Mapping Study on Key Barriers to Women’s Economic Empowerment (WEE) CONTENT Content List of Tables ii List of Figures ii Abbreviations 04 Executive Summary 06 Chapter One - Introduction 09 1.1. The Background 09 1.2. Objectives of the study 10 Chapter Two – Situation Analysis 11 2.1. Finding of the Analysis 11 2.2. Domestic Violence, Decision Making, Women Empowerment and Employment 12 Status 2.3. Education 14 2.4. Policies and National Programs 14 2.5. Enterprise Sri Lanka 17 2.6. Grama Shakthi 17 2.7. Agriculture Sector Modernization Project 18 2.8. Identified barriers for women economic empowerment 18 Chapter Three - Methodology 20 3.1. Research Design 20 3.2. Data Collection 20 3.2.1. Sample size calculation and Selection 20 3.2.2. Data Collection Method 22 3.3. Data Analysis 22 3.4. Approach to the Qualitative Data Collection 22 3.4.1. Key Informant Interviews 22 3.4.2. Focus Group Discussions 22 3.4.3. Households Surveys 22 3.5. Data analysis for qualitative data 23 3.6. Limitations 23 3.7. Location 23 3.8. Scope of the Work 23 3.9. Outline of the Report 24 Mapping Study on Key Barriers to Women’s Economic Empowerment (WEE) in i Uva and Central Provinces, Sri Lanka Mapping Study on Key Barriers to Women’s Economic Empowerment (WEE) Chapter Four – Result, Analysis and Discussion 25 4.1. Distribution of the sample 25 4.2. Gender of the Respondents 26 4.3. Status of Employment 26 4.4. Respondents Current Occupation 27 4.5. Reasons for Unemployment 28 4.6. Economic Status 29 4.7. Monthly Allowances (Samurdhi/Government Allowance) 29 4.8. Income Earning Sources available in the project areas 30 4.9. Monthly Household Income 32 4.10. Method of Covering Expenses 33 4.11. Reasons for obtaining loans 34 4.12. Decision Making 34 4.13. Information related to Vocational Training 36 4.13.1. Participation for Vocational Training 36 4.14. Courses followed 37 4.15. Reasons for Unemployment 38 4.16. Quality of Vocational Training 39 4.17. Awareness about Vocational Training Programme 40 4.18. Reasons for Unawareness about Vocational training Programme 40 4.19. Difficulties and way to overcome vocational training (Only for Female) 41 4.20. The way to overcome the Problems 41 4.21. Reasons for not attending Vocational training 42 4.22. Training Preferred 43 4.23. Information Relevant to the Services 44 4.23.1. Benefits from Financial Institutes 44 4.23.2. Benefits from the Government Sector 45 4.23.3. Benefits from the Non-Government sector 46 4.23.4. Barriers to obtaining Services 47 4.24. Self-employment 48 4.24.1. The reasons for not being Self-employed 49 4.24.2. Opportunity for self-employment 50 4.24.3. Possible interventions preferred in perceiving self-employment 51 4.24.4. Barriers to access women employment 52 4.25. Project Oriented subject Areas 53 4.25.1. Issues related to Dairy Farming 53 4.25.2. Cinnamon/Coco Cultivation and the main problems 54 4.25.3. Potato Cultivation and the main problems 55 Chapter Five – Barriers, Stakeholders and their Intervention, and Recommendations for 57 Intervention and Capacity Buildings 5.1. Social and Economic Barriers to Women’s Engagement in Economic Activities 57 (WEE) Mapping Study on Key Barriers to Women’s Economic Empowerment (WEE) in ii Uva and Central Provinces, Sri Lanka Mapping Study on Key Barriers to Women’s Economic Empowerment (WEE) 5.1.1. Economic Growth 57 5.1.2. Women Entrepreneurship: Issues and barriers (WEE) 58 5.1.3. Education and skills development 60 5.1.4. Education and skills development 60 5.1.5. Reproductive and domestic responsibilities 60 5.1.6. Access to physical and financial assets 61 5.1.7. Social Capital and leadership 61 5.1.8. Gender norms and discriminatory social norms 62 5.2. Key stakeholders and their current intervention 62 5.3. Possible Interventions 63 5.4. Area of capacity building 67 5.4.1. Capacity building for the primary stakeholders (women) 67 5.4.2. Capacity building for the secondary stakeholders 67 References List of Tables Table 2.1. Domestic Violence 12 Table 2.2. Decision making ability in the three districts 13 Table 2.3. Employment status by Employment 13 Table 2.4. Vocational Training Centers 14 Table 3.1. Distribution of Sample 21 List of Figures Figure 4.1. Distribution of the sample based on the district and DS area (In %) 25 Figure 4.2. Gender of the Respondent (In %) 26 Figure 4.3. Status of Employment (In %) 26 Figure 4.4. Respondents Current Occupation 27 Figure 4.5. Reason for Unemployment (In %) 28 Figure 4.6. Monthly Allowances - Samurdhi (In%) 29 Figure 4.7. Monthly Allowances – Government Allowance (In%) 30 Figure 4.8. Availability of Income Earning Sources - Agricultural (% out of total 31 respondents) Figure 4.9. Income Earning Sources available in the project areas– Non-Agricultural 32 (%) Figure 4.10. Sufficiency of Monthly household Income (In %) 33 Figure 4.11. Method of Covering Expenses (In %) 33 Figure 4.12. Reasons for obtaining loans (In %) 34 Figure 4.13. Decision Making (In %) 35 Figure 4.14. The reasons, if none of the decisions are made by Woman in the family 36 (In%) Figure 4.15. Participation in Vocational Training (VT) (In %) 37 Mapping Study on Key Barriers to Women’s Economic Empowerment (WEE) in iii Uva and Central Provinces, Sri Lanka Mapping Study on Key Barriers to Women’s Economic Empowerment (WEE) Figure 4.16. Course Followed 38 Figure 4.17. Reasons for Unemployment (In %) 39 Figure 4.18. Quality of Vocational Training (In %) 39 Figure 4.19. Awareness about Vocational Training Programme (In%) 40 Figure 4.20. Reasons for unawareness about Vocational Training Programme (In%) 40 Figure 4.21. Difficulties at Vocational training (Only for Females) (In %) 41 Figure 4.22. The way of overcome the Problems (In %) 42 Figure 4.23. Reasons for not attending Vocational training (In %) 42 Figure 4.24. Trainings preferred (In %) 43 Figure 4.25. Benefits from Financial Institutes - Savings (In %) 44 Figure 4.26. Benefits from Financial Institutes, Loans, leasing and microcredit (In %) 45 Figure 4.27. Benefits from the government sector (In %) 46 Figure 4.28. Benefits from the non-government sector (In %) 46 Figure 4.29. Barriers to obtaining Services (In %) 47 Figure 4.30. Self-employment Situation (In %) 48 Figure 4.31. The reasons for not being Self-employed (In %) 49 Figure 4.32. Opportunity for self-employment (In %) 50 Figure 4.33. Types of Opportunity for self-employment (In %) 50 Figure 4.34. Possible interventions preferred in perceiving self-employment (In %) 51 Figure 4.35. Barriers to access women employment (In %) 52 Figure 4.36. Dairy Farming (In %) 53 Figure 4.37. Main problems of dairy farmers (In %) 54 Figure 4.38. Cinnamon/Cocoa cultivation (In %) 54 Figure 4.39. The main problems of cinnamon/cocoa cultivation (In %) 55 Figure 4.40. Potato Cultivation (In %) 55 Figure 4.41. main problems (In %) 56 Annexures Annexure I : KII Guidelines 69 Annexure II : FGD GUIDELINES 76 Mapping Study on Key Barriers to Women’s Economic Empowerment (WEE) in iv Uva and Central Provinces, Sri Lanka Mapping Study on Key Barriers to Women’s Economic Empowerment (WEE) ABBREVIATIONS DS - District Secretariat DTET - Department of Technical Education & Industrial Training Authority EGSD - Enhancing Gender Inclusive Socio-Economic Development FHH - Female head of Household FGD - Focus Group Discussions GII - Gender Inequality Index GOSL - Government of Sri Lanka HDI - Human Development Index HH - House Holds IDA - International Development Association KII - Key Informant Interviews MRA - Multiple Response Analysis NHRAP - National Human Rights Action Plan SDGs - Sustainable Development Goals SPSS - Statistical Package for the Social Sciences SRS - Simple Random Sampling TVEC - Tertiary & Vocational Educational Commission VTA - Vocational Training Authority VT - Vocational Training WEE - Women’s Economic Empowerment Mapping Study on Key Barriers to Women’s Economic Empowerment (WEE) in v Uva and Central Provinces, Sri Lanka Mapping Study on Key Barriers to Women’s Economic Empowerment (WEE) Executive Summary Sri Lanka has reached a per capita GDP of $ 4065 by 2017, while standing as a middle- income country1. In order to develop Sri Lanka empowering women in the economy is of paramount importance. The women of Sri Lanka bring the uppermost foreign exchange to the country in numerous ways. Among those, especially women who work in the Middle East, apparel industry and plantation sector add the highest value to the GDP of the country. Although Sri Lanka is a lower middle-income country, regional disparities can be noticed in terms of economic status, educational level and social status. This may be due to the variations in climate patterns, cultivation patterns, infrastructure facilities, etc. Regional disparities create vulnerable communities especially in the rural and estate sector. These variations effect the self-employment of women as well. The Women’s Economic Empowerment (WEE) project directs its focus on the most vulnerable areas in Central and Uva provinces in Sri Lanka. The key objective of the Enhancing Gender Inclusive Socio-Economic Development (EGSD) project is to enhance rural and estate communities’ sustainable and diversified livelihoods, with effective engagement in inclusive gender-sensitive socio-economic development processes, in cooperation with the private and public sector. As per TOR, the objectives of the assignment are as follow; • Identifying social and economic barriers to women’s engagement in economic activities at individual and household level, community and district, regional level in the project area. • Mapping of the key stakeholders and their current initiatives were undertaken on women’s economic empowerment in provinces (at policy and practice level).