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	Care and support systems are failing women and girls by UN Working Group on Discrimination Against Women   Dec. 2025   United Nations General Assembly adopts resolution on care   By 160 votes in favour and 2 against, the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted on December 15th a resolution on "Contribution of the care economy to sustainable development" formally putting the issue of care in the agenda as part of the international efforts to eradicate poverty.   The resolution acknowledges "that care work, paid and unpaid, which is disproportionately carried out by women, is essential to all other work" and recognizes that " the care economy contributes substantially to national income, employment creation, human capabilities and productivity".   The UN General Assembly notes "that unpaid care and domestic work is estimated to be between 10 and 39 per cent of gross domestic product, if valued at the hourly minimum wage, and can surpass that of manufacturing, commerce, transportation and other key productive sectors, underscoring its overwhelming economic relevance:   http://docs.un.org/en/A/C.2/80/L.30/Rev.1   Aug. 2025   The Center for Economic and Social Rights welcomes the Inter-American Court on Human Rights’ historic recognition of care as a human right. This is a long-overdue step toward justice for women, caregivers, and communities across America.   This breakthrough builds on decades of feminist organizing, including the Care Manifesto, and echoes the vision we share with allies like Public Services International. Care is the invisible foundation of our societies and economies. Yet too often it is ignored, unpaid, and placed on the backs of women and girls.   Recognizing care as a right changes the terms of the conversation. It affirms that care is not a personal responsibility or private burden, but a public good and a state obligation. And it opens the door to systemic change, starting with how governments fund, design, and deliver public services.   From recognition to redistribution   The right to care means that everyone, regardless of income, gender, disability, or migratory status, must have access to quality, affordable, and dignified care. It also means that those providing care, whether paid or unpaid, must be supported, protected, and fairly compensated.   To meet this obligation, states must invest in universal, gender-responsive public services that meet the needs of both caregivers and those receiving care. That includes:   Public funding for health, education, childcare, eldercare, disability support, water, sanitation, and energy. Infrastructure designed with equity in mind: accessible, safe, affordable, and culturally appropriate. Fair pay and decent working conditions for care workers, with the right to organize and bargain collectively. Gender-responsive budgeting, backed by disaggregated data and clear accountability mechanisms.   The care crisis does not stop at national borders. Migrant care workers, mostly women from the Global South, fill critical labor gaps in richer countries, often in exploitative conditions. A rights-based response demands international cooperation to uphold their labor rights and ensure fair, safe, and dignified work.   We already have the legal and policy foundations: the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, CEDAW, and the ILO’s 2024 resolution on decent work and care. Recent commitments, such as the March 2025 Joint Statement endorsed by over 70 countries, have created political space for stronger cooperation. But commitments only matter if they come with resources. That means urgent reforms to the global financial system:   Fix tax rules to stop illicit financial flows and corporate profit-shifting that strip resources from public budgets.Cancel or restructure unsustainable debts so governments can invest in care, not austerity. Mobilize climate finance to build resilience in communities, especially women on the frontlines of crisis.   Recognition is not enough. Realizing the right to care will take bold action, sustained pressure, and a shift in political priorities. Governments must move from rhetoric to redistribution, from token programs to universal, well-funded systems that treat care as a shared responsibility and a pillar of justice.   As CESR’s Executive Director, Dr. María Ron Balsera, puts it: “The right to care is not merely aspirational. It is achievable if we prioritize gender justice, fiscal justice, transparency, and redistribution.” We will keep pushing until care is no longer invisible or undervalued, but recognized, resourced, and shared.   http://www.cesr.org/care-as-a-human-right-a-new-mandate-to-build-gender-responsive-public-services/ http://www.cesr.org/key-voices-veronica-montufar-unionism-feminism-and-rebuilding-the-social-organization-of-care/ http://www.cesr.org/progressive-taxation-for-a-gender-transformative-social-organization-of-care/ http://www.ohchr.org/en/stories/2025/10/transforming-care-and-support-just-and-inclusive-societies http://publicservices.international/resources/campaigns/care-manifesto-rebuilding-the-social-organization-of-care?id=11655&lang=en http://gi-escr.org/en/our-work/on-the-ground/historic-ruling-inter-american-court-recognises-the-human-right-to-care-2   http://gi-escr.org/en/our-work/on-the-ground/we-called-the-un-cescr-to-recognise-the-human-right-to-care-and-support-in-reviews-of-chile-and-colombia http://gi-escr.org/en/our-work/on-the-ground/boosting-regional-dialogue-on-the-implications-of-recognising-care-as-a-social-right-during-the-xvi-regional-conference-on-women-of-latin-america-and-the-caribbean http://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2025/08/americas-conferencia-regional-sobre-la-mujer-debe-ser-un-cortafuegos-frente-a-los-ataques-contra-la-igualdad-de-genero/   August 14, 2025   Inter-American Court Recognizes the Right to Care as an Autonomous Human Right, by Emily Carrazana and Ivonne Garza. (O'Neil Institute Georgetown Law)   In a groundbreaking Advisory Opinion, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights has recognized the human right to care — long an overlooked pillar of human well-being — as an autonomous and enforceable right, placing it on equal footing with the rights to receive and to provide care.   The Court emphasized that this human right has its own legal standing, as it safeguards the essential material and social conditions, including adequate time, sufficient resources, supportive relationships, and accessible services — conditions that enable the full enjoyment of a dignified life.   When those conditions are omitted or neglected, the ability to exercise many other interdependent rights is undermined. Entrenched in the right to care, this autonomy is expressed in three dimensions: the right to be cared for, the right to care for others, and the right to self-care.   The Three Dimensions of the Right to Care   1. The Right to Be Cared For   Every person is entitled to receive care that is available, accessible, culturally appropriate and acceptable, and of high quality — regardless of income, age, health status, or location. This right protects persons who depend on others for their survival and well-being, including children, older adults, and people with disabilities.   2. The Right to Care for Others   All persons have the right to provide care — whether for family members, community members, or in a professional capacity — under conditions that respect their dignity, ensure fair labor protections for paid caregivers, and prevent economic or social disadvantage for unpaid caregivers.   3. The Right to Self-Care   Persons have the right to take care of their own physical, mental, and emotional well-being. This requires States to create environments and policies that make self-care possible, which includes access to preventive health services like reproductive health care, safe working conditions, adequate rest, and freedom from practices that undermine personal autonomy.   Why Self-Care Matters   The Court’s Advisory Opinion frames self-care as a legal entitlement — recognizing that the ability to care for oneself is foundational to living with dignity and exercising other rights. Without the means and freedom to practice self-care, individuals can be trapped in cycles of ill health, dependency, and economic vulnerability.   By placing self-care at the core of the right to care, the Court acknowledges that autonomy over one’s own health is not a privilege, but a right that States must actively enable and protect.   In articulating self-care as a human right, the Court situates it within a normative framework grounded in three governing principles. First, social and family co-responsibility locates care within a network of actors — individuals, families, communities, civil society, businesses, and the State — each bearing an obligation to sustain it.   Second, the principle of solidarity affirms the necessity of mutual support among all members and institutions of society.   Third, equality and non-discrimination impose a mandate to ensure that the provision and receipt of care do not reproduce structural inequalities, particularly those entrenched along gender lines.   State Obligations: Recognize, Reduce, Redistribute   To fulfill the right to care in all its dimensions, the Court outlined parameters that States should take into consideration when designing and adopting legal frameworks and public policies:   Recognize the economic and social value of care, both paid and unpaid. Reduce the burdens and barriers that make caregiving — or self-care — inaccessible, unsafe, or inequitable. Redistribute care responsibilities more fairly between men and women and across the State, market, community, and families.   While the form of care systems will depend on national contexts and resources, the Court recognizes that a model that includes the aforementioned parameters can better contribute to effectively implementing the right to care.   Link to the Right to Health   Although autonomous, the right to care is closely linked to the right to health. Fulfilling it requires:   Accurate and timely information to make health decisions, including reproductive and maternal health. Free, prior, and informed consent before any medical decision. Quality standards that are culturally acceptable, scientifically sound, and delivered with dignity.   In Latin America and the Caribbean, persistent barriers — such as the scarcity of medical goods and services, high costs, discrimination, and widespread misinformation — continue to undermine the practical realization of both care and health rights.   A Call for Action   The Court’s recognition of the human right to care, and especially the right to self-care, calls for a rethinking of public policy. Governments must invest in care systems, expand parental leave, enforce labor protections, and ensure that people have the time, resources, and autonomy to look after themselves.   By embedding the right to care into national law and policy, States can move toward more equal, healthy, and sustainable societies — where caring for oneself and others is not left to individual circumstances but, rather, is supported as a shared social responsibility.   http://oneill.law.georgetown.edu/inter-american-court-recognizes-the-right-to-care-as-an-autonomous-human-right/   July 2025   Care and support systems are failing women and girls   A new report by the UN Working Group on Discrimination Against Women and Girls warns that global care and support systems are failing women and girls, exacerbating human rights violations and deepening gender inequalities.   Released ahead of the 59th session of the UN Human Rights Council, the report presents a bold call for urgent public investment and structural reform to recognise, redistribute, and properly reward care and support work.   “Despite care and support work being essential for the health, wellbeing, and sustainability of societies, it remains largely invisible, undervalued, and unprotected,” the Working Group said.   “Women and girls shoulder 76% of unpaid care responsibilities globally, amounting to 12.5 billion hours of unpaid work each day, worth an estimated $10.8 trillion annually if monetised,” the experts said.   The Working Group called for counting the unpaid care into the GDP of states.   “Care and support systems are failing women and girls under demographic pressures, economic inequality, and persistent gender norms,” the Working Group said. “Without immediate and transformative action, millions of women and girls will continue to sacrifice their rights, health, education, and economic opportunities to fill this systemic gap.”   The report highlights how fragmented and insufficient care and support policies amount to systemic gender discrimination, affecting rights to education, health, employment, political participation, and other human rights of women and girls.   From rural women and girls denied healthcare and schooling, to migrant domestic workers facing exploitation and violence, the care crisis is both global and intersectional.   “Particularly alarming is the impact of conflict and climate change,” the experts said. “In armed conflict zones such as Gaza and Sudan, the deliberate destruction of care infrastructure, coupled with the use of sexual violence as a weapon of war, dramatically increases care and support needs and responsibilities of women and girls.”   They noted that climate-induced scarcity of resources also forces women to work longer hours under harsher conditions, further undermining their wellbeing.   The report calls for the creation of gender-responsive, human rights-based care and support systems anchored in the principles of equity, dignity, and sustainability. It urges governments to increase investments in public services, eliminate harmful gender norms, and implement policies to promote shared caregiving responsibilities by engaging men and boys.   The report also calls upon the international community, including financial institutions and corporations to prioritise gender-responsive resource redistribution and recognise care and support related skills in recruitment and employment policies. The Working Group has developed a “CREATE” framework to offer a concrete roadmap for this transformation.   “Care and support are not charity—they are the foundation of human rights, economic development, and ecological sustainability,” the experts said. “States must act now to protect both those who provide and those who receive care and support, and to build a future where care and support are shared, supported, and valued.”   http://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2025/06/un-working-group-calls-urgent-overhaul-global-care-and-support-systems http://www.ohchr.org/en/documents/thematic-reports/ahrc5945-gendered-dimensions-care-and-support-systems-report-working http://www.ohchr.org/en/documents/thematic-reports/a80170-care-and-support-children-disabilities-within-family-environment http://www.ohchr.org/en/stories/2025/10/transforming-care-and-support-just-and-inclusive-societies   July 2025   Care enters the global financing agenda. (Global Alliance for Care)   The Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development (FfD4) served as the stage for the launch of the initiative under the Seville Action Platform: “Investing in Care for Equality and Prosperity: A Global Initiative to Promote Gender-Responsive Development Financing.”   Led by the governments of Mexico, Brazil, and Colombia, together with UN Women, the International Labour Organization (ILO), and the Global Alliance for Care (GAC), this initiative is aimed at transforming the international financial architecture so that care is no longer invisible and is recognized as essential infrastructure for sustainable development.   The process began on July 1 with the event “Financing Care Systems for Gender Equality and Economic Prosperity: A Multi-Stakeholder Approach”, the event brought together government officials, multilateral organizations, and civil society in a united call to place care at the heart of public policies and investment systems.   Enrique Ochoa Martínez, representative of the Government of Mexico, stated: “Our commitment to the care economy is rooted in our history, public policy, and vision for the future. This initiative affirms that care is not a cost — it is a strategic investment for inclusive development and social justice.”   From Brazil, Luana Pinheiro of the Ministry of Social Development highlighted the transformative power of the Care agenda: “Investing in care is not just social policy. It is economic, labor, environmental, and infrastructure policy with immense multiplying potential. This initiative promotes a shared responsibility among the state, civil society, and communities.”   Arlene Tickner, Vice Minister for Multilateral Affairs, said: “Colombia advocates for a feminist foreign policy that puts care at the center. This initiative is a transformative platform linking gender, development, peace, and sustainability from an inclusive approach.”   Jemimah Njuki, Director of Programs at UN Women, said: “We celebrate this milestone where gender equality and investment in care are integrated, now we need to move forward with actions.”   During the launch, other representatives also stressed the urgency of advancing toward a care-centered economy.   María Guijarro, Spain’s Secretary of State for Equality, declared: “Investing in care means investing in a fairer, more equitable, and more sustainable society. True shared responsibility requires a collective commitment to building a society of care.”   Ana Guezmes from the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean warned of the region’s triple crisis — care, climate, and development — and called for sustained investment “to care for both life and the planet.”   Alejandra Haas of Oxfam was clear: “Care must not remain a commodity. It is a right that must be guaranteed through public services and fair financing.”   Camila Barretto Maia a human rights expert, reminded the audience: “The current distribution of care is deeply unequal and unsustainable. It demands structural reform based on a global feminist perspective.”   The Seville Commitment, the final document adopted by all Member States present, includes in Article 11 a call to increase investment in the care economy, recognize its value, and fairly redistribute the burden of unpaid care work, which disproportionately falls on women.   Through the Seville Action Platform, signatory countries commit to a transformation, where care work is no longer invisible and takes its rightful place: at the center of economies, policies, and lives.   http://www.globalallianceforcare.org/en/news/news-press.html http://www.unwomen.org/en/news-stories/feature-story/2023/09/global-alliance-for-care-leads-changes-in-the-care-economy   Not all gaps are created equal: the true value of care work. (Oxfam International)   Women and girls work incredibly hard to care for others. Not only is this work unpaid, but it's often not seen as real work at all. If we valued care work the same as other work, it would be worth nearly $11 trillion US dollars a year. But its true value is much greater.   When we think of the gender gap our minds tend to leap to wage packets and glass ceilings. But for women and girls the gender gap may be better illustrated by the long and often dangerous daily walks to fetch water, the countless hours they spend caring for others, cooking and cleaning. All these invisible tasks traditionally belong to them but are neither counted nor valued.   Care work is the ‘hidden engine’ that keeps the wheels of our economies, businesses and societies turning. And it is driven by women and girls who, with little or no time to get an education, earn a decent living, be involved in their communities or have a say in how our societies are run, are trapped at the bottom of the economy.   Care work is central to human and social wellbeing. It includes looking after children, the elderly, and those with physical and mental illnesses and disabilities, as well as daily domestic work like cooking, cleaning, washing, mending, and fetching water and firewood.   Without someone investing time, effort and resources in these essential daily tasks, communities, workplaces, and whole economies would grind to a halt.   Across the world care work is disproportionately falling on women and girls, especially women and girls living in poverty and from marginalized groups.   While much of this work is done for free at home or in the community, women and girls working as cleaners, or in care services like healthcare or childcare often do so for poverty wages.   Women and girls undertake more than three-quarters of unpaid care work in the world and make up two-thirds of the paid care workforce. They carry out 12.5 billion hours of unpaid care work every day.   When valued at minimum wage this would represent a contribution to the global economy of at least $10.8 trillion a year, more than three times the size of the global tech industry.   In low-income countries, women in rural areas spend up to 14 hours a day doing unpaid care work. Across the globe, 42 percent of women cannot get jobs because they are responsible for all the caregiving, compared to just six percent of men.   80 percent of the world’s 67 million domestic workers are women — 90 percent don’t have access to social security, and more than half have no limits on their weekly working hours.   Even though it lays the foundation for a thriving society, unpaid and underpaid care work is fundamentally invisible. It is radically undervalued and taken as a given by governments and businesses. It is often treated as ‘non-work’, with spending on it treated as a cost rather than an investment.   It undermines the health and well-being of women and girls and limits their economic prosperity by fueling gender gaps in employment and wages. It also leaves them time-poor, unable to meet their basic needs or to participate in social and political activities.   Unpaid and underpaid care work perpetuates gender and economic inequalities. It is fueling a sexist economic system that has accumulated vast wealth and power into the hands of a rich few, in part by exploiting the labour of women and girls, and systematically violating their rights.   Women everywhere, in particular the poorest women, contribute massively to the economy and society through the essential care work they provide. Yet, our broken economic system values the wealth of the privileged few, mostly men, more than the billions of hours women and girls are putting in every day for free, and countless more for poverty wages.   Governments must prioritize care as being as important as all other sectors in order to build more human economies that work for everyone, not just a fortunate few.   They must ensure corporations and the richest are fairly taxed and invest this money in public services and infrastructure, which would help free up women’s time, empowering them to engage in activities outside of the home and lift themselves out of poverty.   http://www.oxfam.org/en/not-all-gaps-are-created-equal-true-value-care-work http://www.oxfam.org/en/research/empowering-women-through-care-work-recognition http://policy-practice.oxfam.org/gender-justice-womens-rights/
	The future will only be fair and prosperous if leaders choose gender equality now by UN Women, ILO, UN DESA   Investing in women could lift hundreds of millions out of extreme poverty and add $4 trillion to the global economy by 2030 and $342 trillion cumulatively by 2050. Equality is not a cost to bear – it is the profit the world forfeits every day it delays it.   But money alone is not enough. This is about exclusion. Women and girls are pushed out of labour markets, denied healthcare, erased from budgets, and silenced from decision-making. Systems don’t suddenly crash, they are hollowed out, piece by piece.   The path forward is no mystery. The Gender Snapshot 2025 points to six game-changing areas: digital inclusion, freedom from poverty, safety from violence, equal decision-making, peace and security, and climate justice. Together these form the Beijing+30 roadmap: concrete solutions that can speed up progress, improve lives everywhere, and rewire economies for equality.   The future will only be fair and prosperous if leaders choose gender equality now.   Just five years remain before the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development deadline, which the world set to make equality a reality for all. The Gender Snapshot 2025, produced by UN Women and the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, shows both the cost of failure and the gains within reach.   There are reasons to be hopeful. Girls are surpassing boys in school completion, women are gaining seats in parliament, and in just five years nearly 100 countries have scrapped discriminatory laws – from protecting girls from child marriage to establishing consent-based rape laws. But poverty, hunger, war, climate disasters, and backlash against feminism are eroding progress and could obliterate the gains made by a generation.   The data makes the choice we face clear: Equality could still be a reality for girls born today, but the world must invest now.   Poverty has a woman’s face   Ten per cent of women live in extreme poverty, a number that has not improved since 2020, and 351 million women and girls could still be trapped in extreme poverty by 2030. Women are taking on more unpaid care work than men, they are locked out of land ownership, finance, and decent jobs – denied the necessary tools to prosper.   If governments act now, women’s extreme poverty could fall from 9.2 per cent in 2025 to just 2.7 per cent by 2050. And the payoff? A $342 trillion boost to the global economy by 2050. Investing in women is the smartest growth strategy a country can choose.   Hungry, tired, and overlooked   In 2024, women were more likely than men to go hungry with 26.1 per cent of women facing food insecurity compared to 24.2 per cent of men – that is 64 million more women than men. Women also spend nearly three more years of their lives in poor health. By 2030, one in three women of reproductive ages could be living with anaemia, a condition that saps energy, productivity, and health.   Hunger and poor health keep women away from school, work, and leadership, and the costs of this exclusion rip through entire families and economies. Children born to malnourished mothers, for example, face higher risks of poor health and lower lifetime earnings.   A society is only as strong as the health of its women. When women get the food and healthcare they need, families thrive and poverty cycles end.   School doors open, but child marriage and violence cut futures short   Girls are now more likely than boys to finish school, but the path to leadership is broken. In 65 of 70 countries, women are far more likely to be secondary school teachers than principles, showing just how few make it to the top, even in a female dominated sector.   For too many girls, education ends abruptly with nearly one in five young women married before turning 18. Violence is also a daily horror, with 1 in 8 women aged 15–49 suffering from partner violence in the last year alone. Yet where strong laws, services, and systems exist, rates are 2.5 times lower – proof that protection works.   Harmful practices continue to strip girls of their dignity and bodily autonomy. Each year, 4 million girls undergo female genital mutilation (FGM), half before their fifth birthday. At the current pace, progress needs to be 27 times faster to end FGM by 2030.   Education can open doors but child marriage, FGM, violence and discrimination slam them shut, leaving the glass ceiling intact and women side-lined from leadership.   Power, pay checks, and the AI divide   Women hold just 27 per cent of parliamentary seats and 30 per cent of management roles. At this pace, equality in leadership is nearly a century away. Quotas show what is possible – in some countries they have doubled women’s share of parliamentary seats – but progress remains painfully slow.   Hurdles start long before women reach the boardroom. Some 708 million women are excluded from the labour market by unpaid care and time poverty. Even when women do work, they are crowded into lower paid jobs with fewer chances to rise.   Yet, when women do reach positions of power, the payoff is clear: companies with more women in leadership consistently outperform their peers – proving that when women have equal access to opportunity, growth and innovation flourish.   As the Artificial Intelligence (AI) revolution takes hold, the world faces a new disruption, and inequality risks being coded into the future if we do not learn from past mistakes. Women make up only about 29 per cent of the global tech workforce and just 14 per cent of tech leaders. And nearly 28 per cent of women’s jobs are at risk from AI, compared to 21 per cent of men’s.   But the digital future could also be a equalizer. Closing the gender digital divide could benefit 343 million women and girls, lift 30 million out of extreme poverty, improve food security for 42 million, and spark $1.5 trillion in global growth by 2030.   Women pay the highest price in conflict and climate chaos   In 2024, 676 million women and girls lived within 50 kilometres of deadly conflict, the highest number in decades. At the same time, climate change related stressors, such as floods, droughts, and deadly heat are intensifying, and women are the first to feel the impact.   This means walking further for water, haemorrhaging income when farms and fisheries collapse, or living in peril in unsafe shelters. Climate change alone could push another 158 million women into poverty by 2050, nearly half in sub-Saharan Africa. And yet women are still shunned from peace negotiations and climate disaster planning.   Solutions can be simple. An estimated $8 billion a year for clean cooking fuels could deliver $192.3 billion in health and time savings for women and girls, alongside major cuts in carbon emissions — a 24-fold return. Without investment, the costs of inaction could reach $800 billion.   No data, no progress   You can’t fix what you can’t see. Yet governments are systematically defunding one of the most important tools for progress: data.   Since 2025, more than half of national statistical offices reported budget cuts, including to life-saving surveys on health and demographics. Only 57 per cent of the gender data needed to track progress is available, just 1 in 4 countries know how much they spend on gender equality, and only half of national gender institutions are adequately staffed.   Without solid data, governments will be unable to lead the race for equality. Protecting data means protecting progress. It is one of the simplest, most cost-effective steps we can take – because if women’s needs and successes are not counted, they are written out of the future.   The world has five years left to decide whether equality will remain a hollow promise or become a reality for everyone.   The stakes could not be higher. Keeping women in poverty, side-lined from leadership, and exposed to violence is economic sabotage. Inequality drains growth, wastes potential, and holds entire societies back. Action can turn deprivation into growth.   http://www.unwomen.org/en/articles/explainer/gender-equality-in-2025-gains-gaps-and-the-342t-choice http://www.unwomen.org/en/digital-library/publications/2025/09/progress-on-the-sustainable-development-goals-the-gender-snapshot-2025 http://www.ilo.org/topics-and-sectors/gender-equality
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