Abstract

COVID-19 and its associated disease control measures have greatly altered everyday life. The burden of these challenges has fallen disproportionately on women. Drawing on qualitative inquiry in agrarian north India and Nepal, this research note analyzes how South Asian COVID-19 lockdowns have affected women's labor responsibilities in sometimes surprising ways. We find increased responsibilities for caregiving within the household, substantial stress in responding to food insecurity, and growing expectations to fulfill public roles in disease response measures. However, we also find that the return of male migrants and youth has, in some cases, reduced women's farming responsibilities and created opportunities for household togetherness at a time of great uncertainty. We conclude that more research is needed to examine the nuanced aspects of COVID-19's gendered labor impacts to create comprehensive policy responses to address the multiple and sometimes conflicting effects the lockdown has had on agrarian women's informal labor and well-being.

Keywords

Care labor; policy; subsistence agriculture; India; Nepal; intra-household bargaining

Published in

Politics and Gender
2020, Volume: 16, number: 4, article number: PII S1743923X20000483

SLU Authors

• Fischer, Harry

  • Department of Urban and Rural Development, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

Sustainable Development Goals

Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls
Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels


UKÄ Subject classification

Gender Studies
Public Administration Studies
Human Geography


Publication identifier

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1743923X20000483

Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/108041