Report shows Fijian women do more unpaid work, have less free time

THE Fiji Women’s Rights Movement has launched a report which exposes the inequities women and girls face in terms of paid work, unpaid household work and leisure time.

Its director, Nalini Singh, said the report, entitled Beyond 33%: The Economic Empowerment of Fiji Women and Girls, shows Fijian females comprise just 34 per cent of the labour force, and men the rest.

But females do 73 per cent of the unpaid household work.

“The report comprehensively documents the many inequities that women and girls face in the economy in paid work — formal and informal sectors — unpaid household work and in the use of leisure time,” Ms Singh said.

The findings of the report also show males have more time for leisure activities compared to females, at all ages, growing from primary to tertiary education levels.

At working age there is a gap of five hours per week and even in retirement there is a recorded average gap of 4.4 hours per week.

She said more needs to be done to address the inequalities outlined in the report.

“Whilst some work has been done in the past to improve the situation in the area of women in decent work, it is imperative that more work is left to be done to address the existing inequalities outlines in this report so that there is transformative change towards gender equality,” Singh said.

The Assistant Minister for Women, Children and Poverty Alleviation, Sashi Kiran said women’s economic empowerment was crucial to Fijian society.

“Increasing women’s participation in the economy creates positive changes for women and ripple effects for the nation overall. However, the existence of systematic and structural barriers faced by women in Fiji hinders holistic opportunities and participation of women in the economy,” she said.

The report, which was authored by Professor Wadan Narsey and a team from the movement, is supported by the Australian Government through the We Rise Coalition.