According to a study by the International Labour Organisation

Between 25 and 50% of informal workers in the Americas lost their jobs during the COVID-19 pandemic

photo_camera OIM/Muse Mohammed - Many migrant women have lost their jobs as domestic workers.

A decade after the landmark adoption of the Domestic Workers Convention, the coronavirus pandemic has in many cases worsened the working conditions of domestic workers, according to a new report by the UN's specialised agency on industrial relations.

The International Labour Organisation (ILO) study notes that, at the height of the pandemic, job losses among domestic workers in the Americas were the worst recorded among regions, ranging from 25 to 50%, followed by most countries in Europe, along with Canada and South Africa, with a range of 5 to 20%.

In comparison, it is worth noting that during the same period, employment loss among other wage earners was less than 15% in most countries.

According to the study's findings, the COVID-19 pandemic has worsened already difficult working conditions for the world's 75.6 million domestic workers (4.5 per cent of global wage earners).

"The crisis has highlighted the urgent need to formalize domestic work in order to ensure that domestic workers have access to decent work, starting with the extension and enforcement of labour and social security legislation for all domestic workers," said ILO Director-General Guy Ryder.

Trabajadoras domésticas participan en una manifestación para mejorar los derechos laborales  PHOTO/OIT
The Convention is making progress, but not enough is being implemented

The adoption of the landmark Convention ten years ago was hailed as a major breakthrough and caused the number of domestic workers completely excluded from the scope of labour laws and regulations, many of whom are women, to fall by more than 16 percentage points.

Despite these gains, 36 per cent of domestic workers lack labour coverage, indicating an urgent need to close legal gaps, particularly in Asia and the Pacific and Arab States, where such gaps are greatest.

Domestic work remains a female-dominated sector. It employs 57.7 million women, or 76.2 per cent of those in domestic work.

While in the Americas, Europe and Central Asia, women represent the majority of the workforce, the situation is reversed in the Arab States and North Africa where men represent a higher percentage (63.4 per cent), and just under half of all domestic workers in South Asia (42.6 per cent). 

The vast majority of domestic workers are in two regions: about half (38.3 million) are in Asia and the Pacific regions, largely in China; while a quarter (17.6 million) are in the Americas.

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