Women's Human Rights & Business: What ASEAN governments and businesses can do to support gender equality and the empowerment of women in the workplace

This Briefing Paper contributes to the global conversation on how states and businesses can use the gender lens to ensure that policies and practices create an enabling environment for gender equality and women’s empowerment.

In this briefing, we focus on six priority issues affecting ASEAN women workers:

1. Sexual harassment and violence against women;
2. Discrimination;
3. Concentration of unpaid care work on women and girls;
4. Absence or invisibility of women in agriculture value chains;
5. Lack or absence of property rights
6. Difficulty in accessing state and non-state remedy mechanisms when their rights are violated.

Recommendations for governments and businesses (excerpts):

1. Align policies with relevant international standards;
2. Commit to zero-tolerance against discrimination and guarantee equal pay for equal work;
3. Invesment in accessissible infrastructure that provides for quality care services;
4. Enact gender-sensitive human rights due diligence policies that put economic value on the contribution of women at work;
5. Allow women to own property and to participate in decision-making processes that affect their properties;
6. Ensure that government and company remedies to violations of women's rights empower women to seek effective action that effectively address the root of the violations.