On Saturday,
June 3, the International Labour Office (ILO) Maternity
Protection Committee voted to increase maternity leave
to 14 weeks. (The vote was 111,061 for, 97,478 against,
and 6,392 abstaining.) Maternity leave was set at 12
weeks in 1919, and this is the first change in 81 years.
Although it is a move in the right direction, there
is still a need to bring maternity protection provisions
in line with current health recommendations as presented
to the Committee by WHO and UNICEF. Yet to be debated
are the provisions on paid breastfeeding breaks and
workplace facilities that enable women to sustain exclusive
breastfeeding while at work.
The Maternity
Protection Coalition wants to see that protection
for breastfeeding mothers will be strengthened, not
"bargained" away.
A raw
deal for women
For the last
81 years, breastfeeding was a part of "maternity."
The first Maternity Protection Convention No 3, passed
in 1919, established the ILO's basic principles of job-protected
maternity leave, income replacement for mothers on leave,
and health protection for mothers and babies. Convention
3 called for two half hour nursing breaks for women
returning to work after leave. The first Maternity Protection
Convention revision in 1952 strengthened the standard
by adding the requirement that nursing breaks be paid
and counted as working time. But soon after the second
revision began in 1998 women discovered that nursing
breaks and other protection for breastfeeding mothers
had been laid on the table as a "bargaining chip".
A fair
deal for women workers
What has
changed since 1919? Not women's biology. Not their babies'
needs for the best attainable nutrition, health protection
and care. What has changed is women's economic and political
position in the face of business and industry. More
women nowadays are spending their childbearing years
in paid employment, and the need for adequate maternity
protection legislation has thus increased. These labour
market changes were one reason that the ILO governing
body decided that it was time to revise the Maternity
Protection Convention for the second time.
Not a
"big deal" for governments and employers
The low level
of ratification of the previous Maternity Protection
Conventions was a reason for revising. According to
ILO's count only 38 countries have ratified either of
the two MPCs. The ILO Secretariat has stated in Report
V (2) that a more flexible, less prescriptive instrument
would be more ratifiable. But the ILO itself reported
in 1998 that four out of five members states surveyed
provided 12 or more weeks maternity leave. In the African
region, only three countries had ratified but 39 had
12 weeks or more of maternity leave. This fact contradicts
the opening statement by the Employers that when countries
do not ratify, "absolutely nothing happens."
Furthermore, the Croatian delegate reported that her
country provides 28 weeks of paid maternity leave, and
women make up 45% of the workforce. This example shows
that providing maternity leave does not necessarily
jeopardize women's opportunity for employment.
The best
deal for all
One major
concern about any increase in maternity protection is
"who will bear the cost?" The health and economic
benefits of maternity protection must also be
considered by all parties. Everyone benefits from maternity
protection, so everyone should share the costs. For
employers, the benefits include a productive, stable
and loyal workforce, giving them a competitive edge
in the market. For nations, the benefits include lower
health care costs and less need to manufacture or import
expensive substitute foods for babies. In the long-term
perspective, the benefits of providing adequate maternity
protection far outweigh the costs. Or as the delegate
from Finland said at the opening of the session, maternity
protection is an investment in Social Capital.
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To
support the right of women workers to breastfeed,
we strongly recommend, in the Convention:
And
in the Recommendation:
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Contact for
further information :
GIFA, Geneva
Infant Feeding Association, PO Box 157, 1211 Geneva
19, Switzerland Phone : +41 22 798 91 64 Fax: +41 22
798 44 43
Email: gifa@iprolink.ch
The
ILO Campaign is organised by the Maternity Protection
Coalition consisting of groups from The World
Alliance of Breastfeeding Action (WABA),
the International Baby Food Action Network (IBFAN) and
LINKAGES, with technical support from International
Maternal & Child Health, Uppsala (IMCH) and the United
Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF).
See daily
updates on the ILO
Campaign website.
See the Coalition
intervention at the Committee on Maternity Protection.
