions defined in terms of nation states to those defined by the international market. In the past, gains made by more vulnerable groups often were due to the creation or realignment of mediating institutions'. Organizations such as HomeNet and the International Alliance of Street Vendors hold out much promise in terms of being the new mediating institutions. Support to such organizations - either independently or preferably in coordination with other agencies through alliances such as WIEGO - could do much in terms of helping women in their efforts to eradicate poverty.

Finally, since this roundtable is being held during International Women's Week, I would like to take the opportunity to point out the many battles which the strong international women's movement has fought and won on behalf of women and society as a whole. However, these have been mainly around social issues. There is obviously now a need to turn our attention much more to organizing women around economic issues internationally. As episodes such as the Asian Crisis point out, this increasingly is the new battlefield.

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