Gender and Waste Nexus: Experiences from Bhutan, Mongolia and Nepal

Bhutan

Stakeholder snapshot

Households and communities

Administration • Managers are predominantly men in both the public and private sectors. • Office staff are more often women or gender parity is better, especially within public administration. • Boards of directors have more men than women. Small-scale enterprises • Social entrepreneurs in thewaste sector are mainly men. • Some higher technological recycling (e.g. plastic for road construction) is mainly run by men.

• Women are by far the main household waste managers. • Women are mostly active as volunteer waste managers in their communities (sometimes because they do not work outside the house or are homemakers). • Community leaders are mostly male.

Policy and governance

• Men occupy high decision-making positions both at the national and municipal levels and also on boards of directors. • Women have a limited role and little participation at the political, administrative and economic leadership levels.

Informal

Informal sector laborers (unwaged) • Waste pickers are mainly women.

• Recycling in the sense of weaving baskets or making flowers is typically seen as being a female activity. • Both men and women work at scrap yards. Small-scale enterprises which are both formal and informal • Second-hand/repair shops are mainly run by men. • Scrap yards are mainly run by men.

Operational levels

Formal

Formal sector laborers (waged) • Street sweepers are mostly women. • Office cleaners are mostly men. • Waste collection truck drivers and handypersons are exclusively men. • There is gender parity among waste pickers that work with contracts.

are respected in their communities and often consult with community members, affording them great potential to improve their community’s waste management, in part through increasing their role as a waste sector stakeholder. Community leaders can, for example, organize training on composting and waste segregation, and mobilize community members to attend. Women mainly attend such courses, which often occur mid-morning, though some women may take time off from work to attend. In practice, women play an important role in ensuring that streets are clean and that waste is properly segregated and collected. Several recommendations and plans are in place that indirectly target women on issues related to waste segregation, composting and recycling. Clean Bhutan, a CSO, and the Tarayana Foundation, a public benefit organization, both have programmes to build the capacity of women and youth and to provide them with training.

Clean Bhutan employs about 11 staff members, 80 per cent of whom are women, including project coordinators, finance managers and trainers of trainers. Clean Bhutan informs citizens about good waste management practices and behaviours, and also organizes clean-ups. Recycling is a main concern: one programme teaches participants how to make baskets from plastic using traditional weaving techniques. Although both men and women can join the courses, men, if they do start, usually do not complete them. Reasons for men quitting include having found a job, though this sometimes proves not to be the case. This behaviour suggests a lingering stigma related to waste and/or activities that are thought to be suited to women. However, women realize that they can sell some of valuable waste items to make extra income, which incentivizes them to be even better at segregation.

67 Gender and waste nexus