Reducing South Asia's Gender Gap
Foremost Priorities Essential

By Khilendra Basnyat

IN South Asia, about fifty per cent of the total population constitutes women. Therefore, one cannot think of development in any sector if half of the population remains aloof from the mainstream of various development activities. As a result, the improvement of women's status has become a common concern in this region.

Lower Status

In most South Asian countries, age-old traditions and culture have hampered women's development. Although in these countries equal status is provided to men and women in their constitutions, the social and economic conditions are lower than those of their male counterparts, especially in rural areas.

Women's conditions are peculiar. They are known to work harder than their male counterparts. However, they are discriminated against their male counterparts. In Bangladesh, about thirty per cent of women reside in rural areas. Their literacy rate is only thirteen per cent. They work hard at home and also in agricultural land. Rural Bhutanese women work from sunrise to sunset. They lack modern skill. They are involved in agriculture and allied activities apart from domestic chores.

In India, rural women reveal their spatial, cultural, financial distances from the development process, widening inequality between males and females, high illiteracy rate and fertility rate due to early marriage and isolation from various development activities.

The Nepalese rural women work on their fields from morning to evening. What is more, they work at home, perform their duties as mothers and wives. However, they still lag behind in social and economic sectors from their male counterparts.

In the educational sector, Sri Lanka's women are ahead in comparison to other South Asian countries. Their literacy rate is more than ninety per cent and is considered one of the appreciable rates in the world. However, the fate of Sri Lanka's rural women is almost similar to other South Asian countries.

The situation of rural women in Maldives is also miserable. Although they labour hard, they lag behind in social and economic spheres. Out of the total illiterate population in South Asia, about sixty-three per cent are women. About two-fifths of the girls, enrolled in primary schools, drop out before they pass grade five. Consequently, the net primary school attendances was much lower for girls than for boys during 1990s. This is much lower in South Asia in comparison with the world average.

The social returns to educating girls are rarely matched for women themselves, their families and communities and for the society as a whole. Actually, girls are discriminated against in terms of their investment in their education compared to male children. The increase of the low investment in women's education is due to the traditional notion that different individuals have varied returns to investment.

In South Asia, female members of the family have lower returns of expenditure on consumption, nutrition and education. Returns of education are perceived to be greater from the male children. It is because educational skills or the technology required by the females are non-marketable, and family looses access to her income when the female member is married off. Consequently, women are usually bypassed when training, technology and access to technical assistance are being passed around.

South Asia's women have limited access to income and economic opportunities mainly because of their work being at the margin of development efforts and programmes. Of the total people living in poverty, more than seventy per cent are females because of their unequal access to economic assets and inputs such as land, credit, seeds, etc.

Till now, in rural economy, the issue of women's land rights has received very little attention in policy formulation. The lack of right to land for women also leads to discrimination in their access to bank lending, which requires mortgage of property for loans. In general rural women have no access to banking system due to their illiteracy, difficult loan procedures and usually long physical distances. The structural adjustment programme undertaken by most South Asian countries has also affected more men than women. For example, the reduction of food subsidies has a grave impact on women. It is because mothers and girls are denied adequate nutrition due to favour shown to the male members in the family.

Women's contribution in the domestic sector is considered unproductive output and is therefore not included in national accounts. Actually, if all such contribution by women were added, their share in the national income would have been equal to or greater than women's work.

Most South Asians have realised that women's work should be visible, recognised and quantified. They should have access to productive sectors at par with males. However, this has not been possible in real life. The similarities in women's status in South Asia's women's status across national, regional and international borders focus on the common problem which have peristed for a long time. The best way to help women to come forward is to encourage them in education.

Most women of South Asia are not equipped with skills essential to play their rightful role in the economy as a major source. Education helps encourage sharing in development activities.
In reality, low women's literacy rate has contributed to low women's participation in civil services. Women's development at par with man's should begin with educational development in the family. Apart from this, education for all schemes should be implemented giving special priority for women.
The huge gender gap in the development policies and investments inhibits women from performing the full potential in social, economic and political life. Generally, government policies provide little or no support to activities in the formal sectors where adequate women are engaged.

Vital Element

In fact narrowing the wide gender gap that exists in South Asia should be the foremost priority for the overall development of this region. For this initiatives should be taken on the areas which have been recognised as the vital element in improving the women's status of this region.

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