Government has committed to installing 175 GW of renewable energy by 2022.
This provides an immense opportunity for employing women and reducing poverty in rural areas.
What is the current state of women workforce in India?
More than 270 million Indians live in poverty (World Bank Report) and India also ranks very poorly on female labour force participation.
Constraints - Some estimates hold that India can increase its GDP by up to 60% by 2025 by enabling more women to participate in its workforce.
But social and cultural constraints can prevent this from becoming a reality.
Many women who work outside home still have primary household and parenting responsibilities that need to be balanced with their work life.
Opportunity - The government has committed to installing 175 GW of Renewable Energy (RE) by 2022.
This provides an immense opportunity for women and the rural poor.
Notably, as many as 3.3 lakh jobs are expected to be created in the wind and solar energy sectors alone.
What is the situation in Renewable sector?
India’s RE industry presently has low participation of women, and even the few women engaged are mostly daily wage labourers.
Moreover, the working conditions on many sites are not always suitable for women as they are devoid of safety and support systems.
In the current situation, jobs requiring some skilling are completely closed for women as formal education and training largely continues to elude them.
One has to pass 12th grade to get into technical training institutions and these institutions are largely concentrated in urban and semi-urban centres.
These are significant entry barriers for rural women workforce participation, and this hurdle only enhances with the burden of household responsibilities.
Consequently, there are very few women in production, facilities, and operations and maintenance roles in the RE sector.
Why is RE sector significant for women empowerment?
A recent study has stated that some tweaks in the system might enable the RE sector to impact poverty by opening up opportunities for the poor.
Particularly with the growth of the decentralised RE and off-grid energy sector, there is significant potential to include local women in the workforce.
Hence, the government, enterprises, training institutes and civil society should work together to tap the potential of rural women for RE projects.
Importantly, for such interventions to be successful, it needs to be designed with women at the centre and not as an afterthought.
What are the specifics needed?
Training institutes could reduce the bar on entry, allowing for less formally educated women to learn new skills and receive training.
Training should be customised to respect specific needs like location, hours of engagement, safety, sanitation and women specific needs.
Mobile training modules that can cater to small groups of women in remote areas can be developed.
Training institutes and civil society organisations should collaborate with enterprises to help trained women secure employment.
Such efforts will enable India’s transition to clean energy to also brighten the prospect of empowering our women and addressing poverty.
