Introduction
HomeNet Pakistan is a network of organizations working for the recognition and labour rights of home-based workers. HomeNet Pakistan recently got registered under the Societies Registration Act on November 2nd, 2005. HomeNet Pakistan is a member of HomeNet, South Asia, which consists of HomeNet, Bangladesh, HomeNet, India, HomeNet, Nepal and HomeNet, Srilanka.
HomeNet Pakistan started working under the guidance of Aurat Foundation. HomeNet Pakistan with its facilitation and support is working for women who work at home for remuneration either on contract basis or are own-account workers. These women, whatever their mode of work is, belong to the poorest class in the economic strata of Pakistan. Given the circumstances and large number of women involved, it becomes essential to organize women in the informal sector and to negotiate with the government on their behalf. Without such initiatives, the home-based workers will get proper recognition and social protection which they deserve.
The fact that home work is generally carried out in isolation and is invisible to the public explains the absence of the representative organizations and the scant attention devoted to the home workers by the trade union movement.
Thus organizing and mobilizing home based workers organizations and home workers themselves; is a major task that HomeNet Pakistan took after 2004-2005. Until now a total of 538 home based workers organizations are registered with HomeNet Pakistan from all over country with 58,282 home based women workers. This process initially started after 2005 realizing the fact that collecting statistics would provide sound grounds for advocating for laws and polices for these home workers and specifically women workers who are a major contributor in the national economy. And above all; strong networking of home based workers organizations and home base workers among themselves would enable them in learning and sharing experiences and would help them in getting recognition and giving voice to their views.
It has become apparent form various surveys and researches conducted over the years that women home based workers need a great deal of support at different levels and the support is of different kinds .They want support in information, knowledge, capacity building – developing contact, presenting issues, advocacy skills , designing and marketing etc. Apart form this what they essentially want is linkages and that is of two kinds ; i) institutions and ii) individuals ; who could play a role to support them so that what ever knowledge and advocacy they are doing could possibly materialize into something concrete and tangible. Another kind of linkage is among the organizations themselves i.e. networking.
HomeNet Pakistan thus believes that home-based women workers should not only be seen as poor women, deserving charity and some welfare schemes. They should be recognized as workers. They must be seen as producers. Their productivity has to be increased with skill development training, improved technologies, access to credit and direct access to the market. They also need to be adequately reflected in statistics and recognized as workers in the labour laws of the country, thus making them eligible for social protection.
Keeping in view the present scenario of the issue of home based workers in Pakistan, HomeNet Pakistan currently aims at developing a multi-pronged strategy to address the challenges faced by the home-based workers. Specifically, those that can be summarized into three main issues:
a) Invisibility
b) Lack of access to resources such as land, labour, capital and markets and
c) Lack of social protection
Therefore HomeNet Pakistan aims to strengthen the capacities of the organizations and networks of home-based workers in Pakistan and in South Asia to promote affirmative policies for improving the working and living conditions of home-based workers in Pakistan and in the region leading to safe and secure livelihoods for home based workers and respectable status among the working community.
My Home is My Work Place