WUNRN
The Gender Dynamics of
Trade and Investment and the Post 2015 Development Agenda: A Developing Country
Perspective
By Ranja Sengupta1
Introduction
In an increasingly
globalised world, the impact of trade and investment liberalisation is an
important area of policy focus. In the current context, the gender impact of
trade policy must be paid serious attention especially as it is increasingly
evident that trade policy is not ‘gender neutral’. This is because women’s
economic and social positions are weaker, their rights are not well defined and
a harshly competitive system hurts the weakest the most. The impact on women is
partly general2
and partly gender
specific, determined by the way they are integrated into specific sectors.
The nature of international
trade itself is undergoing continuous changes, with autonomous liberalization
undertaken by countries, multilateral commitments at the WTO, as well as rapid
advances in bilateral trade and investment agreements (FTAs) and Bilateral
Investment treaties (BITs)/ Bilateral Investment Promotion Agreements (BIPAs).
Globally 575 FTAs or RTAs were notified to the WTO (until July 31, 2013) of
which 379 are in force. There are 3196 international investment agreements
including 2857 bilateral investment agreements or bilateral investment
partnership agreements (BITs/ BIPAs) in force globally (UNCTAD Trade and
Investment Report 2013). With the growing coverage of trade agreements spanning
agriculture, industry, services, intellectual property rights, investment,
government procurement and other areas, the interactions between provisions in
the sector/area specific liberalisation policies create complicated and
multilayered impacts. All these have a two‐way interaction with women’s
access to critical physical, financial and human resources and access to basic
services, with significant implications for their empowerment, livelihoods,
health, socioeconomic status and well‐being. In many cases, the impact
process is so complex that the gendered nature of it is apparent only after a
deeper analysis. An area of increasing concern with development analysts, NGOs
and academics is that the trade and gender issues are not properly raised and
debated in the public sphere, and do not feature prominently in development
discussions. In particular, this discussion is of great significance for the
post 2015 development agenda. It is obvious that issues such as poverty,
inequality, gender empowerment, women’s education and health cannot be
addressed effectively unless structural issues are addressed. It is more
important in the current context, as a meaningful
global agenda must address global level policy issues which impact gender relations down
to the grassroots. Goal 8 of the MDGs was weak in terms of implementation and
accountability, and the current Goal 12 proposed in the HLP Report also has
several shortcomings, including being gender insensitive. On the other hand, to
address the gender impacts of international trade and investment requires an
inter weaving of several areas such as access to health and education, to
resources and to food with gender sensitive international policies. The Post
2015 development Agenda must therefore deal with this complex multilayered
relationships if it has to indeed deliver on gender equality and women’s
empowerment. This chapter attempts to enunciate some of the gender related
impacts of international trade and investment mainly in the context of
developing countries.
Gender Inequalities and
Vulnerability
Gender discrimination is
historically given in most countries; in resource ownership and control; access
to finance; access to jobs and incomes; knowledge, education and skills; in
accessing healthcare; in social relations and in several other areas. In fact
it is not a developing country phenomenon alone, though it may be more
prominent in less developed societies. In some regions, e.g. South Asia,
Africa, Middle East, we see a prominent manifestation of gender inequalities.
1 Ranja Sengupta is
based in New Delhi, India and works as Senior Researcher with Third World
Network. She has worked extensively on agricultura, poverty and inequality,
international trade and investment and impact on gender dynamics, SMEs,
employment and development in general.
2 The impact on poor
rural women may be partly determined, for example, by the way all poorer
farmers are affected.
It is well documented that
women also face more poverty, including time poverty. Female headed Households
(FHHH) have often shown higher poverty rates3.
Working poverty is also high as revealed by country specific data, which shows
a higher rate for women. For example, in India 86.4 percent of working women
are poor compared to 81.45 percent of men (at less than USD2 per day) and 36.1
percent of working women are poor compared to 30 percent of men (at less than
USD 1 a day).
Given these inequalities,
women are sometimes more vulnerable to the adverse impacts of macro and
external sector policies which do not take them into account. At the same time,
they may be less able to make use of the benefits that may accrue to specific
sectors or economic groups. Women are also more vulnerable to shocks such as
climate change, economic crisis, etc. These factors then can actually
exacerbate the given inequalities further and can create unforeseen situations which
are much more difficult to deal with.
The Gender Dimension of
International Trade and Investment
In the context of a larger
than life influence of trade and investment globally, it is pertinent to ask
whether these policies improve gender disparities or worsen them. We need to
know exactly where and how they impact women’s lives. The current trade
paradigm is also supposed to increase growth, decrease inequalities in the long
run, ensure full employment for all countries (especially so that developing
countries can ‘catch up’) but this has been much discounted from the
current evidence. Trade need not necessarily lead to growth, and can
increase inequalities especially in the short run, especially across sectors,
income, gender and social groups. In addition, economic growth, even if it did
result from trade, does not always lead to gender equality, as seen in South
Asia.
There are clear linkages
through which policies of international trade and investment, whether
autonomously driven or by specific commitments in international agreements, can
affect gender dynamics. These may be categorised among the following areas;
Work Sphere affecting employment and
incomes, terms of employment, work conditions
Access to resources (land, water,
credit, technology)
Access to basic services (e.g.
health, education)
Home situation affecting care work,
unpaid work, within household inequality/empowerment
Migration including both domestic
and international of both men and women
Women as consumers
Affecting the policy space for
gender friendly policies, social policies
In addition, several other
areas may be affected in complicated ways some of which we may not have even
begun to understand.
A Sector Wise Look:
Agriculture
Agriculture supports a
large number of the world population, especially in developing countries. Women
are particularly dependent on the primary sector and are engaged in crop
cultivation and animal husbandry which engages 44.4 percent of women workers in
developing countries. Agriculture is a natural mainstay for women in developing
countries because it can be combined easily with work at home, and requires
less skill and financial resources. Women are willing to be in the informal
economy and earn zero or low wages that this sector offers. Most important,
women take the final responsibility to put food on the table for the family and
staying close to food sources comes as a natural option. As producers and
sellers of food, they also produce for home consumption and so livelihoods in this
context also imply a direct access to food. However, they still do not have
much control over productive resources such as land, credit, water and their
decision making powers are also limited. The agriculture sector also houses the
largest number of poor and women among the poor.
Under the WTO, agricultural trade was opened up under the Agreemet on Agriculture (AoA) which involved providing market access to each other by capping (binding) import duties on foreign imports, laying down uniformly applicable (to all WTO members) standards & processes, laying down safeguard mechanisms for developing countries (Special Products or SP and Special Safeguard Mechanism or SSM) and eliminating trade distorting export and domestic subsides which are given mainly by the developed countries. Interestingly the last has seen very little progress and developed countries such as the USA and EU have continued to give subsidies under various disguises threatening access for small farmers in developing countries, many of whom are women. At the same time subsidies which could be given by developing country members are mostly banned under the WTO rules, making it impossible for governments (especially in large countries) even to support food subsidy for poor consumers and price support for small farmers.
The AoA has been criticised
for being gender insensitive and several gender related concerns have been
raised by analysts. Criterion of using ‘gender sensitive products’ to protect
products with high engagement of women from import competition has been
suggested by gender analysts but has not gained much ground yet.
Moreover trade
liberalisation has not been able to control speculation (further boosted by the
crisis in financial markets), concentration in global food markets and the
resultant volatility in international prices has been hurting both poor farmers
and consumers, and has threatened food security across developing countries.
With the advent of bilateral or plurilateral Free Trade
Agreements (FTAs), liberalisation
has been deepened and widened at the same time. Under FTAs, Import duties on
agricultural products are reduced to zero as opposed to simply binding duties
as under the WTO. SP, SSM safeguards have to be negotiated hard, and some
developed countries ask that export measures, left largely uncontrolled by the
WTO, be eliminated.
Interestingly, under FTAs,
one area that cannot be touched is developed country subsidies which are
supposed to be negotiated multilaterally. These threaten market for women
farmers and workers. However women have got jobs sometimes in export based
agricultural sectors such as plantation products, processed food products, but
the growth is still limited and it does take women away from basic food
cultivation.
In addition, developed countries
often demand WTO plus provisions in other areas. Under intellectual property
rights (IPRs), patenting of life, control of seeds (through UPOV 1991), and
pesticides (through data exclusivity) are brought in (see Sections on
intellectual property rights below for more details). Strong investment
chapters under such FTAs can give widespread access to land and natural
resources. Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) also leads to mechanisation in
traditional agriculture, which may be good for productivity increases but it
has a gender impact as such mechanisation takes away women’s jobs from low
skilled labour intensive segments. Service delivery machanisms such as retail,
credit and extension services may also be impacted.
NAFTA and Women in
Mexican Agriculture4
• US subsidised corn and
bean entered Mexico after NAFTA
• Devastated Mexican
Agriculture, 1.3 million jobs lost mainly of small and subsistence farmers
• Women farmers are largely
small: 70.8% of women farmers cultivated plots less than 2 hectares
• Poverty levels increased
by 50% in female headed households
• Wage per hour fell from
10.3 pesos in 1991 to 1.3 Pesos in 2003 (at 1994 constant pesos), gender wage
disparity increased
• Similar impact on wages
in Andean Community (Peru, Colombia)
It is clear that a full
liberalisation of the agriculture sector through multiple mechanisms will
reduce protection for women farmers and workers in developing countries. In
addition, protective mechanisms such as sensitive products (using a gender
criterion) and SSMs are being increasingly restricted. Women will also be hurt
more public procurement. Their dependence on the resources threatened under
these agreements is higher and their ability to shift out of agriculture is
limited. Their role as food providers gets severely undermined not only by
losses in production and livelihoods, but also from threats to natural
resources, markets and technologies which are important for direct access to
food as well as instruments for sustaining production and sales. Gender
sensitivities need to be taken into account in all aspects of trade agreements,
while combining it with gender friendly development policies.
4 Speildoch,
Alexandra (20 4)
A Sector Wise Look:
Industry
Trade liberalization has
also taken place across industrial sectors across the developing world,
following either autonomous, WTO promoted or FTA pushed frameworks. The WTO has
pushed member states to cut duties according to a Swiss Formulae, and has
increasingly linked duty cuts to the special and differential treatment
developing countries can receive. Similar to agriculture, the industrial sector
has witnessed deeper tariff cuts under FTAs on applied duties. Moreover further
liberalization, by pushing for zero duties in specific sectors (Sectorals) and
not permitting full exclusion of any sector (Anti Concentration Clause) is
being promoted through both the frameworks. The North‐South FTAs also
often talk about labour and environment standards.
There has been a significant increase in women’s employment
in export‐based sectors some parts of
the developing world, especially
visible in Asia;
specifically in textiles and garments, leather, food processing and marine
products. The export led growth in these sectors has often been ascribed to
women. This has arguably led to a process that has been linked to women’s
empowerment.
However while acknowledging
the positives of such job opportunities, the literature also points to significant concerns. The first issue is of sustenance.
Seguino and Grown5, among others, have shown that
semiindustrialized economies that emphasize export manufacturing have
experienced a rise in the female share of employment, but only in their early
phases of industrialization and this effect tends to reverse over the course of
industrial development.
Second, along with gains in
some industries, most of which are of low value, there has been simultaneous
loss in uncompetitive sectors across Africa, Asia and Latin America leading to
job and income losses. In addition, small suppliers have in particular been
often hit (for example in Textiles & Apparels in Cambodia). Small
enterprises find it more difficult to survive under strong competition as they
often face discrepancies in access to credit, technology, infrastructure etc.
This has a gender dimension as SMEs are owned by and employ more women
worldwide.
Women and
Employment in Africa: Some Cases6
• In Nigeria, Tunisia, Morocco, Ghana,
Senegal there was a decline in women’s employment in manufacturing, especially
in textiles.
• In Jamaica, jobs in manufacturing
(textiles), services sector (a major women’s employer, 72% of women), declined
as a result of CARICOM, CSME. NAFTA shifted female jobs from export processing
zones in Jamaica to Mexico. Consumption by FHHH fell by 14.5%, of MHHH by only
1.7%.
• In Madagascar, there was an increase
in women’s employment in textiles.
• 85% of women had never earned
before. But in spite of comparable education, women were confined to unskilled
jobs with low wages, as well as temporary jobs. Unskilled wages were stagnant
and there was an increase in gender wage gap.
Third and of critical importance, while women have been hired, it has been on adverse terms. The work is mainly informal with increased casualisation all over the developing world, for example in Asia, in Mexican Maquiladoras etc. Employment has been volatile with higher rates of reallocation. Significant wage disparity and job segregation persists or even and labour saving FDI especially in labour‐intensive segments have meant that women are the first to. Working conditions have been kept adverse, with minimum investment in providing better work conditions. Often no leaves are given to female employees, sometimes no toilet break, and workers often inhale materials with severe adverse impacts on health (as it is the case in the production of textile, garments, tobacco and chemicals). So while women have been ascribed the credit for the gain in exports, it is because they have been exploited and they have been used as necessary adjustors in a situation of volatile trade. Such conditions are not a fall‐out but a natural driver of this kind of competitiveness and women have been used as pawns in this game of competition. Such conditions are perpetuating, as they are key to developing countries continuing to gain from trade. Simultaneously there has been increase in unpaid work, and self‐employment.
5 Seguino and Grown
(2006) - 6
UNCTAD
(2009).
Example of Asia: The
Garment Sector in Bangladesh7
• Domestic liberalization
and the growth of the garments industry has led to increase in unskilled
women’s employment in garment sector
• 46% contribution to
family incomes by females’ employment leading to empowerment within HH
• Women’s share in
employment 90%, Wage Disparity 50%
• Women are limited to low
skilled segments, whereas wages have grown more in skilled jobs
• Hazardous conditions of
work, unhealthy impacts, sometimes not even toilet breaks are allowed
• Decrease in time for
house work, leisure, education
• 40% of female workers do
not receive medical treatment (33% for men)
• Only 35% of female
workers got leave when asked (60% for men)
In sum, in sectors which do
well, women gain jobs but gains are less than proportionate compared to gains
for men8. Where sectors lose, women lose
disproportionately and are the first ones to be fired. Women are used as a
wedge to adjust to trade volatility, and under this logic they must necessarily
not be given any rights. The gender wage gap increases growth in countries at
low levels of growth. Skill and resource gap is only part of the explanation,
social relations constitute the other major part as women have limited rights
and men are seen as legitimate jobholders. It is positive that they get
employment, but a lot more needs to be done to address disparities, both from
equity and efficiency points of view.
Given this context it is
not surprising that women lose disproportionately more in times of crisis.
Women’s jobs in export based sectors go faster (e.g. under the East Asian
crisis, women lost 7 times the jobs of men in South Korea) and even when jobs
are not cut, wages are cut further and the wage cut is higher for women9. Unpaid work also increases in
times of crisis, together with significant worsening of conditions of work.
Another contentious issue
is labour standards (LS) in North‐South FTAs, which have been resisted
most often by developing countries on grounds that these pose actually as non‐tariff
barriers for developing countries. LS can arguably help women, but can be tricky
under bilateral trade agreements as several critical issues crop up. Will jobs
go to another country that does not upgrade LS?
Another question is whether
developing countries become uncompetitive while supplying to developed partners
who want these chapters. The overall impact on employment is therefore unclear.
The policy issues are
complex in this context. It is important to remember that in many cases women
have gained, yet gains are maximised where the government and NGO’s have
intervened in policy, for example, in the cases of Kenyan women workers in
flower horticulture and Burkina Faso’s women workers in the shea sector. It is
also important to remember that policy can backfire and the opposite impact can
occur. In the case of South Korea, a policy to address wage disparity led to
older women workers being fired. In addition, policy space may be eroded by
FTA/ investment agreement provisions on investment protection (for example: any
labour law that reduces profits of investors), and therefor limit countries’
capacities to intervene (see sections on investment below).
7 Raihan, Khatoon,
Husain & Rahman 2007, Van Staveren et al 2007, Paul, Majumdar and Begum
2000
8 UNCTAD (2008);
USAID (2006)
9 Hirway and Prabhu
(2009).
Finally, it is undeniable
that to protect women workers, there is need for a comprehensive trade,
macroeconomic and social policy package. A social security package is an
important ingredient of this, which must be seen not only as a welfare measure
but also as a boost for domestic demand.
A Sector Wise Look:
Services
Global trade in services
has witnessed a significant growth over the past two decades and several
developing countries such as India, China, Philippines, are now important
players in the world market. However, their competitiveness is often limited to
a few sub sectors and developed countries are the ones that dominate services
trade globally.
The service sector and
trade thereof is actually one of the most critical drivers of gender relations
in the world today. While a growing service sector can be a source of jobs for
women, which sometimes can be specifically suited to women’s needs, the sector
must include critical provisions in health, education, water, energy and credit
that are essential for basic human well being as well as for people’s economic
and social development.
In particular, it has a
clear gender‐differentiated impact given women’s critical need, but
limited access to such services in developing countries. The impacts vis a vis employment and access to services
reinforce each other and can help perpetuate or break a cycle of gender
disparities.
The service sector and
access issues also have important relevance for women’s care work. Clearly, in the presence of
affordable and well‐distributed services in water, healthcare, education,
etc., generally publicly provided, the burden on women to supplement these
services with their care work is much less. Whenever there has been contraction
of such services, whether under a crisis or under structural adjustment programmes
or due to other reasons, the burden of care work has increased.
Trade in services takes
place through four modes, each with its own gender dimension.
Mode 1 refers to Cross
Border Supply (for
example in sectors like Information and Technology (IT) ) of services. While
this can offer significant opportunities to women, as in India, there are
gender specific concerns as well. Because the jobs created in the IT sector are
skilled, the number of jobs is extremely limited even in India which accounts
for less than 3 percent of urban women’s jobs and has no presence in rural
areas. This sector is known for its adverse working hours for women, wage
differences and job segregation where women cannot enter high‐level jobs.
For example, in India’s IT sector women account for 40‐50 percent in
Business Process Outsourcing but only 25 percent for the higher value added
software segments.10
In addition, 70 percent
of women workers feel work hours are unfavourable for women (especially for EU,
US clients), and 94 percent of married women felt a negative effect on
children’s education.
Mode 2 refers to
Consumption Abroad (for
example in sectors like tourism). These sectors have offered women considerable
job opportunities though issues such as sex tourism and medical tourism have
been issues of concern. The rapid development of medical tourism, in several
developing countries such as Thailand, Jordan and India, have created job
opportunities for women health professionals but issues such as surrogacy which
such tourism has tended to promote, have often worked against women’s health
and psychological well being. Regulation of these activities has also become
increasingly difficult, often because of FDI related issues (see investment
issues below).
Mode 3 refers to
Commercial Presence (focused
on investment in service sectors). While GATs (under WTO) has been limited by a
voluntary offer‐ system, increasing pressure to open up Mode 3 is now
exerted through FTAs, especially North‐South ones. While FDI can
ostensibly generate access where services are underdeveloped there are several
challenges to consider. FDI in services can threaten access in critical
services such as water, banking, healthcare and education by chasing out public
investment, raising user fees and limiting business to “safe” urban areas
without including rural areas. There is also evidence of FDI threatening jobs
in gender sensitive informal sectors such as retail and waste. In addition
there are serious regulatory issues which are discussed below.
Banking Liberalisation
in India and Credit Access for Women
10 Sengupta amd Sharma
(2009)
11 Sengupta Ranja
(2011), No. 2.
• Foreign banks: 27.8% of activity in
derivatives, stocks etc, 7.9% to credit
• Proportion of women account holders
(23.8%) but disbursement lowest compared to all others (only 7.9%).
• Comparatively Regional Rural Banks
(RRBs) do much better: 25.5% of accounts, 19.6% of credit to women
• Foreign banks avoid risk and
concentrate only in metros (81.4% of branches) and in urban areas (17.9% of
branches).
• Urban lending to women is only 24.4%
of total lending to women and 21.1% of women borrowers
• Foreign Banks lending to Agriculture
sector Is 0.01% (2008, of their total credit), and to SMEs 1.2% (2007, % of
total credit)
Mode 4 or the ‘Movement
of Professionals’ is
of great interest to women care workers.
Currently the global arena
has seen a significant increase in migration of nurses and women care workers.
Most developing countries have a significant interest in this as remittances
form an important chunk of their incomes. This also is meant to balance the
anomaly in encouraging the free trade of goods but not of labour.
Mode 4 could in theory help
women workers like nurses and caregivers by ensuring more jobs, incomes and
better protection. However the framework under which this has evolved under the
WTO and FTAs is very limited. First, Mode 4 is limited to temporary movement, often linked to commercial
presence as a prerequisite. Second, it is limited to skilled professionals only and women domestic workers are not
often considered skilled. As a result most that Mode 4 has seen in recent times
is some very limited advancement in jobs for nurses (e.g. under India‐Japan
FTA) but nothing for care workers is on the card. Third, there are strict
barriers in most countries (Economic Needs Test or ENT, language test, pre
employment requirements, confinement to sector, and an absence of wage parity)
which women migrants often find more difficult to meet. Fourth, most migrant
workers have limited rights, work in the informal sectors and face exploitation
both domestically and abroad (e.g. China’s dagonmei,
Mexican women workers in US) but Mode 4 is unable to address this aspect. There
has also been criticism that Mode 4 has resulted in encouraging sex tourism.
While encouraging Mode 4
could have some benefits for women in developing countries, critics have also
argued that there is a cost to the country of sending workers out. For example,
when health workers go out there can be adverse impact on availability of
health professionals and health services within a country.
Women and the poor will
likely suffer disproportionately from a constraint on quality health services.
So Mode 4 must be promoted to be expansive and effective while keeping domestic
needs in mind.
Intellectual Property
Rights (IPRs) and Access to Medicines
The WTO had established the
TRIPs regime in 1995 and member countries have gradually enacted or amended
their patent and other Intellectual Property (IP) laws in accordance with it.
The increasing recognition of strong IP rights has already increased costs of
many patented drugs. It has also threatened the cheap supply of medicines from
the generic industry based in several countries such as India, China, Thailand,
Brazil and South Africa. In developing countries, often with severely unequal
health indicators and access, this threat to access to medicines is of critical
concern.
Access to medicine and
healthcare has a clear gender component. Women already face lower access to
healthcare and medicines. High maternal mortality in Africa, South Asia and
high undernourishment among women and children in Africa and Asia validate
these concerns. So has been the increase in incidence of HIV/AIDs among women with
lower access to treatment and discrimination. As costs go up women are often
forced to forego treatment, as is clear in the case of HIV infected couples.
Increase in fertility related treatment often at high prices has also been a
specific trend. Prices of treatments for breast cancer has also increased
prohibitively. For example, Trastumazab, a key medicine for breast cancer has
been patented in India and is available at the price of Rs. 124,000 per month
per person where the treatment must continue for 52 weeks. Women in developing
countries both practice and use traditional medicines extensively which can
also be impacted by IPRs.
Under TRIPS, governments were supposed to
provide stricter protection of IP, which has increased medicine prices
worldwide as well as affected access to them in cases of critical diseases.
However innovation (the stated objective of stronger IPRs), especially in
neglected diseases, has not been forthcoming. Still, the TRIPs framework did
offer some flexibility such as provisions for compulsory licensing, parallel
imports of medicines, sui
generis protection
for plants and animals, protection of traditional knowledge, etc.
However under FTAs, especially North‐South FTAs,
developed regions and countries such as the EU and USA often ask developing
partners to make IPR commitments beyond the TRIPS agreement. As a result, the
global IPR system may become even stronger. In addition, several flexibilities
such as compulsory licenses offered by TRIPS are being continuously challenged,
further aggravating the situation. The FTAs often include provisions such as
data exclusivity (DE)12, patent term extension patent
linkage (linking of the patent with marketing rights) and IP enforcement
(including border measures that allow countries to seize critical medicine
supplies in transit for alleged IP violation), among others. In Jordan, DE
provision under an FTA with the US resulted in medicine prices being 200‐600%
higher compared to neighbouring Egypt, where DE was not in operation13.
Intellectual Property
Rights, Traditional Knowledge (TK) and Biodiversity14
Women’s are preservers of
seeds, of traditional systems of cultivation, of biodiversity as they depend
more on these traditional systems and also help to nurture their diversity.
These are under threat from the current IPR systems. Even the way traditional
knowledge is currently being ‘protected’ by the mainstream approach actually
either takes access away from communities, or lures them into the IPR system in
the name of rights, reward or recognition. The IPR system is inadequate to deal
with people's knowledge systems, which neither privatised the knowledge nor
were based on individual inventorship. For most local groups and women their
know‐how of the living world is intellectual heritage and not
intellectual property. Despite what is said globally and nationally about
patents, plant variety protection, geographical indications, etc. mere
accommodating women within them does not effect real justice to them. For
example, the relation of India's Biological Diversity Act with these IPR laws
has to be critically viewed, as this conservation law is also fast becoming a
venue to approve IPR applications on India's biological resources and related
knowledge.
Conditions on
Investment, Investment Agreements and Policy Space
The sections above
highlight how FDI can pose specific gender concerns in developing countries.
However there are two important areas of concern related to FDI focused on the
specific mechanisms through which FDI enters into a country. This relates to
the terms and conditions of bringing in FDI which could be through investment
protection agreements, trade and investment agreements, or through autonomous
routes.
The first relates to the
fact that conditions on FDI, referred to as performance requirements (PRS) are
getting increasingly diluted globally, either through the governments’
autonomous policies or through investment chapters in Free Trade Agreements.
For example, in India the conditions imposed on allowing FDI into multibrand
retail (a recently announced and very controversial policy shift) are already
getting diluted. Many governments have also increasingly removed conditions
related to mandatory technology transfer, very important for domestic growth
and also for creating opportunities in SMEs where a lot of women work as
entrepreneurs and employees.
The second concern stems
from the rapid growth of Bilateral Investment Treatments (BITs) and Bilateral
Investment Promotion and Protection Agreesments (BIPAs), which do not give
market access to investors but gives them very strong protection and legal
rights. While this is seen by many as necessary for attracting FDI, others
argue that this has severely limited the policy space of governments to
regulate in national interest.
Under BITs / BIPAs, foreign
investors have the right to sue national governments in secret arbitration
cases in international tribunals if they perceive any violation of their
investment. Several public interest regulations by governments across the world
have been challenged. For example, Phillip Morris has sued a number of
governments including Australia and Uruguay for trying to bring about plain
packaging on tobacco packs. This is already acting as severe policy deterrence
and has the potential to freeze policy regulation in the future and poses a
significant challenge to future regulations that may adversely affect women’s
rights and space.
12 Under DE, national
regulators cannot refer to trial data submitted by the original manufacturer to
grant marketing rights to a generic producer for a certain period of time. So
generic producers will now have to submit their own data and repeat clinical
trials if they have to enter the market.
13 (Oxfam 2007)
14 This section draws
on Shalini Bhutani (2011), “IPRs, Bio diversity and Traditional Knowledge”, at
Workshop for the Media on
“International
Trade and Gender Dynamics in India”, organized by CLRA, Centad, TWN and HBF, 10
August 2012, New Delhi.
For instance, it may become
difficult for governments to bring in future policy regulation in areas where
regulation is still weak, for example surrogacy laws and medical tourism, which
impact women significantly.
Another critical area to be
affected by BITs and BIPAs is natural resources, which women traditionally use
and depend on. The majority of the known outstanding investor‐state cases
under US’ FTAs and BITs (totalling $11 billion in claims) relate to natural
resource policies. Nearly half of the 129 cases pending before the World Bank’s
investment dispute facility relate to natural resources. Burlington Resources Vs. Ecuador, pending, reveals conflicts
between government duties to protect human and indigenous rights, on the one
hand, and obligations to protect foreign investors. Public health and environment regulations, areas on
which women and children are critically dependent, are also being challenged
globally. For example, in the case of Renco Vs.
Peru, lead poisoning of 162 La Oroyan children led to the Peruvian government
taking measures against the company but Renco sued Peru for 800 million USD
under the US‐Peru FTA.
Policy Options
There is an increasing loss
of policy space from various directions for governments to enact policies in
social needs. For example, one might consider the loss of tariff revenue that
can lead to lower spending on social sectors, or the loss of access for weaker
sections of the population. Governments are also losing the space to protect
natural resources and keep control in communities; among other relevant policy
restrictions that impose pressure to ensure women’s interests and their
development.
From an overview of issues,
it is also evident that while goods trade has its own challenges, trade’s
movement beyond goods may not always be beneficial to women, and gender
insensitivity is often more intrinsic in these issues. There is therefore need
for higher regulation and monitoring of these areas for gender impacts. There
is a need to focus government policies to address disparities (in resources,
skills, etc.) and protect sectors and workers until these are addressed. There
is a dire need to address labour concerns and in particular the casualisation
of work. There is also the need for social rotection measures with gender
specific focus. Finally it is of critical importance to assess what kind of
development parameters we need in place before we can go in for rapid
liberalization that affects specific groups in very particular ways. There are
certain policy options that can be pursued at national or global levels in
order to take these concerns into account:
Changes in trade and investment
policy: At national
and global levels, monitor gender impacts and take protective measures where
impacts are expected to be harmful; not compromise governments’ policy space to
regulate in interests of vulnerable sections; strengthen and implement
countries’ extra territorial obligations; identify and protect gender sensitive
products; ease processes (waiving of license and other fees), create Research
and Development resources for women entrepreneurs, credit and marketing
facilities, etc.
Changes in domestic macroeconomic policies: Create public employment; gender
mainstreaming of macro economic policy design; implement preferential policies
across sectors; planned investment in creating infrastructure; facilitate
access to technology and ensure access to common natural resources
Changes in labour and social
policies: Update
labour laws and labour standards including wage uniformity policy; implement
regulations on working conditions, social security law for unorganised workers,
maternity benefits, public facilities for crèche and
schools for women workers’ children; invest in nutrition, health and education.
These will also help boost demand and create market.
Need for deeper introspection for
protection of women:
Implement policies focused on changing social mindsets through education,
awareness building, etc.
Develop women’s political empowerment and decision‐making content in all forms of policymaking, especially external sector policies.
Recommendations related
to international trade and investment issues for a Post 2015 Agenda
Based on the analyses
above, some recommendations are provided below. The list is ambitious but the
issues of international policy go to the heart of gender relations and impact
multiple aspects of people’s lives. Some indicators are cross cutting and
may appear more than once. The recommendations place significant
attention on the global policy framework but include national and local level
interventions as well. The list is indicative and certainly not exhaustive.
1. Framework
Inter‐weave
gender dimensions in all goals;
and especially under global cooperation for development (MGD Goal 8) or under
“Create a Global Enabling Environment and Catalyze Long‐Term Finance”
(Goal 12 of the HLP Report). Simultaneously interweave international components under the gender
related goals (e.g.
Goal 2 of the HLP Report) but also in other goals, for example, in goals
related to employment
(Goal 8 of the HLP
Report), food
security and nutrition (Goal
5) of the HLP Report).
Address global framework and
structural issues as
intrinsic to attainment of all goals.
Try to influence policymaking at all levels: National/state, trade
policy/domestic policy, other
Use indicators that lend themselves
to more
disaggregated analyses
Promote gender specific impact
analyses and research on
trade and investment policies
2. Specific Issues
Acknowledge and address the link
between international issues and gender relations
Strengthen Goal 8, make it
accountable and undertake meaningful reform of global trade, finance,
investment, IPR rules (and
associated technology transfer arrangements) so that policy space of national
governments to monitor and regulate such arrangements in public interest, e.g.
protecting public health, environment, natural resources, and in the interest
of gender and social justice is protected;
Apply the Maastricht Principles on Extraterritorial
Obligations of States in
the area of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in the application of trade
and investment agreements
Ensure Means of Implementation (MOI) with every gender related goal and
target (as well as with other goals).
Allow conditions (performance
requirements) to be imposed on FDI,
whether autonomous or through international agreements, so that it serves the
interests of the host country, especially a developing country: FDI should
mandatorily create jobs, transfer technology and transmit skills and practices
from which the recipient population can benefit. Conditions can also be imposed
to address the issues of inequalities that may stem from the natural operation
of FDI (e.g. not going to rural areas).
Women’s work in sectors linked to
international trade and investment
Strengthen or add targets and
indicators on wage
inequality, job segregation, informalisation / casualisation of work, job
benefits including
maternity benefits in export based sectors;
Ensure access to productive resources (physical, financial and human) such
as land, water, credit, infrastructure, skills and technology for women by
making public investment in these areas, if needed;
Enact policies including external
sector policies to protect
and promote women’s entrepreneurship especially
in SMEs with access to credit, infrastructure , technology, and market access
on fair terms.
Recognise care work as critical to survival of the
economy and society, and promote means to ease the burden of care work (e.g. by
necessarily providing public services/sourcing of healthcare, education,
energy, water)
Provide strong social protection/security,
safety net addressing
the needs of vulnerable and marginalised groups and provision of public
services.
Women’s Access to Resources and
Critical Services
Promote women's equitable access to and control over resources
regarding the use
of land, property, water, ocean, forests, and other forms of natural resources.
Ensure women’s access to agriculture and food sources, including the access to
seeds, to cultivate, to gather from common resources.
Ensure women’s access to knowledge, including traditional knowledge,
intellectual and cultural property and therefore to develop national/ local IPR
strategies in keeping with needs of specific groups.
Ensure that trade and investment
policies do not impede women’s access to basic services including quality education and skill development opportunities;
healthcare including access to medicines;
women’s sexual and reproductive healthcare including safe abortion, and
maternity care, Sexually Transmitted Infections and HIV prevention and
treatment; to safe and accessible drinking
water; and to
sustainable and affordable energy
sources.
Ensure external sector policies and
global rules do not impede on governments’
policy space to support large scale public programmes to ensure basic human sustenance and
well being, such as food, health, education etc, especially of vulnerable
groups
Actively penalize harmful FDI in activities that affect the health
of people and women, and the environment. Specific areas could be mining,
nuclear energy, and chemicals.15
3. Strengthen the
Institutional Framework
Include economic and democratic governance
of international policies at
both global, national and if needed, at local levels, and address gender
specific concerns within this framework. This includes strengthening
transparency, accountability and review mechanisms at national levels (such as
local government review, parliamentary processes, independent review commission
etc), as well as global levels (UN bodies, International Financial
Institutions, etc.).
Involve participation of CSOs, in particular, women’s groups, in
trade and investment policymaking and in the process of reviews.
Design indicators such that policies that aim to
achieve them do not have retrograde impacts.
References
and resources:
Cagatay
Nilufer (1998) “Gender and Poverty”, UNDP WP‐5, Social Development and
Poverty Elimination Division, May, Francis
Taylor
Group, 2007. ISBN 978 0 415 43637 3
Jhabvala,
Renana (2003) “Globalization, Liberalization and Women in the Informal Economy”
in Veena Jha (ed) Trade,
Globalisation,
and
Gender: Evidence from South Asia, UNIFEM in collaboration with UNCTAD, New
Delhi
Oxfam
(2007) ‘All Costs, No Benefits: How Trips‐Plus Intellectual Property
Rules in The Us‐Jordan FTA Affect Access To Medicines’,
Oxfam
Briefing Paper, March
Randriamaro,
Zo (2006) “Gender and Trade: Overview Report”, Bridge.
Sengupta,
Ranja and Ashutosh Sharma (2009) The EU India FTA in Services and Impact on
Women in India: Concern Areas, Centre
for Trade
and Development and Heinrich Boell Foundation, New Delhi, December. Available
at http://www.boellindia.
org/web/112‐536.html
Sengupta
Ranja and others (2011) HBF‐TWN Trade and Gender Briefs, Vol. 1‐5,
published by Heinrich Boell Foundation and Third
World
Network, New Delhi.
Speildoch,
Alexandra (2004) ‘NAFTA Through a Gender Lens: What "Free Trade"
Pacts Mean for Women’, Centre of Concern and
IGTN
Working Paper
Stephanie
Seguino & Caren Grown (2006) "Gender equity and globalization:
macroeconomic policy for developing countries,"
Journal of
International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 18(8), pages 1081‐1104
Tran‐Nguyen,
A‐N and A Beviglia Zampetti (2004) Trade and Gender: Opportunities and
Challenges for Developing Countries,
UNCTAD,
Geneva
UNCTAD
(2009) Mainstreaming Gender in Trade Policy: Case Studies, UNCTAD, Geneva
UNDP (2005)
“The Great Maze Regional and Bilateral Free Trade Agreements in Asia: Trends,
Characteristics, and Implications for
Human
Development”, Policy Paper, Asia‐Pacific Trade and Investment Initiative,
UNDP Regional Centre in Colombo, December.
UNDP
(2007) “Gender Dimensions of Intellectual Property and Traditional Medicinal
Knowledge”, Ediscussion Paper, Asia‐Pacific
Trade and
Investment Initiative, UNDP Regional Centre, Colombo
Van
Staveren, Irene, Diane Elson, Caren Grown and Nilufer Cagatay (eds.) (2007) The
Feminist Economics of Trade, Colchest:
Williams,
M (2003) Gender Mainstreaming in the Multilateral Trading System, Commonwealth
Secretariat, London
15 Women’s Group Statement, Conference on “Advancing the Post 2015 Sustainable Development Agenda”, available in section 4 of this publication
__________________________________________________________
ILO - International Labour
Organization
SOCIAL DIMENSIONS OF FREE TRADE
AGREEMENTS
Direct Link to Full 130-Page 2013
ILO Report:
Labour
standards increasingly included in bilateral and regional free trade
agreements. A new ILO report shows free trade agreements with measures relating
to labour standards are on the rise and recommends measures to improve their
effectiveness.
07
November 2013 - GENEVA (ILO News) – The number of trade agreements that include
labour provisions has increased significantly over the past two decades,
according to a new report by the International Labour Organization (ILO).
The report on the Social
Dimensions of Free Trade Agreements says that there has been a
substantial growth in the number of trade agreements featuring labour-related
measures since the mid-1990s, including more ‘South-South agreements’ between
developing countries.
In total, there were 58 agreements with labour provisions in June 2013 – almost
a quarter of the total 248 trade agreements currently in force. These have
included provisions on minimum working conditions, enforcement of national
labour laws, as well as monitoring and enforcing labour standards.
“The increasing number of trade agreements which include provisions with
respect to labour standards is a reflection of the growing awareness that trade
liberalization, important as it is, should go hand-in-hand with progress on the
employment and social front,” said Raymond Torres, Director, in charge of the
ILO Research Department.
In some cases, the improvement of labour standards has been made a condition
for the entry-into-force of agreements between countries. In the last six of
seven US trade agreements, some improvements in labour standards were made
prior to their coming into force.
In almost 60 per cent of cases, the agreements promote compliance with labour
standards, without direct commercial or financial consequences attached to
them. This often involves cooperation between partner countries to improve
working conditions and commitments to maintain labour standards.
The report says that none of the agreements studied show signs of protectionism
by the governments concerned. In all cases where issues were raised regarding
the alleged non-compliance with a given labour provision, a significant effort
was made to resolve the issue without resorting to sanctions. Indeed, no
dispute regarding labour provisions has given rise to sanctions so far.
Effectiveness
of labour provisions
The sheer variety of labour clauses with different legal and institutional
implications makes it difficult to generalize about their effects.
According to the report, when conditions are applied at the pre-ratification
stage, they sometimes lead to significant changes in labour legislation, such
as improvements in labour inspection or the adoption of new legal protections,
especially in the area of freedom of association.
When they are introduced after the deal has been signed, complaint mechanisms
sometimes helped to ensure compliance with existing labour laws. In addition,
there has often been a wide range of cooperative activities among signatory
parties after ratification. For example the MERCOSUR* Regional
Plan on Labour Inspection has triggered joint inspection activities, often
facilitating improvements in national practice.
The report suggests several avenues for improving the effectiveness of labour
provisions in trade agreements, including: