Gender and the Environment Relationship

ENS 458 GENDER AND
THE ENVIRONMENT
Assignment 2
UNIVERSITY OF BOTSWANA
ENS 458: PART II DR MOSETLHI
Empirical Basis of Gender & Environment
Relationship:
Author: Mr Koketso Kanekane

1
Trends and Impacts of Rural-Urban migration on Gender Roles and Division of
Labour between Men and Women in China
Rural-urban migration is the movement of people from the countryside to the city; rural urban
migration leads to rural depopulation1 and leads to urban population increase2. In one voice with
this, (Saracoglu & Roe, 2004) argues that rural urban migration is a change in the spatial
distribution of population in a given country over time. Gender role refers to the activities or
behaviors typically associated with women or men. Gender roles as defined by Susan Basow cited
in (UNESCO , 2000) “refers to society's evaluation of behaviour as masculine or feminine, e.g.,
cooking is feminine, while fishing is a masculine role in most societies”. Division of labor is the
separation of works in the family, office or corporate. Labor according to (Zhang, Gao, & Li, 2013)
can be categorized into two types: waged labor and domestic labor. Waged labor refers to the work
of providing goods and services to sustain family livelihood, domestic labor refers to unpaid work
done to maintain the operation of the households.
China is the world’s third largest country in terms of land area, it has the largest population. Until
2012, the majority of that population lived in remote rural areas with mountainous terrain and
infertile lands. Life in rural China is difficult for many reasons; and with China’s relatively recent
rise to economic power, rural Chinese have begun to move to cities in an accelerating trend of
rural-urban migration3. Rural- urban migration is caused by; firstly, labor Surplus in rural China
and with very few jobs besides farming available, workers look to the large cities. Secondly,
extreme poverty in rural areas4; according to (Niño-Zarazúa & Addison, 2012), 94 percent of
China’s rural population lived on less than US$1.25 a day in the early 1980s and by 2005, the
percentage of people in poverty had fallen to 26 percent in rural areas. The need for income drives
the poor to areas with a promise of new income. Lastly, rural Chinese live a mainly agrarian
1 Rural depopulation is the process in which population density in rural areas decreases overtime. This is caused by
the migration of people to urban areas in search of a higher quality of living (employment, education and health
services). Rural populace move out in large numbers temporarily or permanently to towns and cities to seek out new
opportunities, improved livelihoods and better standard of living, contends (Abdullahi, Shaibu-Imodagbe,
Mohammed, Sa’id, & Idris , 2009).
2 (Gugler,1998) cited in (Mitra & Murayama, 2008) ) argues that Around two-fifth of the total urban growth in the
Third world is accounted by the rural-to-urban migration
3See more at http://projectpartner.org/poverty/untold-story-chinas-rural-urban-migration/ Accessed 20 April 2016
4 About 362 million Chinese live on less than $2/day.

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lifestyle with access to clean water limited, lack of modern equipment, constant threat of extreme
drought, each generation becomes less entrenched in this lifestyle and ultimately look to find work
in cities that seems more productive. Migration in China is between hukou, non-hukou and rural
labour migrants, prominent migrants being the rural labor migrant5, who as mentioned above go
look for greener pastures at the cities.
China uses the household registration system called the hukou system to deal with rural-urban
migration issue6 and control the flow of migrants. The hukou system, as stated by (Education
Services Australia , 2013) requires people moving to cities in China from country areas must be
'registered' and buy a permit. The cost of the permits vary, but for cities such as Beijing they are
quite expensive7 and some permits allow permanent migration but most do not. Permanent
residence is given to those who are highly educated, have special skills or have immediate family
already resident with legal status. The system had experienced some reforms which some argue
discriminate against poor migrant workers and in favor of the already wealthy and educated. In
one voice with this, (Congressional-Executive Commission on China, 2005) argues that these
reforms have shifted the hukou system from a method of restricting changes in permanent
residence to a barrier preventing some of China’s most vulnerable citizens from receiving public
services.
This paper intends to identify and discuss the trends and impacts of rural-urban migration on
gender roles and division of labour between men and women in China.
The Trends of Rural-urban Migration
Over the last quarter century, there has been general increase in the number of migrants in China.
(Chan K. W., 2012, p. 4) argues that “despite this, the annual number of hukou8 migrants recorded
by the Ministry of Public Security remained stable, between 17 and 21 million people in the early
1980s. The majority of migrants were predominantly non-hukou9 migrants from the rural areas
5 “Labour migration accounts for about 50-60% of migration, similar to other developing countries” (Chan, Liu, &
Yang, 1999, p. 431).
6 China’s hukou (household registration) systemhas imposed strict limits on ordinary Chinese citizens changing
their permanent place of residence since it was instituted in the 1950s.
7 Even a six-month permit can cost up to a year’s average income.
8 Migration with "local" residency rights (bendi hukou) (hereafter, hukou migration). This is usually open only to a
very select group (currently, the rich or the highly educated),and immediate family members of residents with local
hukou (Chan and Buckingham, 2008);
9 Migration without hukou residency rights (non-hukou migration).

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since the early 1980s.” The stability of the number of hukou migrants and of the percent in urban
areas may reflect strong government intervention in area of hukou migration across city, town and
township boundaries, through mechanisms such as a quota control. The non-hukou migrant
population has been growing since the early 1980s. (Chan, Liu, & Yang, 1999, p. 431) maintains
“that for those who did not have a local hukou in the destination (non-hukou migrants), they would
have to be in the destination for at least one year, or to be away from their place of registration for
at least one year (State Council and SSB, 1993).”
Rural to urban migration was strictly regulated and suppressed in the 1960s and 1970s, it was
reserved for bringing in the necessary labour force in support of state initiated programmes.
Migration to the city was only an ordinary peasant's dream. Today, peasants can move to many
places and work as `temporary' labour10. Of like mind, (Chan K. W., 2012) argues that the size of
the rural migrant labor generally grew from about 50-60 million in the early 1990s to exceed 100
million in the early years of this century and in 2009 when the figure was close to 150 million.
Slow growth was observed in the number of migrants in the second half of the 1990s. Going after
this, (Chan K. W., 2012) argues this slowdown was likely caused by smaller rural outflows related
to the sluggish urban economy in this period, the job competition from laid-off workers of urban
state-owned enterprises, the increasingly protectionist policies used by local governments against
recruitment of outsiders, and improvement in the rural economy, at least between 1996 and 199911.
The 1995 survey according to (Chan K. W., 2012) reported 72% of the inter-county migration was
within provinces; the remaining 28 per cent (9.2 million people) were inter-provincial migrants.
The volume of migration had increased substantially by 1995-2000, the predominant flow during
1995-2000 was from rural to urban areas with 50.32 million migrants. In the early years of the 21st
century, demand for migrant labor resumed at a high level, especially after China’s accession to
the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001. In 2002-2007, the annual average growth of rural
migrant labor was 6.6 million, compared to an annual average of about 4 million in the 1990s.
There was however slow migration in the year 2004 and early 2010, this ultimately led to shortages
of migrant labor in the Pearl River Delta which had far higher pace of demand growth for migrant
10 But getting formally registered as full urban residents in a medium-sized or large city is still largely out of reach.
11 The slow migration growth in the second half of the 1990s also corresponds to the general rural-urban migration
trends identified by Chan and Hu (2003), and Cai (2002, p. 70), because rural-urban migration made up a large
proportion of the rural migrant labor flows.

4
workers and shortages in the Chinese export industry12. In 2009, according to (Hu, 2012) there
were 145 million rural-urban migrants in China, accounting for about 11 percent of the total
population, an estimated 85 million to 100 million among them born after 1980.
In the rear of rural-urban migration in China, the volume of migration has expanded steadily since
the early 1980s, accelerated in the first half of the 1990s and, again in the first decade of the twenty-
first century. While the volume of annual hukou migration remained quite stable in the last 30
years, non-hukou migration has become more voluminous. Rural-urban migration has played a
very important part in China’s recent epic urbanization13. Even if only the urban population
increase was 440-622 million in 2009 since 1979 was migration, the volume of rural-urban
migration in such a short period is likely the largest in human history.
Impacts of Rural-urban Migration on Gender Roles or Division of Labor
Gender affects and is affected by social, political, economic, and religious forces. Migration
represents a drastic life change, gender roles and relations often shift in this process; gender
permeates many of the practices, identities, and institutions involved in the processes of rural-
urban migration, asserts (Knapp, Muller, & Quiros, 2009).
As we could expect in such areas, that is urban areas; there are many reports of the breakdown of
the sexual or gender division of labor. As generally labor in households can be categorized into
waged labor performed by husbands and domestic labor performed by the wife. There are changes
in division of labor in households after migration, (Zhang N. , 2014) contends waged work
transforms rural women from an invisible laborer in the household to a visible cash earner in the
city, enables them to be financially independent from their families, and gives women an
opportunity to recognize their own value and ability and gain confidence in themselves. Studying
changes in gender division of labor in China, (Zhang, Gao, & Li, 2013) found out that most wives
start to gain independent labor positions after migration. Before migration, most women are bound
12 Shortages of migrant labor in Chinese export industry was due to the alteration of the economic landscape where
most migrant labor was employed; about 23 million migrant workers lost their jobs in early 2009. Under China’s
massive fiscal stimulus program, many short-term jobs (especially in the construction sector,such as building railway
projects) were created and were able to re-absorb the unemployed.
13 (Chan, 2010c) cited in (Chan K. W., 2012), in the 30 years since 1979, China’s urban population has grown by
about 440 million to 622 million in 2009.

5
to work inside the house and do some trivial labor and their income are almost invisible and often
ignored by the family.
In one voice with this, (Davin, 1996, p. 25) claims “women or men are drawn into work they would
not otherwise have done; men may take on what is normally thought of as women's work, where
there is heavy migration of women.” Women may take over most of the agricultural work, even
doing tasks which traditionally were always performed by men. By contrast, (Wan Shanping 1993)
cited in (Davin, 1996) argues that in Anhui it has been reported that men cook, clean, and even
sew when the female members of their family have gone to work in the cities. Similarly as women
migrate to work in the cities, they work jobs thought to be done by men in the cities. Lee (1995)
(Fan, 2003, p. 28) “argues that the youth and short tenure of migrant women have given rise to the
‘maiden worker’ construction which perpetuates their inferiority and vulnerability to exploitation
at the urban workplace.”
There is also the breakdown of traditional norms, rural migrant women readily depart from peasant
identity; rejecting the identity of ‘dagongmei’14. (Gaetano, 2008: 641-642) in her study of rural
migrant women in Beijing cited in (Zhang N. , 2014) concludes that upon migration, rural women
reject rural identity and all that it signifies, preferring instead to embrace ‘a more sexualized, urban
femininity’ through a discourse of ‘eating spring rice’15. It is worth pointing out that embracing an
‘urban lifestyle’ or having a desire to be modern does not necessarily mean that migrant women
can easily discard their peasant identity or the low quality ‘di suzhi’ that is linked to it contends
(Zhang N. , 2014) 16. Urban living also is associated with greater anonymity and residential
mobility, erosion of traditional values, which leads to more liberal behavioral norms, and increased
diversities in population and social networks17. The breakdown in traditional norms about sexual
behavior in China in the last three decades is arguably one of the main contributing factors of the
spread of commercial sex and other risky sexual behaviors in urban China, states (Yang , 2014).
14 identity for rural migrant women
15chi qingchunfan
16 Such alienation and other institutional barriers that rural migrant women have to face in the city force them to rely
heavily on their family and kinship guanxi networks for support,which may further push women to reconcile
themselves to peasant identity.
17 (Frye et al., 2006; Galea et al., 2005; Weiss & McMichael, 2004) in (Yang , 2014).

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Socioeconomic characteristics of the urban environment may also be conducive to the spread of
risky sexual behaviors (Frye et al., 2006) in (Yang , 2014)18.
There are also changes in decision making role perceived to be of the men in families. (Zhang N.
, 2014) believes working in the cities makes rural migrant women more experienced and to have
more information about the cities and the labour market, and their opinions are valued more by
their family members, which allows them to have greater involvement in decision-making on
various matters in the family; in one mind (Zhang, Gao, & Li, 2013, p. 51) argues “Wives enjoy
more economic decision-making rights after migration.” There has also been a growing incidence
in female-headed households in rural China (Economic and Social Development Department of
the FAO, 1995) which it argues needs to be reflected in reflected in agriculture, land tenure and
population policies. Female headed families because when men move to the cities and leave their
families behind, this changes the perceived role of men as the head of the family. It also gives
women power to make decision in the family with regards to farming and land control.
China has seen significant number of people in the country moving from the rural areas to urban
areas since the 1980s to 2009, this form of migration has affected roles and labour perceived by
Chinese populace to be for men and women.
18Like any other human behavior, risky sexual behaviors are not inborn but learned through socialization (Bandura,
1986; Clark, 1987).

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Chinese Households. Asian Journal of Women's Studies, 19:1,39-64.

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Zhang, N. (2014). Performing identities: Women in rural–urban migration in contemporary China.
Geoforum54,17-27.

9
Importance of Gender Issues in today’s Development Agenda “in the process of
Urbanization”
We live in the world faced by severe global environmental issues today than ever, a world
characterized by problems of climate change, pollution, global warming, exponential population
growth and urbanization just to mention a few. These problems arise from various factors and
inequalities19; these factors and inequalities are born in pursuit of development. It is important to
consider factors and inequalities or issues like gender in the development agenda of today if we
are to achieve a desired development by all, which is a sustainable one. In peace with this, (UN
Sustainable Development , 2016) argues that gender equality is not only a fundamental human
right, but a necessary foundation for a peaceful, prosperous and sustainable world.
The center of interest of this essay is to fulfill and comment on the importance of considering
gender issues in the development agenda today, pointedly in the urbanization process. The World
Development Report in (World Bank, 2012) defines gender as socially constructed norms and
ideologies which determine the behavior and actions of men and women.
Urbanization is the process by which large numbers of people become permanently concentrated
in relatively small areas, forming cities20. In agreement, urbanization is the increasing in the number
of people that live in urban areas, it predominantly results in the physical growth of urban areas.
According to (United Nations Population Fund, 2015), the world is undergoing the largest wave
of urban growth in history. More than half of the world’s population now lives in towns and cities,
and by 2030 this number will swell to about 5 billion. Much of this urbanization will unfold in
Africa and Asia, bringing huge social, economic and environmental transformations. (OECD,
2015) maintains that gender equality matters in its own right is a prerequisite for the health and
development of families and societies, and a driver of economic growth.
According to (Masika, de Haan, & Baden, 1997, p. 5), “the urbanization process is itself shaped
by gender roles and relations. For instance the scale and nature of migration into urban areas in
Latin America is much influenced by decisions in rural households about who should migrate and
for what reason, by constraints placed on women’s work outside the home by households, and by
19 Factors like industrialization, promotion of economic development at the expense of the environment, improved
medicinal services that prolong life and inequalities in the form of gender and income distribution.
20See more at: http://water.tkk.fi/wr/tutkimus/glob/publications/Haapala/pdf-files/URBANIZATION.pdf Accessed
22 April 2016 and https://www.sciencedaily.com/terms/urbanization.htm Accessed 22 April 2016

10
the demand for female labour in urban areas, (Chant 1992)”. One of the factors contributing to
urbanization is rural-urban migration, increased industrialization, education for all ‘women’,
poverty in rural areas make people to move to urban centers with the hope of greener pastures
there.
Urbanization provides more opportunities to advance economically and socially. Female migration
UN (1995) in (Masika, de Haan, & Baden, 1997, p. 5) “is increasing despite the constraints of
women’s dependent position within the family and society, as households are in need of income,
and more employment opportunities are available to women”. Urban sex ratios usually show more
women than men and levels of female household headship are higher in urban than rural areas21.
In Botswana and Argentina, (Chant & Mcilwaine, 2013) states that older old’ women outnumber
their male counterparts by nearly two to one, while in Malaysia the ratio is almost 1.5 to one. In
one voice, (Mcilwaine & Willis, 2014) argues that a critical aspect of migration is the dynamics of
the selectivity of long-term or permanent rural-urban movement in Middle America, “the
dominance of women in rural urban migration is partly a function of the juxtaposition of declining
productive possibilities for women in the countryside and relatively greater income earning
opportunities in towns, page 37.” In urban centers, for women in particular; accessing the increased
social, economic, and political opportunities ostensibly available to them in cities can be ‘in
reality’ incredibly difficult to take advantage of22.
Urbanization is associated with greater changes in physical landscape, socioeconomic life and
offers greater opportunities to improve lives; it has a bad a side. Urbanization promotes inequalities
(gender and financial) and to some extend worsens problems like poverty, pollution and
environmental degradation. Agreeably, (United Nation Organisation, 2009, p. 2 of 17) states that
“rapid urbanization in most of the developing world has also resulted in stark inequalities between
the rich and the poor, environmental degradation and growing numbers of slum dwellers.” These
changes or inequalities and problems impact women and girls more than they do men and boys.
Men and boys are most likely to survive urban life changes than women and girls; understanding
this (Denisiuk, 2004)23 with evolutionary psychology sex and gender differences are viewed as
21Kerala with 1084 females for every 1000 males has the highest sex ratio according to Census of India
http://www.indiaonlinepages.com/population/sex-ratio-of-india.html Accessed 22 April 2016
22 See more at: http://www.iwpr.org/publications/pubs/gender-urbanization-and-democratic-
governance#sthash.F2JdAgrX.dpufAccessed 23 April 2016
23 See more at:http://www.personalityresearch.org/papers/denisiuk.html Accessed 23 April 2016

11
dependent on reproduction and changes that occur are biologically as people adapt to changes in
the environment; and in social structural theory, sex and gender differences are viewed as
influenced socially by roles of men and women. According to (Tacoli & Satterthwaite , 2013, p.
3) “most urban women experience profound disadvantages compared to men in their daily lives.”
(United Nation Organisation, 2009) contends that while urbanization offers many benefits, the
ugly face of urbanization is urban poverty, which often has the most severe impact on women and
girls. The world’s 828 million slum dwellers in cities24 suffer in varying degrees from poor
sanitation, inadequate access to clean water, crime, unemployment, threats of evictions,
overcrowding and poor quality housing; women make a significant number of these slum dwellers
and are there are more female headed households in these slums. Congruently (The Cities
Allience, 2016) argue that “more and more slum households are headed by women. Many are
women with children whose husbands have left them behind to look for work elsewhere. In other
cases, women have fled to the slums to escape domestic violence, discrimination in rural areas, or
difficult situations created by divorce or marital disputes”25. Women in cities often suffer
disproportionately, not only because they are, on average, poorer than men26, but often also
because they experience greater difficulty in accessing resources and services tailored to their
needs, and decision-making opportunities.
For women, urbanization will be able them to join wage-earning labor force, and (Tacoli &
Satterthwaite , 2013) argues that urbanization is often associated with greater independence and
opportunity for women. These are better opportunities than in rural areas, they offer women an
opportunity to engage in paid employment outside the family, better access to services, lower
fertility rates, and some relaxation of the rigid social values and norms that define women as
subordinated to their husbands and fathers and to men generally. But also, urbanization is
associated with high risks of violence and constraints on employment, mobility and leadership that
reflect deep gender based inequalities in urban centers. (Iyenda, 2005, p. 63) analysis of gender
relations in the context of household survival in Kinshasa27 has shown the importance of giving
24 UN-HABITAT (2009) Global Urban Observatory
25 More at http://www.citiesalliance.org/About-slum-upgradingAccessed27April2016
26 Three-fifths of the world’s one billion poorest people are women and girls, more from UNDP (2006) Taking
Gender Equality Seriously.
27 Largest city and capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, http://www.britannica.com/place/Kinshasa
Accessed 26 April 2016

12
women and especially young girls, access to adequate support in their efforts to participate in
development and in obtaining the purchasing power to buy what they need for their households;
goes on to argues that the promotion of gender equality in household management and decision
making should be an important goal in order to increase the involvement of women in urban
development. In agreement to violence and gender linkages in urban areas, (Chant & Mcilwaine,
2013) denote that urban women across the world have been identified by the World Health
Organization as being at particular risk of gender-based violence, which, in turn, was a major factor
in UN-HABITAT’s and UNIFEM’s joint establishment in 2009 of the Global Programme on Safe
Cities Free from Violence Against28. Goes on to say that according to UN-HABITAT (2006),
together with other forms of urban violence, domestic violence makes women twice as likely as
men to suffer acts of aggression29.
Gender issues are an important element in the environmental problems like urbanization the world
is facing today which are often at the forefront of development. Women use the environment more
than their man counterparts do, this is because women are the ones in households responsible for
daily chores like collecting firewood, cooking, and botanical and vegetable gardens and selling in
the streets. It then can then be argued that women are the major key actors in caring and degrading
of the environment. The migration of men to urban areas has resulted in the growing incidence in
female-headed households in rural China. This event of rural-urban migration which is
‘fundamental’ to urbanization affects gender roles and duties, especially women than men. Women
in these cases are left behind by their husbands to urban centers leaving them with all household
responsibilities, including those like farming which are often perceived to be outside women circle
of duties. (Economic and Social Development Department of the FAO, 1995) argues that “this
needs to be reflected in agriculture, land tenure and population policies”, as it affects agricultural
production; in either a positive or negative way.
Gender is therefore an important consideration in development, gender analysis is a way of looking
at how social norms and power structures impact on the lives and opportunities available to
28 See (UN-HABITAT, 2010, p. 13) http://www.unhabitat.org/pmss/listItemDetails.aspx?publicationID=2887
29 “Indeed, the rate of physicaland/or sexual violence against ever-married women aged 15-49 years in Indian cities
ranges from 15% in Delhi to as much as 41% in Chennai, and with levels commonly being twice as high in slums
than in non-slum areas Gupta et al, 2009:62 in (Chant & Mcilwaine, 2013).

13
different groups of men and women. Given that globally more women than men live in poverty,
including urban poverty and that women are also less likely than men to receive basic education,
to be appointed to a political position nationally and internationally; and understanding that men
and women, boys and girls experience urban poverty and poverty in general differently and face
different barriers in accessing services, economic resources and political opportunities in urban
areas helps to target interventions. (Kangas, Haider, & Fraser, 2014) in agreement argues that
acknowledging and incorporating these gender inequalities into programs and analyses is therefore
extremely important, both from a human rights perspective and to maximize impact and
socioeconomic development. (Tacoli C. , 2013) "Urbanization is among the defining features of
current times, but it can mean very different things for men and women. Unless policymakers,
urban planners and development agencies understand these differences, urbanization will fail to
meet its potential to improve the lives of all urban citizens." quoting the journal's guest editor
Cecilia Tacoli of the International Institute for Environment and Development.

14
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Sustainable_Urbanisation-fact_sheet.pdf
United Nations Population Fund. (2015, June 26). UNFPA Newswire. Retrieved from United Nations:
http://www.unfpa.org/urbanization
World Bank. (2012). ‘Overview’ in World Development Report 2012: Gender Equality and Development.
Retrieved from World Bank: http://www.gsdrc.org/go/display&type=Document&id=4299

15
Gender Disparities in Accessing Urban Employment and Housing and the bearing
of this on Equitable Access and Social Justice in Democratic Republic of Congo
(DRC)
Gender disparities in access to employment and housing are not only characteristic to rural areas,
there pertinent to urban centers. According to (Benschop, 2004)30, exclusion of women from land
and property in rural areas has pushed many into the slums of urban areas, contributing to the rise
in woman headed households among the urban poor. “Land and housing are economic resources
that also bring social benefits and improved status to those who own, control or have access to
them” maintains (Inter-Agency Network on Women and Gender Equality (IANWGE), 2009).
Similarly, (Chant & Mcilwaine, 2013) argues that gender gaps remain significant in urban labor
markets in respect of the occupations in which women and men are engaged and on what basis,
notably ‘formal’ or ‘informal’, part-time or full-time.
(Filmer, King, & Pritchett, 1997) defined gender disparities as purely descriptive observation of
different outcomes between males and females. Employment as defined by (Kaufman, 2004) is
work that is performed under contractual arrangements and that involves material rewards. Rawls
in (Robinson, 2016) defined social justice as assurance to the protection of equal access to liberties,
rights, and opportunities, as well as taking care of the least advantaged members of society.
In a country famously endowed with riches almost beyond belief, “the Democratic Republic of
Congo is potentially one of the richest countries on earth, but colonialism, slavery and corruption
have turned it into one of the poorest”, historian Dan Snow quoted in BBC Magazine31. (Davis,
Fabbri, & Alphonse, 2014) argue that the vast majority of the population in the DRC are
desperately poor, and women are the poorest of all despite the fact that the country is currently
enjoying economic growth. This essay seeks to bring to light the gender disparities in accessing
urban employment and housing and the bearing of this on equitable access and social justice in the
Democratic Republic of Congo.
30 A paper presented at the UN-Habitat Commission on Sustainable Development, 22 April 2004.
31See more at http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-24396390 Accessed 25 April 2016

16
Despite the DRC’s riches, the country lacks equitable distribution of access to resources and
capital32. According to (AfDB, OECD, UNDP & UNECA, 2012), the proportion of women unable
to undertake an economic activity for lack of resources is put at 44% against 22% for men in the
DRC. The distribution of jobs is marked by deep disparities between the sexes. Women occupy
only 2.8% of waged jobs, which are concentrated in farming, the informal sector and commerce.
“Women in DRC, particularly poor women have little financial autonomy” maintains (Davis,
Fabbri, & Alphonse, 2014, p. 30). In South Kivu33 where the main economic activities are
agriculture, mining, commerce and international trade. Women are generally perceived to
participate in these activities, particularly commerce; in a marginal, informal way and in the trade
sector where women often work as petty vendors, (Davis, Fabbri, & Alphonse, 2014). In the areas
surveyed in South Kivu, verifying this (Global Witness, 2012) upholds that those coming from
other areas to work in mines or related activities were primarily male between 60% and 70 %.
The trade sector is not regulated and women have no legal protection, social security or any other
benefits. They are also subjected to a high level of official and unofficial taxation. In Kinshasa34,
women traders appear to have been hit particularly hard, including physically, by police efforts to
‘clean up the streets.’ With accordance to the series of abuses faced by women in mining sector,
(Côté, 2014) found out that body searches are carried out by men, often in public view, after every
work shift with the aim of preventing women hiding gold in their clothes. Cheating and other
scams practiced by men are other widespread forms of discrimination against women.
Artisanal and small scale mining35 is another sector of employment which is an important part of
South Kivu’s economy, attracting workers driven by poverty from rural areas. Women in the
mining sector in South Kivu do not have access to the same opportunities as men according to
(Davis, Fabbri, & Alphonse, 2014, p. 32). Paying attention to artisanal mining, according to (Fraser
Institute, 2012) it is often characterized by; operations without legal mining titles or a valid contract
32 Which can be attributed to two decades of civil war and ongoing conflicts throughout the Democratic Republic of
the Congo (DRC)
33 South Kivu is a province of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, its capital is Bukavu.
34 Largest city (with a population of 5 million) and capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kinshasa is the
center of the dynamic and contradictory influences that have shaped the country’s character in modern Africa. More
at: http://www.britannica.com/place/Kinshasa Accessed 26 April 2016
35 Artisanal and Small-scale mining refers to informal mining activities carried out using low technology or with
minimal machinery. See more at: http://www.miningfacts.org/communities/what-is-artisanal-and-small-scale-
mining/#sthash.FZj8sbam.dpuf Accessed 25 April 2016

17
with the title holder, low productivity since this mining often takes place in very small plots, it is
limited to surface mining, and uses inefficient techniques, lack of safety measures, health care or
environmental protections, are practised seasonally36 and associated with economic insecurity.
Women occupied in this form of mining are involved in a range of activities, including mining but
are often excluded due to traditional superstitions. Bushi women are not accepted in mining areas
as they are believed to bring bad luck, contends (Davis, Fabbri, & Alphonse, 2014). Women are
more usually engaged, in supporting activities such as washing, sorting materials, and
transportation, which are less profitable goes on (Davis, Fabbri, & Alphonse, 2014). Women also
work in the camps around the mines in restaurants, hotels, small businesses, and as sex workers.
While everyone in the mine sector is exposed to various risks, women, girls and boys are
particularly vulnerable; in South Kivu they are exposed to coercion, intimidation, sexual violence,
HIV/AIDS, abuses and exploitation.
In Bas Congo37, women are involved in tending small scale plots, the income that women generate
is vital for feeding and housing the family. Yet she pays her husband rent from the land she farms,
pays for education, food and health care. What the man does with ‘his money’ is up to him, but he
is not meant to put it towards the family’s needs and in Equateur this pattern is repeated, observed
(Davis, Fabbri, & Alphonse, 2014). This is all despite the less paying employment a woman has
and the high salaried jobs men do in mining and agriculture in the town. The gender disparity in
the access to employment in Bas Congo subjects women to violence. According to (Davis, Fabbri,
& Alphonse, 2014), customs say that the man is the chief with the legitimate right to take decisions,
the wife is the cashier, and the husband is the manager. If she does anything without the husband’s
authorisation, she will be beaten up and men contend that the money belongs to them.
The agricultural sector is one of the main sectors of activity for women in Bas Congo. Land use in
DRC is regulated and managed by the structures that are attached to cultural values and strongly
dominated by males38. This has an impact on women, especially for their access to land which they
36 supplement farm incomes
37 Or Kongo Central, one of the 26 provinces of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Bas Congo is blessed with
proven oil reserves,industries, transport infrastructure, mineral in resource deposits and agro-pastoral province
(agriculture which employs almost 70% of the population of the Province) reports the World Bank, more at
http://www.afdb.org/fileadmin/uploads/afdb/Documents/Project-and
Operations/DRC_Etude%20decentralisation_english__01.pdf Accessed 25 April 2016
38 A dual systemcomprised of national laws and traditional power structures.The traditional chiefs play a key role
in the allocation and management of land

18
use as source of income. Women in Bas Congo cannot grow a tree because this would signify she
owns the land. Although many families depend on the products women are able to grow on tiny
pieces of land, women rarely own the land. Some women entrepreneurs set up small scale
businesses that play and important part in the local economy, such as the centres de transformation
in Bas Congo. In terms of property and acquisition, women rarely have the financial resources
required to buy land, they face challenges inheriting it and may be prohibited from buying land
under the terms of the Code de famille39, if applied.
Women can rent land, often without formal contract. In some cases, if the land becomes
productive, the landowner may bar women from continuing usage. In other cases, women and their
children can be hired as casual labour in large plantations. They usually come from families that
have no land, have little bargaining power, and are poorly paid. In other cases, they perform some
work for a landowner and in exchange are given a plot of land that they can cultivate for
themselves. This practice has become particularly exploitative as often women are requested to
perform a variety of unpaid chores for the landowner, such as fetching water and washing clothes.
(UNEP, 2001) assert that in the DRC, security of tenure40 is also complicated by disparities
between modern legislation and traditional laws. For example, the DRC’s 1973 Land Act
stipulated that ‘land is the exclusive inalienable and imprescriptible property of the state’, but the
acquisition of land remains subject to the consent of the land chief.
Discriminatory laws and social norms are also a barrier to female entrepreneurship in the DRC
asserts (Durand , 2010); “female entrepreneurs receive different treatment relative to men with
respect to access to institutions and credit, property rights, taxation, and their ability to start a
business. In the Democratic Republic of Congo, women cannot purchase property, sign contracts
or incorporate businesses without their husband’s authorization (Durand , 2010, p. 18).”
Housing is critical to women not only because their domestic roles require them to spend
considerable time in the home, but also because it serves as a key resource in their social,
39 Translated ‘Family Code’ in English
40 Security of tenure means the rights you have as occupier of your home, and is largely determined by the type of
agreement you have, more at : http://www.hackney.gov.uk/Assets/Documents/h-private-security-tenure.pdfAccessed
26 April 2016

19
psychological and economic well-being and security41 (Chant & Mcilwaine, 2013). There are poor
housing conditions in DRC cities, families are not afforded adequate shelter and they are led by
women who then again do not earn much. In Kinshasa, many families ‘female headed’ pack
themselves into one house or compound resulting in overcrowding, facilitating the spread of
disease and the destruction of the environment. The average rent for one house in poor areas is
US$ 55 per month and many street-vendor households occupy only one bedroom. Given the low
literacy rate for women in Kinshasa42, many of them are excluded from the formal employment
market, and so women find themselves obliged to work on their own and in many cases on the
streets because they lack qualifications for formal employment or any form of wage labor states
(Iyenda, 2005).
Gender disparities have contributed significantly to social injustice, made women more
exploitable, vulnerable and subjected women to poverty and violence. According to (Mbambi,
Claire, & Kele , 2010, p. 10) “women of the big Congo River Basin, are objectified and
dehumanized by violence and poverty maintained by a system of oppression and exploitation that
uses militarism, retrograde patriarchy, violent masculinity and misogyny.” Head held high using
the post-modernist theory43, my position is that, despite many years of development and
modernity, women in the DRC are still marginalized and not liberated; women have to be
liberalized and afforded equal opportunities as men so they can realize their potential. In spite of
the weak female economic power due to several factors such as poverty, the lack of access to lands,
lack of estate property, lack of access to appropriate technologies, women marginalization in the
macro-economic sector, as well as insecurity in rural areas following armed conflicts, Congolese
women are true agents of development and their small income generating activities have been
significantly contributing to the survival of their families and the whole DRC as a nation , states
(Mbambi, Claire, & Kele , 2010).
41 (Miraftab, 2001)
42 51% against 66% for men
43 Brian Duignan defines it as a philosophical movement which is largely a reaction against the philosophical
assumptions and values of the modern period of Western history. It characterized by broad skepticism, subjectivism,
or relativism; a general suspicion of reason; and an acute sensitivity to the role of ideology in asserting and
maintaining political and economic power. see http://www.britannica.com/topic/postmodernism-philosophy

20
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