Topic: 2024-Unpaid Care and Domestic Work
Country: Saudi Arabia
Delegate Name: Raj Bayyapuneedi
From cooking and cleaning, to fetching water and firewood or taking care of children and the elderly, women carry out at least three times more unpaid work than men. As a result, they have less time to work in paid labour, combining paid and unpaid labour. Women’s unpaid work subsidizes the cost of care that sustains families, supports economies and often fills in for the lack of social services. Yet, it is rarely recognized as work. Unpaid care and domestic work is valued to be 10 and 39 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and can contribute more to the economy than the manufacturing, commerce or transportation divisions. With the onslaught of climate change, women’s unpaid work in farming, gathering water and fuel is growing even more. Policies that provide services, social protection, basic infrastructure, promote sharing of domestic and care work between men and women, and create more paid jobs in the care economy, are urgently needed to accelerate progress on women’s economic empowerment.
According to the International Labor Organization, Women perform over 70% of unpaid labor hours at the international level.
When women lose their time to unpaid care work, they lack crucial time to increase sustainable productivity and better access markets; to know how to claim their rights, to participate in decision making and to rest. When women spend less time on unpaid care work, they have more time for paid work, farming, making improvements to their home or farm, socialising, participating in their community, advocating for their rights, taking a part in family and community decision-making, and resting.Globally, some progress on women’s rights has been achieved. In Saudi Arabia, the adolescent birth rate is 8.3 per 1,000 women aged 15–19 as of 2021, down from 8.65 per 1,000 in 2009.
This has historically always been a problem in Saudi Arabia. As of February 2024, only 19.9% of seats in parliament were held by women. As of Dec-20, only 36.9% of indicators needed to monitor the SDGs from a gender perspective were available, with gaps in key areas, in particular: violence against women, unpaid care and domestic work and key labour market indicators, such as the gender pay gap. In addition, many areas – such as gender and poverty, physical and sexual harassment, women’s access to assets (including land), and gender and the environment – lack comparable methodologies for reguar monitoring.However, we have allowed reform in recent years. We have expanded employment opportunities for women. In 2017, King Salman ordered that women should be allowed access to government services, such as education and healthcare, without needing consent from a male guardian. Closing these gender data gaps is essential for achieving gender-related SDG commitments in Saudi Arabia.
I want to pass new laws and legislation that promote equality for women. I want to close the pay gap. I want to split unpaid care and domestic work between men and women. I think that the United States, Egypt, Japan and Jordan should work together with me and share those same goals.
