Women become more vulnerable, losing job in pandemic period: Study

Staff Reporter :
Speakers at a workshop said that informal sector workers, mostly domestic workers first lost their jobs during the pandemic period as no household allowed them to enter residences as suspicious virus careers.
The second the services sector, including construction and self-employed people, lost their working opportunities due to lockdown and the low pace of construction works, they said.
The speaker highlighted this in a workshop on “promoting decent work and women’s rights in the backdrop of Covid-19” which revealed a study of the findings on the job situation of informal sector workers during the pandemic period.
The study report was prepared by Workers Resource Centre (WRC), a labour right organisation with the assistance of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) and Japan’s Multi-lateral programme.
“Government and other support from social organisations did not reach these poor and most vulnerable groups. The tragedy was that when they go for support at their Local Authority, they were deprived of relief program,” the study found.
Showing different causes such as women workers struggle and insecurity at the workplace during Covid pandemic was higher than that of male workers. At that time, many violences and harassment incidences were reported, the report said.
Dr. Md Moslem Uddin Sadeque, consultant of ILO, Shusuk Oyobe, programme manager of PRS, Gunjan D Dallakoti, ILO official, Saif Mohammad Moinul Islam, senior program officer, ILO-Dhaka office, among others spoke in the function.
Representatives of different labour organisations, journalists, trade body representative from BGMEA, BKMEA, and household workers also joined the programme.