Women & Work:  
History and Development  

Gives an overview of the situation of working women around the world from early 20th century and especially since globalisation. With the latter process came the urbanisation of life and the alienation of women's labour. The talk covers the differing experiences of women in urban and rural areas as well as discusses women's experiences working in the formal and informal sector and their corresponding problems. How has modernisation increasingly separated women's productive and reproductive work? What is the 20th century challenges for most of the world's working women? Identify the reality situation of women workers in the Third World, and how they combine paid work with domestic chores and child rearing. A discussion on the need for a new women-centred definition of labour which will give a higher value to housework and childcare, together with government provisions for better working conditions (eg. women's health and safety, job security, the need for support from family and employer, how women can claim their rights and where there are good examples). Women have the right to breastfeed and breastfeeding support. What are the priorities for citizen's groups in supporting working women so as to help them more effectively combine their productive and reproductive roles in today's society. 

Children's Rights to the Highest  
Attainable Standard of Health  

A children's rights advocate (David Clark of UNICEF) will highlight the child's right to the highest attainable standard of health and breastfeeding as the means to food security, proper nutrition and care. What international instruments exists to protect the breastfeeding rights of children and how can these tools be used more in advocacy. 

Human Rights & Long Term Solutions  

Points out what the situation of working women would be like if their rights, including the right to breastfeed were respected. To achieve it we need to achieve widespread awareness of the importance of exclusive breastfeeding and the need for society to enable mothers and babies to be together during the early months of life. Breastfeeding is a human rights issue, a woman's right and a child's right. Where exclusive breastfeeding becomes the norm, then these rights will be viewed like the right to vote. No one complains that society cannot afford for everyone to vote. Nor does anyone feel like having the right to vote forces them to do so! Why are we in the 'breastfeeding world' so afraid to set high goals? We must create international norms for the support and protection we know mothers and babies need, just the way we are doing with seat belts, motorcycle helmets and no smoking in public. Then we will find that feminists, employers and others will be on our side!  

Principles of Mother-Friendly Workplaces 

Given today's lack of legal protection for working women, insufficient community support systems, unfriendly employers and unsafe workplaces, how can working women be helped to combine their various work responsibilities with reproductive work such as breastfeeding? The talk provides an overview of definitions of work and applies these definitions to WABA's mother-friendly workplace initiative and the three generic principles of time/space or proximity/support as a framework for analysing mother/baby friendly workplaces. What does a mother-friendly workplace look like and how can these generic principles be applied to various types of worksites, especially non-formal ones. It points to the need for other various short term solutions and creative measures for women working in the non-formal sector. 

Women & Work in Formal Sector 

a) Overview  

Defining formal sector work and workplaces; the challenges such as job security, health and safety issues facing women in the formal sector. What are the international instruments and conventions that protect pregnant and breastfeeding working women? What is the general state of implementation of these laws in different countries? What successes have there been in helping women in the formal sector to combine paid work with childrearing and breastfeeding? What are the recent ILO policy developments and how will the changes or non-changes directly affect women working in the formal sector and indirectly affect women working in the non-formal sector? What can citizen groups do to bring about improvements in legal instruments and ensure better implementation of such good policies and recommendations? 

b) Implementation of Legislation  

This will be a panel discussion with representatives from 5 countries (Sweden, USA, New Zealand, Sri Lanka and Philippines) each giving 5 minutes overview of the state of implementation of legislation/maternity entitlements in their country. Ted Greiner will facilitate the discussion and provide a framework for conceptualising the kinds of action possible on improving legal implementation in different parts of the world. This framework will then be used for the working group session on formal work. 

Women and Work in Non-formal Sector  

a) Overview  

Based on definitions developed earlier, who are the women who are marginalised by existing approaches to work? Who are not covered by legislation? We will consider paid, unpaid, homebased and unrecognised work, and identify the experiences of women who work in the non-formal sector. What are the overarching concerns of these women and their children? Where laws are difficult to implement, what strategies or tools can we use to help women combine productive and reproductive work?  

b) Stories of Working Women's Lives  

(Ruth Tabora will speak of the real lives of women vendors and rural workers in the Philippines)  

c) Case Studies  

Four seedgrant recipients, each presenting their success stories will relate how they have helped working women in their community/country to breastfeed and work. The four presentations cover women working in the market place, in farms, as fisherfolks, in urban slums and in schools.  

Women and Work in Formal Sector  

There will be 5 working groups on formal sector issues identified as:  

a) Working conditions - health and safety issues  
b) Job security and a conducive work environment: how working breastfeeding women can claim their rights  
c) Tax incentives and creative measures  
d) Legislation: maternity entitlements and parental leave - improving implementation e) Understanding and using various International Conventions to promote women's and children's rights to breastfeeding 

Women and Work in Formal Sector  

There will be 5 working groups on non-formal sector issues identified as:  

a) Occupational health Risks and job protection  
b) Nutrition and Maternal Health  
c) Marginalised and Unrecognised sector - Urban poor, domestics, vendors, migrant workers, women in prison  
d) Rural Workers and Marginalised poor - sessional workers, home-based workers, homemakers, farmers  
e) Establishing Support Groups for women  

Working groups will have 2 hours to discuss the issue and come up with recommendations. The facilitator will lead the group beginning with a short 5 - 10 minutes presentation on the topic. Rapporteurs will be given 5-10 minutes to present their issues and recommendations in the next session. 

"How to" Workshop on Infant & Child Care  

This will be an optional workshop for those participants interested in the specifics on how to set up a creche, how to design the creche programme, learning about the health care and nutritional needs for mothers and babies and understanding child development. 

Mother/Baby-friendly Environments Creating the Environment  

This session gives a detailed picture of what a mother/baby-friendly environment looks like, its elements and how to create it. What are the design concepts and architectural concerns for buildings and public spaces that are meant to be mother/baby-friendly? How can friendly transportation systems be designed? What are the legal settings to promote mother/baby-friendly infrastructure? Examples of some existing mother/baby-friendly public places and transportations are given.  

Mother/Baby-friendly Environments Support Systems for Working Mothers  

What are the many faces of mother support? - mother-to-mother, hospital based, community based, workplace based, ... How support systems for women need to be in tailored to the kinds of work settings and culture. How can family members be supportive to working women. This overview is accompanied by 4 case studies giving examples of the different types of support systems for women:  
(i) CEFEMINA, Costa Rica (support by grandmothers and the elderly of a community)  
(ii) CONAPLAM, Guatemala (support for indigenous and non-literate women)  
(iii) LLLI, USA (mother-to-mother support)  
(iv) Support from Men (v) SINAN (support from community healers and factory) 

Networking & Tools for Advocacy  

This session looks at the various tools available for networking and advocacy on the issue of breastfeeding and working women such as the Website, popular materials, as well as identifies possible events for advocacy. It links with the next session on designing strategies as it informs participants of the tools and opportunties available. A panel discussion on how to forge new partnerships will follow. The panel will include a trade union leader, an employer and one representative each from a women's organisation and the mass media. 

Designing Strategies 

This session will involve the active participation of two groups, formal and non-formal (culled from earlier working groups). Drawing from discussions shared in the previous session, the two groups will then suggest practical and viable recommendations for their respective sectors and formulate an action plan for WABA and network partners. 

Vision Statement & Plan of Action 

During this 90-minute session, facilitators of the two main working groups will present the list of viable recommendations discussed during the session oh Designing Strategies. (Note: This session is not about making a range of recommendations for the WABA Secretariat to carry out. Persons making a recommendation must also identify the persons or organisation responsible for carrying out the action). A more useful outcome is to identify workable strategies long and short term that could be in the respective countries or regions.