Margaret Triyana, a Senior Economist at the World Bank's Office of the Chief Economist, South Asia Region joined us to discuss women’s participation in the labour force in South Asia. Margaret shared thatover the past three decades, South Asia has benefited from strong economic growth, accompanied by a shift toward the services sector, growing exports, and stronger legal protections for women. She asserted that these changes have expanded opportunities for all, including for many women. However, women’s employment has remained a source of untapped potential and South Asia’s female labour force participation remains among the lowest in the world, far below the emerging market average.
She emphasised how this low participation rate represents a costly misallocation of resources, and raising this rate to that of men could boost per capita incomes by up to one-half. Speaking on the wide range of policies that could help women enter the workforce, Margaret shared that, legal reforms to improve gender equality, faster job creation in the non-agricultural sector, and the removal of barriers to women working outside the home could play an integral role to bolster labour force participation. She emphasised that such measures will be more effective if accompanied by a shift in social norms toward greater acceptance of women’s employment.