The Deputy Minister of Employment and Labour Relations, Mr Bright Wireko-Brobbey says gender migration plays significant role in the formulation of appropriately feminist development policies.
This, he said, was key because many female migrant workers were confined to low-skilled jobs in domestic and care work, hotel and hospitality service and agriculture.
Mr Wireku-Brobbey made this assertion when he spoke at the 4th edition of the Gender and Migration Conference in Accra on Wednesday organised by the Ghanaian-German Centre for Jobs, Migration, and Reintegration.
It was organised in partnership with Ministry of Employment and Labour Relations, Ministry of Gender, Children and Social Protection and the University of Ghana, Centre for Migration Studies.
The conference, which was on the theme “Rethinking Migration and Feminist Development Policy: Insight from Ghana”, focused on issues related to the root causes of migration, power relations between genders, social norms, and role models.
According to Mr Wireku-Brobbey, government had pursued and promulgated gender-responsive policies to accelerate female participation in the labour market.
Some of these policies, Mr Wireku-Brobbey indicated, include efforts to ratify ILO Violence and Harassment Convention, efforts to ratify ILO Maternity Protection Convention, passage of the Labour (Domestic Workers) Regulations and the organisation of informal workers, economic units and enterprises.
Despite these policies, Mr Wireku-Brobbey bemoaned the inhumane, treatment, abuse and exploitation that women were subjected to when they migrate for greener pastures.
Additionally, he explained that the inability for female migrant workers to obtain work permits and acquire legal statuses in low-skilled sectors was a clear indication that many of the policies in place were incoherent.
Mr Wireku-Brobbey said “policies including gender-responsive policies would have to be carefully formulated to facilitate women’s integration in a changing world of work”.
Joining the programme virtually, the Commissioner for Refugee Policy and Director for Displacement and Migration at the Federal Ministry for Economic Corporation and Development, Dr ElkeLobel, noted that “feminist development policies are political movements that is all inclusive.”
According to her, the attainment of successful feminist development policies, was a collective responsibility.
Dr Lobel explained that in order to change and transform policies on feminist development, there was the need to pay critical attention to the right resources and representation of migrants, especially.
She underscored the importance of the protection of the human right of all migrants while commending Ghana for implementing policies in this regard.
The Director at the Centre for Migration Studies, University of Ghana, Prof. Mary Boatemaa Setrana, noted that studies had shown that issues such as gender dynamics of remittances and changes in family ideals had contributed to the inclusion of women in the migration situation in West African.
To this end, she implored countries to adopt an inter-sectional feminist approach in addressing gender and migration issues.
The German Ambassador to Ghana, Mr Daniel Krull, bemoaned the illegal method which most migrants migrate through the Saharan or Mediterranean Sea.
According to him, the best way to legal migration was through education, information and vocational training.
BY RAISSA SAMBOU
