Unpaid, unaccounted domestic work accounts for 48pc of GDP

Unpaid and unaccounted domestic work accounts for nearly 48 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) and women's contribution to this unaccounted labour market is more than 81 per cent, according to a study.
South Asian Network on Economic Modeling (SANEM) in partnership with Manusher Jonno Foundation (MJF) has assessed the monetary value through developing a methodology under satellite accounting.
While sharing the methodology, first of its kind in the country, during a national dialogue on Monday, speakers called for recognition of such kind of work through making proper policy to promote dignity of non-labour market work in the GDP and its inclusion in the gender budget.
SANEM and MJF jointly organised the dialogue on "Recognition of Women's Unaccounted Work in National GDP and Include in Gender Responsive Budgeting".
Dr Atiur Rahman, Honorary Professor of Development Studies at Dhaka University and Chairperson of Unnayan Shamannay, attended the programme as a guest of honour.
Dr Selim Raihan, economics professor at Dhaka University and Executive Director of SANEM, and Shaheen Anam, Executive Director of MJF, co-chaired the dialogue.
SANEM Research Director Dr Sayema Haque Bidisha and Research Economist Zubayer Hossen elaborated the model based on average hour, wage and population through satellite account for Bangladesh.
Senior Research Fellow of BIDS Dr Nazneen Ahmed, Prof Rumana Huque of DU Economics Department, and Gender Statistics Specialist of UN Women Tengiz Tsekvava also spoke on the occasion.
Dr Atiur expressed the hope that the study findings will help develop physiological reflection in budget preparation for different sectors and projects including gender budget allocation and statistics will help clear many conceptions.
"Policy level recognition helps bring changes in many ways," he said praising the method as SANEM has tried to make data and information on women's unaccounted work credible and valuable.
Dr Selim Raihan highlighted the importance of the valuation of non-labour market household care work not only to acknowledge women's contribution but also to break stagnation in women's participation in labour force market.
"We see the participation of female labour force remains stagnant with 36 per cent since 2010 while male participation is above 80 per cent. The problem is not only on supply side of the labour force market, but also on the demand side. The main issue regarding the supply side is the household care burden carried out by women," he added.
He hoped that perception on women domestic work will also be changed through more data and study breaking male-dominated perception on accounting labour force market.
Shaheen Anam laid importance on recognising women's unpaid household work to eliminate discrimination and violence against women.
She also called for inclusion of unaccounted and unpaid work into budget in recognition of women's contribution at home.
"We need political commitment to acknowledge and dignity of women's work which is not transaction in the labour market," the MJF executive director added.
Dr Sayema Haque Bidisha said women's economic contribution is recognised in paid work and unpaid family work to some extent, but a lot of effort and time is needed to focus women's contribution to unpaid, unrecognised and unaccounted domestic work which is not represented in the GDP and in the market.
She said only recognition can help reduce the burden of unpaid and unaccounted work and redistribute those work to increase representation. "It takes up a lot of effort and time to ensure representation in the GDP and in the market."
Mr Zubayer Hossen briefed on the SANEM methodology to calculate proxy pricing. Among two types of satellite accounting approaches, he said, specialised replacement cost method is applied using Time Use Survey Data of 2012 and Bangladesh Labour Force Survey Data of 2016-17.
"Approximately 17 per cent to 45 per cent of GDP accounts for unpaid and unaccounted domestic work in different countries," said Mr Hossen.
Dr Nazneen hoped that the SANEM methodology will help find contributions of women through valuing unpaid work and comparing it with GDP, saying that there is still need to work on the methodology to make it more acceptable and credible.

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