XII INTER-AMERICAN CONFERENCE
OF MINISTERS OF LABOR
October 17-19, 2001
Ottawa, Canada
OEA/Ser.K/XII.12.1
TRABAJO/doc.40/01
18 October 2001
Original: Spanish
ITEM No. 4: INTEGRATING GENDER PERSPECTIVES INTO THE STUDY
AND IMPLEMENTATION OF THE ACTIVITIES AND GENERAL POLICIES
OF LABOR INSTITUTIONS
THE GENDER EQUITY PERSPECTIVE IN POLICIES FOR EMPLOYMENT AND
PRODUCTIVE OCCUPATION
This Twelfth Inter-American Conference of Ministers of Labor is taking place at a very
special moment in history: a time when women are working over five million unpaid hours a day to
feed today’s world and make its existence possible; a time when that world is caught up in a conflict
of beliefs and principles, a struggle which, in the rarefied atmosphere of war, might appear to be a
clash between civilizations, but which really is nothing more than humanity’s legitimate yearning for
a just, equitable, and peaceful society, a society that we can truly own. We can still hear the dying
echoes of the men and women who worked in the Twin Towers of the Trade Center in New York,
while men, women, and children cross inclement borders, hoping to survive and work to build a
world in which violence and terrorism have been cast aside, a world offering genuine opportunity for
employment, social security, and family stability, where affection and spirituality may thrive and
together serve to capture and preserve the essence of humanity. It is also a time when the active
workforce of Latin America and the Caribbean includes over 60 million women, and yet poverty and
formal unemployment are the bane of the “unrecognized social economy,” in which new creative
partnerships almost spontaneously foster new opportunities for production and productive selfemployment. I would go so far as to say that the complex human concerns underlying the eight
agenda items chosen by this Conference challenge us to address the numerous demands arising
almost spontaneously in the workplace and threatening, to some extent, the stability of the labor
systems with which we are familiar. The uncertainty surrounding the future of the small spaces
where many of those responsible for daily reproduction move and live, such as microenterprises,
family firms, cooperatives, community associations for the grassroots economy, where the basic
fabric of the market economy is woven by the craftsmen and women of development, means we must
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keep a watchful eye on public and private spheres in order to ensure that this sector’s output–the fruit
of these people’s work–is profitable, and that the profits serve to enhance their standard of living.
This civilizing crusade urges us to return to a philosophy of the transcendent and to
reinstate the values of equity, justice, ethics, solidarity, and peace, on the one hand, and, on the other,
respect for the endogenous diversity of national populations which, through their popular activities,
customs, traditions, and knowledge, every day enrich their legal and cultural heritage, a common
asset that must be scrupulously consulted in order to implement human development policies targeted
at productive enterprise. In that context, gender equity which, in the Venezuelan case, is a concept
found throughout the text of the Constitution and defines the new relations which, in juridical,
political, socioeconomic, and cultural senses, characterize the new society in its use and enjoyment of
opportunities, reveals itself as a useful tool in the reconstructive design of public policy and activity
aimed at promoting employment and permanent, stable productive occupation.
How, then is gender to be viewed in this new space for shared responsibility? Firstly, we
would have to say that …
In terms of fostering development, equity means: raising gender awareness.
Equity is defined in terms of natural justice rather than of justice as a legal precept. It
identifies goodness, deliberation, habitual temperance, and an integrating creativity as virtuous
practices for men’s and women’s labor and productive activity. It is natural wisdom that lies deep
within the intimacy of intuitive knowledge ... stories of women with experience of the Ministry of
Labor’s space for dialogue demonstrate their internal knowledge as it translates into work ...
“I imagine my necklaces on my neck, then I start choosing the material and colors, and
then I make a lot, each one different, ” says a craftswoman in the Venezuelan Andes.
“I kneed and kneed the clay until it takes on the shape I want; then I vest it with my soul so
that it finds expression.” A Quibor craftswoman, State of Lara.
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“You imagine what you want to do and ... girl, when we start to weave, it’s as if our fingers
were little machines.” The magic of yarn, as expressed by the Venezuelan Guajiras.
“It dawned on me that I made the most delicious cakes; that my children and family wolfed
them down. I stopped beating around the bush and started a small bakery. Now I feel that I have
cast domestic monotony aside and begun to be a thinking woman ...”
This woman simply broke invisible chains of ownership, ceased to be an object, and turned
herself into a subject, a productive subject. But by what means does she become productive, this
innovator of creative home baking? By virtue of her sensitive sensors, her sensitivity that even
picked up on the enjoyment and pleasure of her children and family, who were the first customers for
her cakes.
Gender equity transcends gender equality which, for a long time, was the defining concept of
the women’s movement in its struggles to achieve the labor opportunities that men enjoyed, and
rediscovers women in terms of their multifaceted focus, assuming responsibility, along with their
partners or on their own, for their family’s direction, the children’s emotional stability, the quality of
their environment and life, the production of goods and services, the reproductive profitability of the,
as yet quantified, use values of social wealth. And it is precisely that profoundly qualitative and
multifaceted part played by women in society as producers and reproducers of the complexity of
development that is innovative in the culture of work. That culture today is enriched and transformed
in its most intimate spheres by returning to the transformational contribution of men’s and women’s
differences which, in the space of the diversity of their capabilities, gives them the right to participate
in building a self-sustainable society on equal terms, sharing the benefits as well.
Equality levels and mythologizes, whereas equity differentiates and rebuilds. In that
context, gender should be construed as an impartial assessment producing a transformation process so
deep that it enables women’s intrinsic qualities to rise to the surface of work, by giving the final
product a qualitative value that is not divisive but unifying. The wisdom of the silk weaving done by
Chinese women, the vegetable dyeing done by the women of India, or the embroidered Nephertitis
offered to tourists by the women of Aswan, the practice of farm women of Esnujaque Mesa in
Trujillo state of cutting of roses while singing, like the women picking peaches in Zaragoza–all are
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jobs revealing the “characteristic temperance” that women bring to the finished product as added
value, making it competitive and marketable, a quality not yet reflected in market economy
indicators.
Lastly, we wish to point out that gender equity breaks the bonds of ownership and
appropriation of the individual in a society now seeking to define itself as proactive, productive, and
reflective, where women’s empowerment and their full participation in the social, economic, and
political development of our societies plays an integral part in the eradication of poverty, sustainable
development focusing on individuals, consolidation of democracy, dispute resolution, and the
achievement of a lasting peace, as well as the development of harmonious cooperation among men
and women. The concentric circles of commitment to family, society, and state make it imperative to
redesign and promote policies on employment and productive occupation based on a social dialogue
that promotes the development of individuals and their local economies.
I consider it opportune to report that the Venezuelan Ministry of Labor is administering seven
technical cooperation programs to improve the physical infrastructure of its 72 labor dispute boards,
computerize data on employment and unemployment and on the profiles of the workforce involved in
training, and operate 23 employment agencies, which are assigning priority to promoting the
financial operations of the Women’s Bank [Banco de la Mujer], the purpose of which is to develop
microenterprise, and which has awarded 3,425 loans. We have successfully handled 119 labor
disputes, and discussions have begun on 1,162 collective agreements by fostering lead participation
by the parties, and by exercising the principles of shared responsibility and tripartite social dialogue.
Dear friends of both sexes, let us trust and follow these signs of new times illuminated by
wisdom, that depart from current knowledge and known practice and make room for the emergence
of an open and systemic organizational strategic model for production, work, and human fulfillment;
a model posing a challenge to us all – of whichever gender.
Distinguished Chair of this Twelfth Inter-American Conference of Ministers of Labor;
workers and entrepreneurs seeking to promote a balance between capital and labor in the Americas;
friends, men and women, from the governments of the countries of the Americas who have come
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together to share in the first fruits of a new and promising age, we ask God to shed his blessings on
this forum for reconstructive reflection and to enrich and consolidate its future activities.
An affectionate fraternal greeting from the Government of the Bolivarian Republic of
Venezuela, and from its delegation present here.
Thank you very much.
Blancanieve Portocarrero
Minister of Labor of Venezuela
October 18, 2001
TB01173E05