Workshop on Capturing Women’s Work (CWW) held at India Habitat Centre,
New Delhi on July 24, 2024
The workshop on Capturing Women’s Work (CWW) took place on July 24, 2024, at the Indian Habitat Centre, New Delhi. Hosted by IWWAGE, the event aimed to address the complexities and challenges in accurately measuring women’s work.
The inaugural session featured key insights from Radha Chellappa, Executive Director, IWWAGE, Neeta Goel, Country Lead – Measurement, Learning and Evaluation, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Foundation and Sona Mitra, Director – Policy and Research, IWWAGE focusing on findings from the IWWAGE study.
Led by Sona Mitra, the IWWAGE research team showcased their findings from the study titled ‘Capturing Women’s Work to Measure Better’ which aimed at developing better mechanisms for data collection by employing innovative probing techniques and sampling frames tailored to capture the nuances of women’s work. Additionally, the session emphasized on the importance of creating a robust framework for conducting women-specific surveys that could be aligned with national Labour Force Surveys (LFS). This would help in obtaining more comprehensive estimates of women’s labor force participation. The session concluded with a series of participant inquiries. The presentation of time use findings sparked discussions about how women’s time allocation evolves with age, specifically when unpaid domestic work becomes a daily routine, and the factors contributing to the transition from ‘girl’ to ‘woman’.
The second half of the presentation focused on findings around identifying and addressing the significant perception bias that often underestimates women’s economic contributions (in cases where the respondent is not the woman herself) were presented. Through these efforts, the sessions aimed to advance methodologies that more accurately reflect women’s roles in the economy.
Findings from the CWW study revealed notable gaps between self-reported data and societal perceptions, highlighting the need to include unpaid domestic work in workforce measurements for greater accuracy.
Discussions also covered the economic valuation of unpaid work, the impact of household characteristics on perceptions, and the significance of detailed recovery questions. Key points included discrepancies between the PLFS 2022-2023 and CWW survey estimates of female labor force participation rates, as well as concerns about the lack of a 180-day principal activity benchmark and the survey’s ability to accurately capture women’s work, particularly in Jharkhand.
The workshop ended with a panel discussion, moderated by Yamini Atmavilas, bringing together experts like Jeemol Unni, Madhura Swaminathan, Rosa Abraham, Neetha N, and PC Mohanan. They discussed innovations in measurement methods and the limitations of current survey instruments. Emphasis was placed on the need for regular Time Use Surveys (TUS) and refining survey tools to capture the dynamic nature of women’s work, including unpaid care and domestic activities. The panel concluded that improving measurement accuracy and recognizing the economic value of women’s work are essential for addressing historical underreporting and better informing policy decisions.
Related Resources
CWW Summary of Findings
CWW Report
