Presentation on gender and waste-picking in Brazil by Sonia Maria Dias (WIEGO) for a workshop on Gender and Environmental Change held by IIED in London, UK on 17-18 March 2014. For more info: http://iied.org/gender

1. Gendered Waste Pickers Perspective
Sonia Dias
WIEGO Waste Specialist/Associate Researcher NEPEM
IIED Gender & Environmental Change Conference
London, 17-18 March 2014

2. 1.WASTE PICKERS : FACTS, CONTRIBUTION AND
THREATS
2. WASTE PICKERS AND GENDER
3.PARTICIPATORY ACTION RESEARCH
-BRAZILIAN WOMEN
4. FOOD FOR THOUGHT
OUTLINE
5.CONCLUSIONS

3. -There are millions of waste pickers
around the world saving the planet
by: recycling; by creating their own
green jobs; and sustaining the entire
recycling industry.
-According to WB estimates, 1- 2% of
the urban working poor earn a living
by handling waste.
-2010 UN Habitat publication2010 UN Habitat publication: waste
pickers perform between 50-100 per
cent of all ongoing waste collection
in most cities in developing countries
– at no cost to the city budget.
FACTS
1. WASTE PICKERS – FACTS, CONTRIBUTION & THREATS

4. - A significant number of waste pickers are
women, and some are children. In some
cities in India, for example, about 80 per
cent of the waste pickers are women; in
Brazil, a small-scale study found that 56
per cent of waste picker organizations’
members are women.
-Recycling: one of the cheapest, quickest
and easiest ways to reduce greenhouse
gas emissions.
FACTS
Woman waste picker from SWaCH Cooperative, Pune -India

5. The high rates of recovery (50-80%)
in some cities are due to informal
recyclers’ work and are a “positive
externality which the municipality
enjoys without having to pay for it
because the environmental gain is a
by-product of the economic interests
of informal recyclers” (WATSAN
2010: 131).
Nevertheless,Nevertheless, they are treated as
nuisances by authorities and with
disdain by the public; face
exploitation and intimidation by
middlemen; have the lowest pay in
the recycling chain; loose their
livelihoods in privatization
processes.
WASTE PICKERS’ CONTRIBUTION
1. WASTE PICKERS – FACTS, CONTRIBUTION & THREATS
Biffins, Paris Canpickers, NY
Ressurgence of picking of recyclables in cities of the
Global North

6. Voices from the Ground - Threats
I have been working at the dumping ground in
Ahmedabad for 30 years. My mother-in-law
picked waste for a living, and so does my
daughter-in-law…
There is less waste and less money now
and more wastepickers. We have no
access to waste, most of which goes into
the new company. Door to door collection
has now started and we have not been included
in it.
The new company employs outsiders for
work, but they do not employ us, why is
that? Our sons know driving too, why not
employ them?
Kanta Narsingh , woman waste picker - SEWA
ASIA- India, Ahmedabad LANDFILL

7. Voices from the Ground - Threats
There are 1200 wastepickers working at the
dumpsite and 800 are members of Book
Diomm, our organization was created in 1995.
The Municipality said the dumpsite will be
closed this year and they proposed the
creation of a «recycling center» for 350 waste
pickers including housing, health- care center,
restaurant...BUT we need to pay in order to
have access to it!
We still may have 700 waste pickers
unemployed after the dumpsite gets closed...
Aliou Faye – wp vicepresident Book Diomm
AFRICA- Senegal, Mobeubeuss LANDFILL

8. Why a Gendered Approach to Waste?
2. Waste and Gender
 Women might not be allowed access to recyclables with the
highest value.
 Women may not occupy positions of authority within their
communities, or may not be respected fully when holding those
positions.
 Asymmetrical power relations at the household level affect
women’s abilities to take part in public committees or to exercise
leadership within their representative organizations due to
barriers that prevent women from involvement in the public
realm.
 Women are responsible for raising children and maintaining the
household, limiting their time and energy for taking up leadership
opportunities.
 When waste picking activity is formalized, women often do not
enjoy the same opportunities as men for fair earnings. Waste
pickers in formalized situation: 80% are men and 20% women
(RAIS database, 2006 - Brazil)


9. Waste & Gender – an invisible issue....
3. Participatory Action Research, Brazil
 Despite the growing number of studies that
focus on solid waste, there are very few that
seek to understand the gender dynamics and
sexual division of labor involved in waste
picking activities.
 Leadership empowerment of women - still
largely ignored at the national movements
of waste pickers: “we are very active at our
coops but when it comes to power positions
at the national movement we face
constraints” (woman leader in LA).
 BUT… In Nicaragua 2012 the LA network of
waste pickers raised the issue and a pilot
Gender & Waste Research Action Project wasGender & Waste Research Action Project was
born.born.

10. Made with Office Timeline 2010 www.officetimeline.com
' 11 feb
2011
may aug nov
feb
2012
may aug ' 12
Feedback
session at
L&C Festival
Informal talks at the national women´s meeting in Curitiba
Half day workshop with
women at Insea with
women from Redesol &
Cataunidos
Informal talks with
women from Redesol &
Cataunidos
Nicaragua meeting
First talks with women
Various meetings with women
leaders" - June 2012 till Aug 2012
Participatory project drafting - June –
Sept 2012
Literature review: June-August 12
Gender Waste Project Timeline – Framing the Project

11. 2013:Waste & Gender Project is born - Goals
1. To provide women with the tools to work
towards equality in the workplace and their
personal lives in order to strengthen their
capacities and voices;
2. To identify women´s practical and strategic
needs;
3. To increase women’s leadership roles in waste
picker representative organizations; and within
the National Waste Pickers Movement/LA
network.
4. To contribute to the economic, political
and symbolic empowerment of women waste
pickers.
Empowerment can only occur if gender planning addresses a full
range of issues in which women are subordinated, encompassing
the economic and political dimensions, but the physical and
symbolic as well (Wieringa, 1998).

12. 2013 – Project in Motion: 4 Regional
Exploratory Workshops

13. Based on our Experience....
4. FOOD FOR THOUGHT
 Relevance of other factors of exclusion: not only sexual differences but also class,
race, caste, and age… matters. However, an holistic approach is easier said
than done. Research: is needed to explore learnings (methodologies/constraints)
from projects which aims to have a multi-pronged approach: economic, symbolic,
cultural & political dimensions.
 Participatory approach has never been so praised. Still donors, international
agencies and researchers seldom allow “pedagogical” time for women to get
involved from the outset of projects, i.e. in the design phases. We often forget that
poor women are overloaded and need time to be active participants. Empowered
participation goes beyond consultation or information sharing to ensure active
involvement of communities and MBOs (as much as possible from the very
beginning of project – its drafting). HOW MUCH ARE WE COMMITTED TO
CHANGE THE PROJECT DRIVEN PATTERNS OF OUR ORGANIZATIONS TO
ALLOW REAL, EMPOWERED PARTICIPATION?
 Transformation happens at the local level but “translocal links” might be also
relevant. Links between women in Belo Horizonte with women in Bogota has
inspired cross- polination of ideas and practices. We need to follow up and deepen
the understanding of trans-local links.

14. Transformative Politics?
• The informal Global Alliance of Waste pickers has been very active in
the most important talks about climate change since COP 5.
• Award winning women leaders such as Nohra Padilla from Colombia
and Monica Santos from Brazil amongst others are at the forefront of
this struggle. These women are challenging hegemonic models of SW
provision and thus hegemonic development models.
• HOW MUCH ARE WE CHALLENGING HEGEMONIC MODELS IN OUR
WORK? How much of our work has been trully transformative?
• Should we (and if so, how) challenge power hierarchies (which
impedes women empowerment) within organizations and
movements we work with when the very survival of our own
organizations depends on the links we have with these groups since
we fund raise to do work with them which keep us in the business of
consulting/research etc?

15. Research Agenda
5. Conclusions
• We need a better understanding of the ways livelihood systems are constitutive
of wider socio-economic and political processes, as well as understanding of how
macro-economic and political driving forces affects the livelihoods of informal
waste pickers and women in particular.
• At WIEGO in the case of waste pickers, to date a lot of our effort has been in
support of both men and women waste pickers, and their MBOs, because there is
a threat to the occupation as a whole. We are know beginning to address gender
issues but we need to deepen our understanding on how women not only are
affected by gender discrimination, but how they can also confront it within the
occupation as a whole and within their representative organizations.
• Comparative research on advantages/disadvantages of different organizational
forms (associations/coops/micro enterprises/unions) might be useful to
understand which (if any) is more favourable to women waste pickers.

16. … the millions of informal
waste workers around the
world demand:
respect andrespect and
ComprehensiveComprehensive
policiespolicies
Thanks!
sonia.dias@wiego.org and soniamdias2010@gmail.com
For examples visit:
www.wiego.org
www.inclusivecities.org