Employees work in a diamond jewelery manufacturing factory in Mumbai. (Reuters)
The female labor participation rate in India fell to 16.1% during the July-September 2020 quarter, the lowest among major economies, said a government report, reflecting the impact of the pandemic and the widespread job crisis.
The report released by the ministry late on Monday said that the percentage of women in the labor force had fallen to a low of 15.5 per cent during the April-June 2020 quarter, when India took the lead in containing the spread of the COVID-19 virus. There was a strict lockdown to stop it. of statistics.
According to World Bank estimates, India has the lowest female labor force participation rate in the world. Less than a third of women – defined in the report as 15 or older – are working or actively looking for a job.
According to World Bank estimates, the female labor participation rate in India fell from 20.3 percent in 2019 to over 26% in 2005, compared to 30.5 percent in neighboring Bangladesh and 33.7% in Sri Lanka.
Most employed women in India do low-skilled work, such as farm and factory labor and domestic help, sectors that have been badly hit by the pandemic.
The unemployment rate among women touched 15.8% compared to 12.6% among male workers during the three months ended September 2020, the latest quarter for which the data was released.
Most economic activity in the country has resumed after state governments curbed the pandemic in response to the decline in coronavirus infections since May peaks. Government officials said this would help in creating more jobs for all workers.
India’s July unemployment rate fell to 6.95% from the June figure of 9.17%, data from the Center for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) showed on Monday.
Several private economists have warned that the slow pace of vaccination and sluggish consumer demand could dent growth prospects, and the economy is unlikely to regain its pre-Covid size before March 2022.
Asia’s third-largest economy, which shrank 7.3% in the fiscal year ending March, the worst slowdown in the past seven decades, is expected to grow 8-9% year-on-year in the current fiscal.
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