The Regional Conference on Equality and Equity in Recognising Unpaid Care Work and Women’s Labour in South Asia, organised by the Women and Media Collective (WMC) in Collaboration with the Social Scientist’s Association (SSA), was concluded successfully on the 20th and 21st of October 2022, at Colombo. This is the first Conference on Unpaid Care Work (UCW) to take place in Sri Lanka.
The Conference brought together academics, activists, and advocates from Sri Lanka as well as those working on the issue from South Asian countries. Participants also included district-level activists, government officials, and journalists from across the country, who contributed to the discourse on unpaid care work, especially in Sri Lanka.
The inaugural Keynote Speech was given by Dr. Deepta Chopra from the Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, UK. Dr. Chopra brought out the importance of using the Unpaid Care Diamond Framework and operationalizing the 3 ‘R’s of UCW, ‘Recognize, Reduce and Redistribute’, and the additional ‘R’ of the ILO framework on UCW. This was a very interesting evaluation of feminists conceptualizing UCW within a developmental framework that is applicable especially to countries in South Asia.
Member of Parliament Dr. Harini Amarasuriya, also known as a Rights Activist, gave the Keynote Speech, opening the proceedings on the second day of the Conference. She gave a reflective presentation on the need to recognize UCW in Sri Lanka and the importance of integrating a critical understanding of the issue, particularly within the socio-economic and political crises facing Sri Lanka.
The Regional Conference centered around five-panel discussions each that focused on a specific area of study. The panels were around the existing structures of Gendered Economic Relations and Household Care Work, Measuring and Valuing Unpaid Care Work, Social Media discourses around UCW, UCW and households of Overseas Migrant Workers, Women Cooperative Members, and paid and unpaid care work in the North, Sexual Identities, and unpaid care work as well as the impact of Covid on UCW in terms of the home.
A documentary film, “Working Hours” was screened at the conference which captured the lives of women who were part of the WMC and SSA study. The film was produced by Sharni Jayawardena.
Day 1
Day 2
