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2.  Background:
› Since 2000 there are two law projects in the Congress that sought to
extend maternity leave permits and breastfeeding benefits.
› Women organizations demanded equal rights in terms of permits for
maternity and paternity leaves as well as breastfeeding benefits for
workers of the private sector and the public sector and respect the
14 weeks of permit established by the ILO:
 Maternity leave: private sector 12 weeks and public sector 13 weeks.
 Breastfeeding rights: private sector two halve hours ad public sector half of a
working day while the mother is breastfeeding.
 Paternity leave: private sector 3 calendar days and public sector 10 working days.
 In 2010 the MTSS developed a law project to match the rights of hired
workers of the private sector with the rights of employees of he public
sector, extend paternity leave permits and include amongst the
beneficiaries, mean and women micro-entrepreneurs that contribute
to social security. However, the initiative didn’t achieved the support of
the Ministry of Economy and Finances and the issue was not discussed
anymore.
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3.  MTSS resumes the issue in 2012 thanks to its inclusion in the
proposal of the current government to build a National
Care System that will provide benefits and services for the
care of he most dependable persons (children from 0 to 12
years old, specially children under 3 years old, the elderly and
dependent disabled persons).
 There was a first estimate of the cost of the law project
proposed by this government in 2010.
 The financial support of the UNFPA allowed to:
› Extend the study by not only carrying out the costing of different
policy options but also;
› Incorporation of the necessary arguments to understand that
these policies don’t necessarily promote discrimination against
women and that in the current situation or scarce qualified
workforce in Uruguay, it is not a cost but and investment.
› Progressive vision: it allow to replaces the right of breastfeeding
for a parental permit.
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4. Alliances
 In order to begin the work of the MTSS we proposed to interview
the MEF to have is impression about the previous project and his
opinion about the possible risks of the project and its impact on
gender equality.
 The consultant proposed an interview with :
› TheGender Equality Department of the PIT-CNT (the union central
organization)
› The National Institute of Women.
› Both organizations drafted a joint alternative before the proposal of the
MTSS in the context of the law project of 2010 that was raised by the
minister trough the Tripartite Commission for Equal Opportunities and
Employment.
 The Entrepreneurial Representative of the Institute of Social
Securitywas also interviewed to get to know her opinion about
the law project and the proposed alternatives.
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5.  Results of the interviews :
› We identified the concerns of actors, which
should be addressed in the report.
› The incorporation of the proposed PIT-CNT
and the National Institute for Women as
alternative scenario.
› Convincing the MTSS about the need to
extend maternity leave permits to 14 weeks
in order to have the support of these two
organizations.
› Put different views into dialogue.
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6. How was the costing carried out technically?
 Methodology: simulation of five scenarios based on
the information for the year 2011.
 Information about the Continued Home Survey that
contains data about the characteristics of
employment, income and small children under one
year old.
 Themethodology consisted in:
1. Disaggregating the different occupation categories and,
within them, clasiffy the size of the company (if the
employee is also the owner) and social security institution to
which they contribute.
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7. 2. Identification of their salary incomes (wetter it the
primary or secondary occupation).
3. Identification of men and women with children under
one year old (at home).
4. Five alternative scenarios were defined and used to
estimate the additional cost of the project, e.i., the
additional cost of permits per population group.
How was the costing exercise articulated with the planning
and budgeting processes?
o It was not articulated, this was not planned.
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8.  The results were presented in a public activity in the
MTSS and this presentation had a very large media
coverage (radio, newspapers and television, in
both general information and in depth programs).
(in March/2013)
 The discussion about the law was resumed in the
Social Cabinet and the ratification of the
Agreement 183 was promoted.
 After a few months of exchange with the MEF the
consolidation of an agreement was achieved by
August in order to introduce the law project into
the Parliament.
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9.  Challenges:
› Design of the methodology due to the difficulties
involved in emulating reality and the limitations in
terms of available information.
› To convince the MTSS and the Ministry of Economy
and Finances (MEF) of the accuracy of results.
 Obstacles: non-existent.
 Strategies to overcome them:
› To maintain technicians of the MTSS involved in the
design of the simulation (trough consultations and
the validation of the process).
› To keep on having exchange meetings from the
beginning of the process.
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10.  Lessons learned:
› Thepositive effect of having interviewed different actors
involved was that it allowed to draw a report that sought to
give answers to different concerns and opened the
possibility of generating strategic alliances between actors
and smooth relationships (between the MTSS and Women
Organizations).
› The benefit of using an intuitive methodology is that it
allowed an easy understanding of the general public.
 Recommendations:
› Keep on carrying out efforts to demonstrate that gender
equality policies are an investment and a necessity that
helps the hole system to contribute to general wellbeing.
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