Gender equity: ‘Govt, businesses could collaborate on setting up day care centres’

Participants discuss need for child care facilities to help mainstream women in the workplace.

LAHORE: The government, civil society, labour organisations and the International Labour Organisation must work together to formulate a coherent mechanism to deal with the issue of child care facilities at the workplace, participants at a roundtable discussion hosted by the ILO said on Friday.

A representative of Pangea (an NGO) presented a feasibility study on establishing day care facilities for low-income households. His study was conducted in Kot Lakhpat in Lahore and Korangi in Karachi. He said most of the residents stressed the need for such facilities because in most cases both parents worked during the day and did not want to have to rely on leaving their children with elderly relatives or parents.

He said the parents, he interviewed, on average were willing to pay between Rs500 and Rs700 for the facility. He said his research showed that employers were willing to provide day care facilities, but a major hindrance was the acceptance of liability of harm that might come to the child. He said if a model to share liability could be agreed upon, most employers said they would facilitate setting up day cares.

He said a model of public-private partnership would be more viable. “The government and the employer could invest the initial capital and an independent company, with a board of directors, could manage and regulate its day-to-day operations. He suggested that parents could pay a fee to ensure that the day care centres remained functional.

An ILO representative stressed the importance of setting up informal day care centres. She quoted an example from Bolivia where the government trained women to take care of groups of 15 children. She said such models were easier to replicate in Pakistan. She said NGOS could help in training such helpers. NGOs in India have managed to set up a more successful model than the government, she said.

A Womens Department representative highlighted various legal provisions that stressed the importance of establishing day care centres. He said the government had provided loans to various organisations for this purpose. The government incurs 30 per cent of the cost for day care, he said.

The roundtable discussion was held to help the ILO representative understand the social and political situation; and the level of awareness regarding day care centres.  She said the ILO promoted gender equity in the labour market. “Since child care is still considered the woman’s problem, establishing day care centres will be essential to helping women play an active role in the work place.”

Published in The Express Tribune, February 21^st, 2015.