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Links Commemorating Walter Rodney's 25th Anniversary Women Against Violence Everywhere Other Press Statements |
Report on Red Thread Time-Use Survey by International Women Count Network (IWCN), 30 November 2004 Importance of the Red Thread survey Despite 30 years of conferences, papers and discussion about women's unwaged work, in the 21st century most of the fundamental work of society, that is, the work that ensures its continuation, remains uncounted, and invisible in national statistics. This is the context of the path-breaking time-use survey by Red Thread. In addition, Red Thread's survey is the first systematic time-use survey conducted by and for grassroots women that we know about, and we understand it is the first time-use survey of any kind carried out in Guyana. Although deprived of the resources - computer technology, supporting staff, years of academic preparation, etc. - available to professional time-use surveyors, this path-breaking project is enabling fundamental truths about women's work and time, and therefore about women's lives and those they care for, to emerge. We believe that, because of its nature, more information has emerged here which is often not fully collected or even approached by other such surveys carried out by government or academic institutions. The goal to measure and value women's unwaged work won from governments at the UN World Conference on Women in Beijing has all too often been corralled into hiding at least some of women's work. There are several reasons that account for this: 1) Sexism continues to trivialise and refuses to acknowledge the importance of much of what women are doing. Can a woman discussing family problems with her neighbours or talking with her children at the end of the day really be considered work? Only if a highly paid therapist or counsellor is doing it. 2) The design and outcome of surveys are increasingly determined by political agendas that would push women into waged jobs on the pretext that this would deal with poverty. Such agendas justify this policy by trying to show that waged work can easily be fitted in with housework, or even that men are sharing the load - flying in the face of universal experience, including of women's desperate overwork even before this second job for wages. This survey counters the censorship of sexism and of all those who aim to exploit women, which keeps the reality of women's workload hidden from history and economics. For the Red Thread women doing the research, this project is not advancing a career nor is it just a job. They did it as housewives and carers themselves and applied their intimate working knowledge of caring work to the project, inspiring trust in those they questioned. They were able to recognise when women are doing two or more different jobs simultaneously, or are doing the emotional work on which social relationships in society largely rest. They are not strangers to how women juggle their time to fit in many different jobs and to meet the needs of all the people around them. They saw the survey as a tool to make visible all women's work including their own, and were committed and determined to record it as best they could. They were able to identify with the women they met and interviewed, and to know what questions to ask. They were therefore in a much better position than any academic or government representative to explain what they were trying to do to, to make women feel it was worthwhile, that they weren't spying and to get women to do their best to put everything down. Of course some women still would not participate - too busy, too suspicious, too incredulous that this could lead to anything positive. We must bear in mind that government time-use projects often consider the survey a success if they get between 40 and 50% of people contacted participating! The dedication and methods of Red Thread introduced startling innovations:
Other advantages: Some highlights from the findings so far: In all racial/ethnic groups the typical working day for the majority of women ranges from 14 to 18 hours, with little help from anyone, often with minimal or unreliable technology, limited access to amenities and with very little leisure or free time for themselves. Several women had longer days - up to 21 hours. The great majority of women are busy by 6am, with a significant number of women in all ethnic groups starting earlier. For example, an Afro Guyanese woman was up by 3am to cook a range of snacks before the rest of the household was up and making demands and in order to start selling at 8am. An Indo-Guyanese woman got up at 3.30am to cook her husband's breakfast and a packed lunch before he left for work as a cane cutter at around 5.30am and while her three small children under three slept. Many women in all the sectors had no breaks in a day. This was as high as 50% among Amerindian women - one of whom lamented it was her day off! The lack of technology had a major impact on their day. The absence of electric light in most households forced women to fit their work into daylight hours, while lack of piped water nearby had women going to the creek several times a day to wash clothes, bathe themselves and their children, and get water for drinking and cooking. For many women in any sector, especially those with small children who were by their side all day, a 'break' represented not a cessation of work but a reduction in its intensity, that is, they stopped tackling more than one job at a time. For many women in all sectors the only time they can call their own are a few minutes' prayer or devotion at the beginning and end of their day. Illness and pregnancy sometimes slowed women down but clearly did not stop them doing a full day's work, including heavy jobs such as chopping wood. And any working day can unexpectedly be stretched to 24 hours, for example, when a child is ill and needs attention through the night as one mother recorded, which does happen to every mother of a young child. It is clear from the diaries that all the women have a mental plan of what needs to be achieved on any particular day and are therefore often working towards several goals simultaneously - caring for their children's physical needs; getting ready for older family members to go and come back from work/school; preparing food to sell; fitting in time to tend a kitchen garden and care for livestock, getting ready for a waged job; making time to talk with children, partners, neighbours. The women show themselves to be extraordinarily well organised. Survival depends on it. The next steps Subject to further funding, a publication of the results - including sample diaries and a detailed report of Red Thread's experience doing the survey - is vital if this new information is to inform not only the professionals but also a wider public within and outside of Guyana. Such a publication can, for example, do much to contribute towards overcoming racial divisions within Guyana, beginning with women the carers in every race. And it can educate women in the North about the lives and situations of their sisters in the South, and how much all of us have in common despite many differences. It will also encourage and instruct other grassroots women, South and North, to conduct similar much-needed projects. Factors affecting the length and intensity of women's working day: We conclude this initial report with a telling entry from a pregnant Amerindian woman with three small children: '8.05 - 8.45pm: lie down worrying, wondering if this time-use would improve my life.' Red Thread and many others, women especially, are determined that it will. All of us will be asking governments, development agencies, economists, anti-poverty and children's charities, aid donors, other funders and all those concerned with economic and social justice such as trade unions: now that we have this information, will they be part of the problem of hiding the work or part of the solution of making it count? Information on IWCN
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