GENEVA, 25 November 2013 (ICMC) – In the Punjab province of Pakistan, the country’s most populated region, the International Catholic Migration Commission (ICMC) helps vulnerable women earn better wages and access decent work opportunities by joining cooperative centres.

Rukhsana, her husband, and their three young children were living in a rented one-room home and struggling to afford basic necessities. She looked for a solution to her family’s financial difficulties. Yet, without an education, she joined the more than 12.5 million women in Pakistan who are home-based workers, and started making embroidery pieces for clothing that were then sold through middlemen.

Home-based or casual women workers performing such tasks as embroidery, carpet weaving, and woodwork make up more than two thirds of Pakistan’s urban informal workforce, according to the International Labour Organization<. They are among the poorest of the already vulnerable informal workers; they lack bargaining power due to their isolation and the small quantities they produce, and are often at the mercy of unscrupulous middlemen. Yet, in developing countries especially, their work can help keep a family out of poverty – even if it is precarious and paid 60 per cent less than men’s.

To give them a voice and jointly address the key obstacles they face, ICMC established 10 cooperatives where home-based workers can thus work together, gain access to specialized tools, and engage in collective bargaining. Through the establishment of these cooperatives, ICMC helped empower over 350 home-based women workers in Punjab.

Cooperating for bargaining power and benefits

Like all informal workers, home-based workers are not legally protected nor entitled to social security or other worker benefits. Having to work through a subcontractor, home-based workers also have little control over working conditions, hours or wages, which are as a result substandard. Many work up to 16 hours every day, reportedly <earning between Rs. 10 and 50 a day (US$0.50).

By directly marketing their own production, cooperatives help workers circumvent middlemen and improve their working conditions. Cooperative members receive vocational training in practical skills such as embroidery or hosiery to help improve the quality of their work and value of their products. ICMC’s project team also helped cooperatives make business connections by organizing meetings with retailers, raw material suppliers and other business representatives.

Rukhsana’s life has changed since she joined the Umeed Home-Based Women Workers Cooperative Centre, established in February 2012 by ICMC and its local partner the Sarsabz Foundation<. Rukhsana used to earn Rs. 1500 – Rs. 2000 ($24-32 USD) a month, which was hardly enough to live on. Now that she has become a supervisor of the cooperative, her monthly wage has quadrupled to Rs. 8000 ($128 USD).

“I get regular and well-paid work – I can now afford to pay for my children’s English medium school,” said Rukhsana. “I have learned a lot and my confidence has grown.”

In October, the cooperatives also opened “Embellish”, a shop for the cooperatives to display their production of clothes, scarves, bags, accessories and jewellery. Here they can sell products directly to customers and further increase workers’ income.

The cooperatives also give home-based workers invaluable access to a network of service providers – to assist with legal counselling, schooling, healthcare and childcare – with whom ICMC has negotiated special agreements and reduced fees.

The cooperatives also give home-based workers invaluable access to a network of service providers and legal counselling, with whom ICMC has negotiated special agreements, as well as reduced school fees, and health and child care.

Each cooperative is run by a committee that received small-business management training to ensure that it becomes self-sufficient after ICMC completes the project next month.

The project was conducted with funding from the United States Department of State’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor.

-- by Vanessa Matyas in Geneva/lb

Photocredit © ICMC / 2013