Women's Expo 2023 [File Photo]

Minister for Women Lynda Tabuya highlights the need to implement the women’s economic empowerment plan to sustain development and inclusive growth.

Tabuya says that the Ministry is working on the Women Empowerment National Action Plan, which will ensure women’s access to markets.

She adds that this will also ensure women’s control over productive resources, opportunities for decent work, bodily autonomy, and meaningful participation in economic decision-making at all levels.

“We identified a significant burden of unpaid work on Fijian women and girls, their overrepresentation in the informal economy, issues of bodily autonomy with high prevalence of gender -based violence as well as reproductive cancers, limited access to sexual and reproductive health rights, daily impacts of the climate crisis, limited knowledge, access and productive use of digital technology and e –commerce.”

Tabuya stresses that women are mainly employed in low-paying jobs within the informal sector.

The Minister further says that only 35.2 percent of women are in formal employment, and they account for less than three in 10 women engaged in paid informal work.

Tabuya states that even though women represent 65 percent of students in academic institutions, they face disproportionately high unemployment.

The Minister was responding to questions asked by Opposition MP Sachida Nand on the implementation of the Women’s Economic Development Plan 2023–2028.