In 1991, the Innocenti Declaration [3] called on national governments to “[enact] imaginative legislation protecting the breastfeeding rights of working women and [establish] means for its enforcement”. This action prompted WABA to start the Women & Work Task Force. In 1993, the “Mother Friendly Workplace Initiative” was launched as the World Breastfeeding Week theme. Later WBW themes especially relevant to breastfeeding women at work were the 1995, “Breastfeeding: Empowering Women”, and the 2000, “Breastfeeding and Human Rights” themes. In 2000, the International Labour Organisation adopted a revised Maternity Protection Convention No 183[4] and Recommendation No 191[5], stipulating women’s right to one or more paid breastfeeding breaks during the workday or a shorter workday and recommending facilities for breastfeeding at or near the workplace.

WABA’s Women and Work Task Force :

• Acts on the belief that integrating breastfeeding with other forms of work requires strong policies and actions that protect and fulfill women’s rights, including the right to breastfeed.
• Supports the development, adoption, implementation, and monitoring of strong maternity protection laws and regulations, as well as the ratification of C183.
• Supports the development of Mother/Parent Friendly Workplaces and encourages local action on behalf of women in the entire range of work situations, including women working in marginalised sectors, to empower them to realise their human rights as workers and mothers.
• Advocates for greater recognition for the value of breastfeeding just like the work that women and men do for pay. Human milk should therefore be valued in the system of national accounts.
• Explores questions of gender equity and the human right to breastfeed.

For more information, please click to download the WWTF brochure.

Christine Mulford
USA
Chris is the mother of two and thanks her first baby for teaching her about breastfeeding. Chris was a LLL Leader for many years. She has worked in the field of lactation since starting as a hospital maternity and nursery nurse in 1975. In 1985 she was in the first group who took the exam to become International Board Certified Lactation Consultants (IBCLCs). Her final job was with the Regional Breastfeeding Initiative for WIC, coordinating a staff that assists low-income women with breastfeeding. She served on the board of the International Lactation Consultant Association (ILCA) for 5 years and has been on the IAC of WABA since 1997. She is now retired and spends much of her time writing and advocating for breastfeeding at the state and national levels. She has been a Co-coordinator of WABA’s Women and Work Task Force since 2000.

Elaine Petitat-Côté
Switzerland/Canada
Elaine Petitat-Côté is both Canadian and Swiss; she is bilingual English-French. After studying Spanish in Barcelona, she studied history at the University of Geneva, majoring on issues centring on women and work at the turn of the 20th century. She also did research on the history of nursing and of medical institutions in Canada.
A large part of her professional experience has been acquired working for NGOs and associations in the areas of women and development, regional development, development studies and health.
She joined IBFAN-GIFA at the end of 2000 and has been focusing on:
- human rights and more specifically child rights and the Convention of the Rights of the Child review process: presenting IBFAN alternative reports to the Treaty Body and obtaining recommendations for better policies and practices on infant and young child nutrition – to be implemented at national level. She also trains breastfeeding advocates in this field;
- maternity protection at the workplace, centering on ILO conventions and national legislation. She has been part of the WABA Women and Work Task-force for some years and works closely with various WABA core members to develop campaign and advocacy tools and give trainings; she has also been instrumental in developing training modules on this topic

Ines Fernandez
Philippines
Ines is a Co-coordinator of WABA’s Women and Work Task Force. She is also the Executive Director and pioneering founder of ARUGAAN in Philippines and a Board Director, Education for Life Foundation in the Philippines. Ines runs a crèche for babies and toddlers of working parents and uses indigenous foods and breastfeeding. She also teaches Food & Culture at the Education For Life, a Filipino-Danish folk school. She also rehabilitated babies and toddlers who were abused and abandoned, placed under the care of Childwatch Centre in the Philippines. She applied breastfeeding through wet nursing and indigenous healing food in their rehabilitation and found that these babies and toddlers recovered well.