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PRESENTATION ON

Empowerment through Mobilization

of Poor Women on a Large Scale

A Case Study on

Self Employed Women’s Association (SEWA), India

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SEWA Self Employed Women’s Association (SEWA) is a

National Trade Union, established by Shri Ela R. Bhatt in 1972

It is a confluence of three movements Labour movement Co-operative movement Women’s movement.

SEWA Organises the women workers through the strategy of struggle and development for its two main goals – Full Employment and Self Reliance

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SEWA adopts an Integrated & Need based Approach to Organising.

It is a member-based movement of about 7,00,000 poor, informal sector women workers of India.

SEWA works in 7 states of India and 14 districts of Gujarat, covering 50% of the State of Gujarat.

SEWA’s membership in Gujarat – 5,35,674

2/3rd of SEWA members live in rural areas

Members represent more than 125 different kind of trades

There are about 3500 local producers groups and 9 Economic Federations.

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Scaling-up in the Recent Past• Membership Growth in Gujarat

– From 1070 in 1972 to 535674 in 2002

Membership Growth

82

451

41

152

317

236

0

100000

200000

300000

400000

500000

600000

Year

Me

mb

ers

hip

050100150200250300350400450500

Gro

wth

Year

Membership

Growth (%)

Year 1972 1977 1982 1987 1992 1997 2002

Membership 1070 1948 10733 15144 38136 159204535674

Growth (%) 82 451 41 152 317 236

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

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• Geographical Coverage– Started with organising in Ahmedabad City– Now operates in 14 districts of Gujarat– 7 states in India– Other countries – South Africa, Yemen, Turkey

• Activity Mix– Members work in markets, in their own home, in

fields- others and their own, in forests, on riverbanks and in the desert. The members are divided in 4 categories viz. Home based workers, Vendors or Hawkers, Manual labourers & service providers and Producers

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– Different Activities include • Organising the informal Sector women into their

own organisations• Capacity Building• Livelihood security activities • Marketing Services• Financial Services• Social Security Activities • Eco-regeneration Activities • Policy Action

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Factors Leading to Scaling-up

• One success leads to anotherSuccess in working in the urban areas led to SEWA’s expansion in rural areas and now it works in 14 districts of Gujarat.

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• SEWA’s Need-based and Demand Driven Approach

SEWA’s approach to organising is a need based and demand driven approach. It identifies the needs and issues of the communities and link them up with government programmes & schemes rather than creating parallel programmes. This helps in leveraging government resources and also policy action. In addition to this, provision of need based and demand driven services like banking, insurance and health care led to expansion and growth of the organisation and new membership.

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• Confidence of the Government

The confidence of local & Central government leads to scaling-up Eg. – SEWA started its operations in Banaskantha district during the drought following government invitation similarly in case of Vadodara district, SEWA started operations following the government invitation for rehabilitating the affected families because of the construction of Sukhi Dam in Vadodara district

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• Demand from similar institutions in India and AbroadScaling-up also results because of the demands from other institutions in India and abroad at the grass root level. Eg. SEWA provides trainings and exposure visits to the other organisations working at the grass root level in India and abroad such as KGVK, Ranchi, training to Afghanistan team, etc.

• Expectations from Development/ Funding agencies The expectations from the government as well as other development and funding agencies help in scaling-up. Eg. expectations from the central government in case of rehabilitation of widows and orphans affected by the communal riots or World bank expectation in case of Grass Root Immersion Programme

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• Incidence of disasters

SEWA’s approach of turning disasters into a development opportunity leads to scaling-up. Also the areas in which SEWA works are arid and semi arid areas and are prone to disasters. This leads to, in a way forced scaling-up. Eg. following the Earthquake of 2001, SEWA membership increased by 88% in just one year. Also the operations increased during the Earthquake as both members and non-members were provided relief, which then resulted in an increase in membership. Similarly, the Communal Riots of 2002 led to an expansion in the geographical area as Hon’ble Prime Minister of India delegated the responsibility of rehabilitating the riot affected widows and orphans to SEWA.

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• Emerging local/ global marketing opportunities

Increased marketing opportunities for the products produced by the members, leads to scaling-up of the operations. Eg. SEWA Gram Mahila Haat (SGMH)and SEWA Trade Facilitation Centre (STFC) were set-up to provide marketing linkages to the members. The market linkages and the technical inputs provided to the members, leads to scaling-up

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Implementation Factors• Learning & Experimentation

– Innovation and Adaptation are seen as normal by SEWA members. They do not think in terms of “success/ failure” but in terms of a long struggle with ups and downs, and periodic realignments of strategy so as to achieve the larger goals. Eg. SEWA’s attempts to gain higher pay for agricultural workers by withholding labor in rural areas did not work out. But this was not a “failure,” and SEWA eventually found a way to achieve the same by promoting alternative income generating opportunities, which both benefit those who participate and raise agricultural wages in the area.

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– Having recognised the importance of access to technology for the members in the informal sector, SEWA’s intervention for providing access to technology to its members include training for technology applications in garment manufacturing, theliphone Yojana (providing loan for mobile phones to the grass root members) which was launched in 2003 by Hon’ble President of India Shri Abdul Kalam and Introducing ATM services at SEWA Bank for the poor members.

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• Institutional Innovation and Implementation

– Capacity building of the members has been a central concern of SEWA since its inception. SEWA Academy was formally registered in 1990 to provide capacity building trainings and undertake research activities for the members.

– In 1974, SEWA had set-up its own cooperative bank for the poor women.

– SEWA is in the process of setting-up a School for Barefoot Managers in order to provide management trainings to the grass root women for managing their own enterprises.

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– SEWA has set-up STFC in order to provide marketing support to its rural producer members. STFC is a company which is owned by the members at the grass root level.

– SEWA, under its Gokulgram programme, undertook the task of providing capacity building trainings to the members of the panchayat (local governing body) and village implementation committee

– SEWA has also set-up its own insurance services for the poor women

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• Political Economy of Change

– SEWA believes in building the capacities of the members so that they become owners and managers of their own trades. It is for this reasons that the concept of spearhead teams was developed.

– As a measure of decentralisation, all the activities in the districts are implemented by a district association

– The members are organized as per their trade. Each trade group of members elects its trade committee. Every three years, the trade committee elects their trade representatives to SEWA’s Representative Council. For every 400 members, one representative is elected. Currently SEWA has 1422 elected representatives. SEWA’s Executive Committee is then elected from the representative council.

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– The SEWA members monitor and evaluate their performance on the basis of lateral learning. The members from one district monitors the performance of the members from the other districts.

– In a membership based organisation, it is the members priorities and needs that shapes the priorities and direction of the organisation. The members, therefore, have themselves developed their own yardstick for evaluation. The members evaluate themselves on the basis of the following eleven questions

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SEWA’S 11 QUESTIONS

• Employment• Income• Nutritious Food• Health Care• Child Care• Housing

• Asset• Organised Strength• Leadership• Self Reliance• Education

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• External Catalyst

– External factors such as disasters play an important role in scaling-up of the operations of the organisation. The scale of operations in the earthquake affected districts has increased tremendously following the Earthquake

– SEWA has also taken several initiatives solely and jointly for making the process of globalisation far and equitable to its poor self employed members.

– In order to keep pace with the changing trends in fashion, SEWA has linked up with the National Institute of Fashion Technology (NIFT) and the National Institute of Design (NID) for design inputs.

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Summary of Lessons

Some of the significant features that account for SEWA’s success in mobilizing large numbers of poor women and encouraging them to empower themselves can be summarised as follows :

• Organizing members (as opposed to offering services at the outset) helps to ensure “ownership” and that subsequent activities are based on members’ needs, while providing a firm foundation for future growth. Most importantly, it leads to collective strength and increased bargaining power of the workers, their Organisation and Movement.

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• Values at the core of an organization help establish consistency in its purpose and perseverance in its efforts, and serve to attract and retain highly motivated staff and members

• Flexibility in an organization’s style and structure encourages experimentation and learning, and a willingness to take advantage of partnerships with others

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•Leadership is crucial not only in defining an organization’s vision, but also in establishing management and behavioral practices that reduce social distance between corporate management and grassroots members – moreover, effective leadership skills can be taught to and learned by poor and uneducated women.

•Policy Action at local, national and international levels towards just and equitable policies and legislation gives SEWA and its members hope and strength to organise further, thus boosting the movement overall.

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THANK YOU