Coronavirus: Asian women pay the price of pandemic as Covid-19 ravages economies, jobs
- Gender inequality is on the rise amid the pandemic, with women disproportionately affected by job losses and the poverty that results
- Some high-flying executives see the crisis as an opportunity for reform, but observers say governments need to do more to bridge the gender divide
She had run the restaurant’s day-to-day operations for more than a year and was looking forward to working with its new owners, until they suddenly withdrew their bid to buy the place and she was abruptly let go, along with the rest of the staff.
The 54-year-old mother of three has been unable to find work since, which has been devastating for her as a single parent, because “it’s always been and always will be important for me to have a stable income,” she said.
Around the world, women like de Guzman are being forced to bear the brunt of Covid-19’s social and economic consequences. A rising number have been forced into unemployment either by the pandemic or the measures put in place to curb its spread, with many of the hardest-hit industries – such as food, retail and entertainment – composed of workforces that are mostly female. Not only that, but about 70 per cent of health workers and first responders worldwide are women, too.
Scholars and researchers predict that the pandemic and its aftermath will roll back the economic gains made by women over the past few decades and reinforce existing disparities. Most governments in Asia have done little so far to pre-empt or tackle the challenges faced by their female populations.
Nott said the proportion of Hong Kong’s women who have jobs was already lower than most of its Asian neighbours and “without concerted action to address the inequalities arising out of Covid-19, [the city’s] female workforce participation rate is at risk of lagging even further behind.”
Financial and job instability will continue to raise the risk factors associated with domestic violence, she said, adding that certain groups of women, such as single mothers and those in low income households, have had added pressures as well as health risks.
“The majority of women will have less power to negotiate terms of employment and wages due to the economic situation,” she said. “We know that women have taken on more of the care roles at home during the crisis, and that has affected their employment opportunities and wages.”
Davies said women had also been disproportionately affected by a lack of employment opportunities in the informal economy, which constitutes a substantial and important portion of the labour force in the Asia-Pacific.
Almost 510 million women, or 40 per cent of all those employed worldwide, work in sectors hit hard by the pandemic, according to an International Labour Organisation estimate. The figure for men is 36.6 per cent.
A recent study from the US-based non-profit organisation Women in Informal Employment: Globalizing and Organizing (WIEGO) showed “a grim global picture of workers reporting they were completely out of work, with zero earnings at the height of their cities’ lockdowns”.
ANXIOUS MUMS
The 28-year-old said that if she budgeted carefully, the money she used to earn would be “just enough” to live in the Vietnamese capital with her 5-year-old son. After being fired, however, she was forced to return to her hometown in Dien Bien province, some 500km away.
“I had to leave my son with my parents because I couldn’t afford for him to live in Hanoi,” Huyen said.
In April, she returned to the city alone and was able to find teaching work again – though only for one hour a day, instead of her previous three – but it was not long before another wave of infection forced all yoga centres to close again in July.
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Even when they were open, the centres she worked at would prioritise retaining male teachers “because men’s strength is better than women’s”, Huyen said. “Also, they can focus on work while we have to take care of the children.”
Her greatest concern now is making enough money to support her son by selling clothes online – something she used to do before becoming a yoga teacher, although she said business “is not as good as before because people seem to not have much money for clothes [now]”.
“My parents are becoming older and I cannot lean on them forever, so I want to make enough money to raise my son,” she said.
At the time, Jakarta was under lockdown and a minivan out of the capital cost three times what it normally would, but Dwi was desperate to leave. “We didn’t know when the pandemic would end and I was scared of giving birth there, alone,” she said.
Since giving birth in July, Dwi has had to adjust to both motherhood and living on a single pay cheque.
Gone are the days of clothes shopping on pay days, hanging out in cafes and eating out multiple times a week, now that her family has less than half the US$425 she used to earn each month to cover their monthly expenses.
“My husband is still working [at a bank in Purwokerto], but we have a newborn,” Dwi said. “Now, we eat out once every two weeks. We try to cut unnecessary spending and just buy baby stuff.”
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Her biggest concern is her daughter’s future and “that her needs won’t be fulfilled”. “I’m also worried that my husband will catch the virus, since he often works off-site,” she said.
Dwi plans to find a new job next year and is eager to start earning again, as “now my money is whatever he gives me”, she said, referring to her husband.
Some 56 per cent of Indonesian housewives report feeling stressed, anxious and sleep-deprived amid the pandemic, according to a survey conducted by consumer insights provider Populix and Teman Bumil, a mobile app for mothers and those who are expecting. About 60 per cent of respondents also said they were concerned about their financial situation.
Migrant domestic workers – most of whom are women – have been particularly hard hit, with 72 per cent losing their jobs this year, according to a UN estimate. Many have been unable to return to their home countries, and with no money and few basic worker protections have had to rely on charity shelters in cities like Hong Kong.
Others who did return home at the start of the year have since been trapped there, unable to travel back to their places of work and denied the earnings they would ordinarily remit to their families.
CLIMBING THE LADDER
Despite the extent to which women have been disproportionately affected by the coronavirus, some in top positions at international companies said the crisis could be an opportunity to improve gender equality.
Christine Burrows, senior director of strategy and business performance for Asia at Manulife in Hong Kong, said remote work arrangements and the digitisation push currently sweeping the sector offered “an unprecedented opportunity” to boost the proportion of female leaders in the financial services industry, which stood at 22 per cent last year worldwide.
“The obstacles for working women are well known, from subtle bias to systematic disadvantages that can stymie women’s career advancement,” said the 36-year-old, who is originally from South Africa and has lived in Hong Kong for nearly six years. “I think it’s time to reframe this issue: it’s not only about women, it’s about leadership. Everyone benefits from family-focused policies, like flexible working hours and paid parental and adoption leave.”
Burrows said Manulife, where she has worked for the past four years, was an example of a company embracing gender equality, with women making up almost half of the members in its senior leadership development programme this year.
Another company that has championed women’s rights and introduced flexible work arrangements amid the pandemic is Lenovo Asia-Pacific, according to its chief financial officer, Joey Wong.
“So far over the past year, at least in my team I have not seen any female dropping out since the pandemic. But stats in the US [showed] that women in tech are about 1.5 more likely than men to be laid off,” she said.
Although Wong, 35, is aware of the difficulties many working mums have faced this year, she also noted that the crisis could be an opportunity. “I do hear that the new normal of working from home opens up a lot of opportunities for a more flexible workforce,” she said. “For instance, mothers who could not commute to office every day – but who are actually capable of lending some of their knowledge – are now able to start working on a part-time basis because everyone is used to the new norm.”
Wong said firms should introduce measures to support their female workforce – such as fostering a supportive culture, holding virtual meetings where possible and telling employees “that they are measured on their results”, rather than how long they spend at their computer.
Affordable childcare, however, remains “a bottleneck for many females to advance their career” and if provided – either by the government or their employer – “would give them some peace of mind”, she said.
SHIFTING GEARS
While some women are fortunate enough to already work for companies that have adapted to the crisis, others are struggling to find new jobs or gain new skills.
In the absence of any real government help, civil society groups have stepped in to offer vital support to those in need, but Davies, the international relations professor, said it was “not sustainable to be asking civil society to manage situations where there are governance and rights failures” in the long term.
Governments across Asia, where the UN projects a resurgence in extreme poverty amid the pandemic, need to understand “the gendered division of economic production and labour in each country to then develop a budget that is responsive to the different ways in which men, women and non-binaries are being economically affected by Covid-19,” she said.
In addition to employment, Davies said more focus should be put on domestic violence and the additional challenges women face accessing affordable or subsidised sexual and reproductive health care during the pandemic.
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Keeping schools open is also important, particularly for women who care for children with disabilities, she said, as “Covid-19 has had a massive impact on disabled populations and their carers, [who are] mostly women.”
In the Philippines, women have suffered some of the worst consequences of the government’s quarantine measures, with the United Nations Population Fund’s gender chief for the country, Aimee Santos, telling a Senate committee hearing in September that survey respondents “feel the extraordinary weight of care work … as they carry the disproportionate burden of their family’s welfare.”
That is something that de Guzman – the single mother and former Quezon City restaurant manager – knows a thing or two about.
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Her son is still in college, and while both her older daughters “are fortunately employed and could share with some of the bills, I do not want to burden them with my financial obligations”, she said.
So she finds a way to make ends meet, and in between doing most of the household chores also studies digital marketing online in the hopes of finding part-time work or becoming a freelancer.
“It looks promising but is very competitive, especially now that most people are venturing into this set-up,” she said.
Yet despite her dwindling career prospects and the general anxiety she feels about her children’s well-being, de Guzman intends to do all she can as the backbone of her family – much like the countless other women like her across Asia.
Additional reporting by Resty Woro Yuniar and Bac Pham
