Puts Women at Centre Stage of COVID Recovery

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London, UK, BTNp: PANDEMIC having made clear the extent to which women and girls everywhere are disproportionately affected by crisis, UNWTO partnered with the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ), and UN Women to put gender equality at the heart of recovery plans

A United Nations-led initiative to empower women in tourism in the aftermath of COVID has been hailed a success and is to be rolled out as a blue-print across the globe. And the Centre Stage project, run by the UN World Tourism Organisation, was piloted among four member states—Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Jordan and Mexico— with the aim of putting women’s empowerment and gender equality at the heart of tourism recovery. Centre Stage brought together the public, private and civil society sectors in tourism to implement one-year action plans.

Project Manager of Centre Stage at UNWTO, Benjamin Owen, introduced the session by telling the audience that that women were disproportionately affected by global crises such as Covid, less likely to recover and more likely to suffer from exploitation.

The idea of Centre Stage, he said, was to: “put women at the centre of recovery efforts – to put women in the driver seat.”

Research undertaken in the four pilot countries ahead of the project showed a higher percentage of women lost their jobs than men during the pandemic. In the Dominican Republic, for example, 61% of women involved in tourism lost their jobs, compared to 56% of men. In Costa Rica, 54% of women and 51% of men lost their jobs during the pandemic.

As a result of the pilot, 175 people in Costa Rica had been trained on gender equality and 124 women employees had received a promotion in a participating business. Meanwhile, 50% of participating businesses now offer maternity leave of 14 weeks.

In the Dominica Republic, 100% of participating businesses are committed to equal pay, while 83 women have received a promotion.

Dr Lucy Ferguson, expert in gender equality at the UNWTO, said 45 people were trained across the four pilot destinations, who then went on to train 600 people.

“A light bulb has gone on for people in different countries who have got on board with the momentum. It shows how public and private sector can work together effectively when they share the same goals,” she said.

Ahlam Alazzeh, HR Generalist and Internal Instructor for Royal Jordanian admitted the airline was sceptical about what the initiative would do for the company. But it now has a zero-gap difference in gender pay, among other improvements in work practices.

Ahlam Alazzeh said: “We’re raising awareness of women’s role in workplace, offering training and employing women to achieve gender equality. We all benefit where policies are not based on gender.”

The pilot programme has now finished and the organisers are looking for more destinations to sign up. Meanwhile, Jordan’s Minister of Tourism and Antiquities, Nayef Hmeidi Al-Fayez, announced his country will include the training in a five-year plan to further empower women.

Impact of COVID-19

UNWTO Secretary-General, Zurab Pololikashvili, said: “As we rethink the future of tourism, it must be one in which women and men are equally empowered to take the opportunities that the sector’s restart is bringing. The four pilot countries have led the way in putting gender-equality centre stage of their tourism recovery plans and UNWTO is committed to taking this work further and wider.”

As part of the initiative, UNWTO conducted a survey on the impact of COVID-19 on tourism employment. The research found that, between March 2020 and September 2021, women in tourism were:

3% more likely to lose their job, 8% more likely to have a pay cut and 8% more likely to have reduced working hours in Costa Rica.
5% more likely to lose their job, 2% more likely to have reduced working hours and 12% more likely to have a pay cut in the Dominican Republic.
4% more likely to lose their job, 8% less likely to have a pay rise and 20% more likely to pay someone to look after their dependents in Jordan.
3% more likely to lose their job, 8% more likely to have a pay cut and 3% more likely to take time off to care for their dependents in Mexico.

UNWTO’s pioneering ‘Centre Stage’ project was designed to address this, working with 3 governments, 38 businesses and 13 civil society organizations to implement year-long gender action plans.

The project has produced the following results:

702 businesses/entrepreneurs received gender-equality training
712 people received in-person training
526 women received a promotion
100% of participating businesses strengthened sexual harassment prevention
100% of participating businesses committed to ‘equal pay for work of equal value’
1 hour online ‘Gender Equality in Tourism Training’ course on atingi.org
Gender Mainstreaming Guidelines for the public sector
Gender Inclusive Strategy for tourism businesses
An awareness campaign at global scale about gender equality in tourism. *BTNewspaper/UNWTO