INTERNATIONAL LABOUR ORGANIZATION
	" Poverty anywhere is a threat to prosperity everywhere "

Capacity-building Programme on Gender, Poverty and Employment
 

One alarming trend about poverty is the increasing feminization of poverty. Indeed, in almost all regions of the world, women are disproportionately represented amongst the poor, and once in a situation of poverty, women find it more difficult to escape out of it.

One major factor explaining the feminization of poverty, is the prevailing gender-based discrimination in society at large, and in labour markets in particular. For various socio-cultural reasons, women find it more difficult to access jobs, especially good quality jobs, which is considered to be the most empowering and effective strategy to break out of poverty.

Drawing on the lessons of experience of the last three decades, the ILO has worked out a "Capacity-building Programme on Gender Poverty and Employment". This Programme, using a didactic methodology:

1. provides a synthesis of the main issues and trends in the area of gender, poverty and employment in all regions;
2. reviews strategies to eradicate poverty from a gender-sensitive perspective which have been put in place at the policy and programme level;
3. provides examples of success stories; and
4. distributes a guide for action in each of the following fields:
• Module 1: Poverty, employment and gender: Trends, issues and approaches: An overview
• Module 2: Access to assets
• Module 3: Investing in human capital: Focus on training
• Module 4: Financial resources for the poor: Focus on credit
• Module 5: Expanding wage employment opportunities
• Module 6: Extending social protection
• Module 7: Organizational and negotiating power: Ability to initiate change
• Module 8: Social funds
• Module 9: Future challenges

It is a practical tool which can be used in a flexible manner by policy makers, planners, programme managers, local government structures, employers' and workers' organizations, non-governmental associations, academics and research institutes, for developing a gender-sensitive approach to poverty eradication strategies. The strategies are centred around the triple objectives of:

1. enhancing women's access to quality employment opportunities;
2. strengthening their bargaining and negotiating power; and
3. providing innovative strategies for social protection, especially for less organized workers such as those engaged in the informal sector, homeworking, etc.

Publications

• ILO: Gender, Poverty and Employment: Turning Capabilities into Entitlements (1995) (available in English and Spanish).
• ILO: Gender, Poverty and Employment: A Capacity-building Programme for Employment Promotion, Gender Equality and Poverty Eradication (forthcoming 1999) (translation into Spanish, Arabic and French foreseen for 1999).

 
For further information, please contact the Development Policies Department (POLDEV)
at Tel: +41.22.799.6436, Fax: +41.22.799.6867, or E-Mail: poldev@ilo.org