Study highlights struggles of women workers in agriculture sector

AMMAN — A study titled “Working Women in Agriculture” said that 92 per cent of women workers in the agricultural industry receive income less than the minimum wage, while 100 per cent of the respondents to the study are not subscribed to social security and do not have any health insurance. 

 The study is conducted by SADAQA, a Jordanian NGO working towards a women friendly work environment, highlights the conditions of women workers in the farming sector, and documents their experiences and challenges in using public transportation to and from their workplaces. 

 “Around 86 per cent of the respondents had a vehicle accident while moving to and from their workplace,” according to the study. 

The study is based on quantitative and qualitative methodology, targeting 83 women to gather relevant information, and was conducted from June to July of 2020, according to SADAQA.

Women face many challenges in the farming sector, the most significant of which are the absence of criteria for decent work in terms of wages and working hours, in addition to the absence of social and health protection, and the multiplicity of women’s domestic responsibilities that men do not participate in, the study observed.  

 “The pandemic exposed the fragility of unregulated sectors, foremost among them is the agriculture sector,” the study said, stressing the need to create a system for agricultural workers, in accordance with the labour law and international standards, with the aim to regulate their wages, work hours, weekday off, internal systems, work hazards and social security.  

The study also noted that “the system must take into consideration the nature of employment in the agricultural industry, including the diversity of contractual relations in their temporary, seasonal and occasional forms, in addition to delivering protection rights and work organisation”.