Inclusive Growth: Gender Perspective
Baikuntha Aryal[1]
Inclusive
Growth is the buzz word in the contemporary development agenda. Most of
international agencies are persuading their aligned countries and governments
to mainstream this agenda in their development process. Recently International
Monetary Fund decided to launch new training program on Inclusive Growth
Strategy for senior level government officials. The UN agencies are well ahead
in cashing this agenda in their impression areas. The same agenda has been one
of the major post conflict agenda in Nepal. Inclusive Growth broadly covers
inclusiveness of all in the growth process. Consequently, gender comes there.
However, the lack of clear understanding on Inclusive Growth and inadequate
efforts to look this issue through gender sensitive eyes has probably minimized
the benefits that were supposed to be. This paper tries to revolve around this
issue and come up with gender sensitive Inclusive Growth ideas.
1. Background
Inclusive
Growth is generally a vague issue. Running through the dictionaries and some
really good articles, one may get confused. In a narrow sense, the arguments
have been including all the people, regardless of gender, race, ethnicity,
religion, geographical location and physical ability, in the growth process. It
mostly covers the rights of the concerned people and often neglects the roles
and responsibilities part. In broad sense Inclusive Growth is harnessing the
capabilities within the people and making the growth process inclusive and
broad based. Still very little has been talked to link the capabilities and the
rights, ironically almost nil has been talked on roles and responsibilities.
Nepal
has seen a lot of ups and downs during its history began some two centuries and
three quarter. Political instabilities, divide and rule policies, personal egos
of political figures and myopic vision in economic development were some of the
reasons that Nepal failed to stand as a developing country if not developed
one. Resource constrain was blamed but little spelled out about efficient management
of available resources
After
the peoples’ movement of 2006, the agenda of Inclusive Growth popped out and
took no time to spread. The Three Years Interim Plan (2007-10) had Inclusive
Growth as one of the major themes. However, the definition was limited to
including all gender, ethnicity, region, physical abilities, backward
communities and backward religions in the development process. Both approaches
of Inclusive Growth – Mainstreaming and Targeted Programs were adopted to make
the development process more inclusive. Before this plan, the Tenth Plan
(2002-07), which is also known as Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper, identified
‘Targeted Programs’ as one of the four strategic pillars. The programs to
support this strategy were basically gender and poverty focused. In the Three
Years Interim Plan (TYIP), more focus were given to the programs and policies
that supported the gender equality, equality in regional and other dimensions.
The
TYIP was one step ahead to address the gender issues. One of the major policies
of this plan was “engendering the macro economic framework”. This meant that
all the works carried out by the women would be recorded in the national
account. The policy itself was quite ambitious, given the inadequate mechanism
to collect those data. However, on the expenditure side, emphasis had been
given to direct the expenses to gender equality and gender responsive.
As
a part of “Engendering Macro Economic Framework” policy, Nepal started Gender
Responsive Budgeting since Fiscal Year 2007/08. This initiative was a
courageous effort of Government of Nepal, as there were limited countries in
the world which were able to track the expenses on gender responsive programs
and projects. Further, the revenue side of Engendering policy was also
implemented in small section of the population. Few policies of tax exemptions
for the women and women involving activities were adopted. Gender Responsive
Budgeting in Nepal has drawn a lot of international attractions. Nepal was even
invited to share its experiences in expenditure tracking in gender responsive
activities in one of the side events “What Women Get?” during recent European
Development Day (26-27 November 2013) program. While Nepal has done a
remarkable job in expenditure side, a lot of concerns on revenue side still
remain.
2.
Inclusive growth
Inclusive
Growth refers to the broad based growth which should be inclusive of the larger
part of a country’s labor force and this should cover all the sectors. The
inclusive growth by and large establishes a direct link between the macro and
micro determinants of growth. This definition, however, is more related to the
use of labor force and its impact on economic growth. This ignores the approach
to harness the capabilities of different section of the population and making
their use in economic development.
Therefore,
the inclusive growth in broader sense is “identifying and harnessing the
potentialities of the labor force and making their use in economic
development”. This definition further demands the equality in benefit sharing
and capacity development of those labor forces, regardless of their ethnicity,
gender, religion, race and any other human and non human determinants. One of
the major dimensions of inclusive growth is the benefits sharing. In a narrow
term, it is non discriminatory wages system and in broader term, it is sharing
of development fruits in an equitable way. Inclusive growth hence enhances the
opportunity for all.
In
Nepalese context, the idea of inclusive growth emerged after the decade long
armed conflict was over in 2006. The voices of the people of the backward
communities and the poverty stricken population were largely unheard in the
past. Although the sustainable economic growth and poverty reduction was always
talked about, but inclusion of all was largely ignored. Even in the Plan
documents after 1990’s peoples’ movement, the broad based economic growth got
the major space, the inclusiveness was hardly spoken. Further, poverty (or
inequality) and economic growth analyses have been conducted separately
traditionally. Recent practices indicate that there may not be a trade-off
between equity and efficiency and it would be a big mistake to separate
analyses of growth and income distribution. Thus inclusive growth can be
defined as raising the pace of growth and enlarging the size of the economy
by providing a level playing field for investment and increasing productive
employment opportunities.
Whatever is the definition, the inclusive
growth largely relates to the raising the incomes of people to reduce the
poverty and reduce the income inequality. In this sense the pro-poor growth
strategy more relates to the inclusive growth. However, the income earning
capacity is dependent on
- Skills
- Access to public goods, education and health services for
example
- Resource endowments such as property rights, intellect
- Freedom to enter into inclusiveness
Given
the slower growth rates in the world in the recent days, the inclusiveness has
been somehow slowed. The recent world growth rate is merely 3 percent per annum
and the reduction of poverty has a slower pace. In Nepalese case alone, while
the growth rate remained nearly 3.5 percent per annum in the last three years,
the poverty reduced by 1.4 percent only.
3.
Gender and Inclusive Growth
Women
constitute the larger part of labor force. Recent census shows that the female
population is higher than the male population. However, several studies show
that the employment is less among the women. This is true in formal and paid
employment case. The story may be different for the informal and unpaid
employment, which the Nepalese women are mostly engaged in. The inclusive
growth demands the inclusiveness of women in capability building, employment
and benefits share. We talk about these issues in bit details in the following
paragraphs.
3.1 Capacity Building
For
the purpose of this article, the capacity building is described in major two
dimensions – education and health. These two dimensions are clearly related to
capabilities of the labor force.
3.1.1
Education
According
to the census, 2011 literacy rate (of the population aged above 5 years) for
Nepal is 65.9 percent. This is 75.1 percent for male and 57.4 percent for
female. The literacy rate for women has gone up remarkably from the last census
of 2001, when it was mere 42 percent. Among the literate, the educational
attainment has also gone up. The data shows that only 4.2 percent of literate
has obtained informal education, while remaining 95.8 percent has gotten the
formal education. Interestingly, the 20.4 percent population has the education
level as SLC or above.
It
is noteworthy that the female literacy has gone up and the net enrolment rate
in basic level (grade 1-8) among boy and girl children is at parity. Earlier
there was a big difference in this rate. However, in the secondary school, the
difference in net enrolment rate between girl and boy children is still high.
Another aspect of education is dropout rate. The dropout rate among girl
children is higher than in among boy children. Engagement in household
activities for the girl child is one of the major reasons for this higher
dropout rate, while the lack of gender friendly infrastructure in educational
institutions is another factor. But recent intervention to build the separate
toilets for girl children and distribution of sanitary napkins during
menstruation period has reduced the dropout rates. Further, ‘Education for All’
program has also played remarkable role in educating the girl children.
The
slower improvement in educational services has slowly increased the
capabilities of the women and the results are being shown in the educational
attainments and their access to policy making.
3.1.2
Health
Nepal
has done good progress in Health sector. The infant mortality rate, child mortality
rate has gone down sharply in last 20 years time. Nepal was recognized by the
international agencies for its achievement on maternal health. The number of
health service centers and health personnel has improved. Although there is not
distinct data base is available for health services for male and female, the
significant improvement in health services signifies to life expectancy of 69.1
years.
Availability
of health services definitely improves the health conditions of both males and
females. But still a large chunk of women population is deprived of proper
health services. In some cases, they do not have access to the services and in
some cases they cannot afford the price of health services. This has seriously
affected women’s health and thereby their capabilities. However, in a macro
level, capabilities of women have increased given the improvement of health
services.
3.2 Employment
In
the past, there was vast difference among men and women in the formal sector
employment. Still the difference is high, but slowly decreasing. Women
participation has increased even in the civil service. The second amendment to
Civil Service Act opened up reservation policy for women. This allows certain
quota for women, Dalits, Madhesis, Janajatis and backward regions. This
has also helped women to come into the civil service. Given the higher
capabilities than before with good education, larger number of women employment
is available in the nongovernmental sector too. In the factory level also the
number of women worker has increased because of equal wage policy.
But
women employment is still large at the informal sector. Women’s work still does
not come into the national accounts and they are very much engaged in household
chores. Even in the educated families, women are more in household activities
than their male members of the families. Although few changes have been seen,
the female member needs to work in the kitchen even if she is employed
somewhere and male member is often refrained from doing so. This is not only
the problem of education and type of employment, but cultural orientation has
also something to do with.
3.3
Benefit share
Benefit
sharing among male and female is normally looked by the expenditure
perspectives. Moreover, it is related to the level of wage they get. As said
above Nepal has been initiating the gender responsive budgeting since last
seven years. The expenditure on directly responsive program and projects has
been increasing while the expenditure on neutral types of activities has been
decreasing. Although it is a complex job to analyze all the expenditure with
gender eyes, Nepal has been able to identify which activity is more gender
responsive. The following chart shows the percentage of gender responsive
budget in total budget.
The
above chart shows that the directly gender responsive budget has been almost
doubled in seven years while the neutral to gender responsive budget has gone
down by more than 20 percentage points.
Another
aspect of benefit sharing is depicted by the wage rate too. Before 1990, there
was differential wage system in the factory level. Women would get lower wage
for the same kind of job. But after the restoration of multiparty system in
1990, the wage difference was removed. However, the wage difference still
remain in the informal sector
The
third aspect of benefit share is the impact of government expenditure. This can
be analyzed through the time saving and access to the resources. Although the
government expenditure on infrastructure is both for men and women, but in many
cases it has helped women to increase their access to the public services such
as health services, drinking water, fuels. These have reduced women’s time
significantly. On the other hand this has helped them to retain their health,
at least by avoiding long hours walk for finding drinking water and firewood.
4.
Opportunities
While
talking about inclusive growth, one should not forget about the opportunities
for all. The Interim Constitution of Nepal, 2007 has identified Rights to
Equality as Fundamental Rights. But this right does not necessarily ensure the
opportunities and participation of all. Although this right does not
discriminates any gender, the capabilities and participation are not
guaranteed. This right is similar to “the doors of five star hotels are open
for everyone” but entering into the five star hotels, one has to have the
affording capacity. Then only (s)he has the opportunity and (s)he can
participate.
The
core of inclusive growth is to make the people capable of getting
opportunities. Capability without opportunity and opportunity without
capability, both do not yield a good result. Hence to make the inclusive growth
successful, enough investment is needed in the capabilities development.
5.
What to do?
To
make inclusive growth a success strategy, the investment is needed to develop
the capacity, increase opportunity and increase participation. Here are few
suggestions.
a. Increase investment in human capital, such as education
and health
b. Increase investment in social sector, such as drinking
water and hygiene
c. Increase investment in infrastructure such that all
population can enjoy the results
d. Mobilize community organization for awareness and
capacity building
e. Support community led programs
f. Exercise Corporate Social Responsibilities by the private
sector to support the inclusive growth process
g. Adopt both targeted programs and mainstreaming of large
part of population
This
list can be longer and longer. But the main thing is that both for inclusive
growth and for gender equality, the focus is needed on capacity building so
that the opportunity comes behind automatically.
6.
Final words
Inclusive
growth is not a new and different concept than the broad-based growth concept.
But this is more specific than the previous one. For this, participation of all
the population is required and their capacity needs to be developed for
participating. Government intervention is a must and private and nongovernmental
sector should also be cooperative.
[1] Joint Secretary, Ministry of Finance.
The views and arguments presented here are author’s personal and not
necessarily represent that of the organization he is associated to.
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