Female workforce seen held down by expectations of childcare, housework

By Erika Mae P. Sinaking, Reporter

THE PHILIPPINES is grappling with weak female labor force participation even though it has some of the best gender gap ratings in the region by traditional metrics, advocates for women in the workplace said.

At a conference this week, participants singled out the persistence of social norms like childcare roles as well as what they called structural workplace biases.

Julia Andrea R. Abad, executive director of the Philippine Business Coalition for Women Empowerment, said societal expectations remain the primary hurdle, as both men and women continue to view men as the primary providers.

“In a stage of a family, whether it’s caring for a child or household duties, it will be the woman who drops out because it’s the man who’s seen as the primary (breadwinner),” she said at a panel discussion in Mandaluyong this week.

She added that even when women reach executive levels, estimated at nearly 40% of leadership teams in publicly listed firms, they are often confined to secondary roles rather than operational positions with the high visibility required for top-tier promotions.

Anna Leah Colina, project officer and women coordinator for the Federation of Free Workers, said that culture that favors men remains deeply rooted despite technological advancements.

She noted that 17 million women aged 15 and above remain outside the labor force, largely due to invisible labor or unpaid care work.

“We are still perceived as secondary to men economically, politically, and socially,” Ms. Colina said, adding that even when women seek work, they often are relegated to vulnerable informal jobs.

Anita E. Baleda, deputy executive director for operations at the Philippine Commission on Women, said that as of 2024, women spend an average of 3.2 hours a day on unpaid care and domestic work, compared to just 1.7 hours for men.

“If we’re talking evidence-based, we know for a fact, that women do twice as much, spend twice as much time as men in doing unpaid care and domestic work,” she told BusinessWorld.

Reducing this burden, she said, requires investment in care-support infrastructure such as facilities and labor-saving household technology.

Merriam Leilani M. Reynoso, director of the Bureau of Workers with Special Concerns at the Department of Labor and Employment, noted a 99.9% compliance rate among monitored establishments for laws protecting women workers, including maternity and solo-parent leave benefits.

Panelists urged employers to complement regulatory enforcement with proactive workplace reforms, including bias-resistant hiring practices, transparent promotion pathways, and intentional inclusion of non-traditional candidates in leadership pipelines.

These discussions accompanied the launch of the “Juana Trabaho Framework,” an initiative of the Department of Economy, Planning, and Development in partnership with the Australian government. The program aims to achieve the female-related goals of the Trabaho Para Sa Bayan Plan 2025–2034, which targets a female labor force participation rate of 59% by 2034, up from 53.7% in 2025.

“This reality underscores why increasing women’s labor force participation is a clear priority of the Philippine government,” Economy Secretary Arsenio M. Balisacan said. “Achieving this requires not only creating quality, secure, and accessible jobs for women but also ensuring that these jobs align with emerging industry demands brought about by a modernizing economy.”

Australian Ambassador to the Philippines Marc Innes-Brown added that the collaboration focuses on policy reforms that support gender-inclusive workplaces and a care economy to drive sustainable economic growth in the region.