International Women's Day

On International Women’s Day SIHMA recognises and celebrates the role migrant women in Africa and in societies across the world. We recognise migrant women’s contribution, their experiences and the challenges faced and overcome. Migrant women and girls are particularly vulnerable to abuse and exploitation and are far too frequently marginalised and excluded from access to rights and opportunities. In 2020 the Scalabrini Institute for Human Mobility in Africa launched a series on the Exclusion of Migrant women in Africa.

In continuing the series on the exclusion of migrant women, in March 2021 we will be looking at the limitations on migrant women’s access to documentation and regularization of migration, and challenges experienced by migrant women in Africa and around the world in this respect.  

Regardless of status and reason for migration, African migrant women face substantial challenges throughout the migratory process, whether pre-migration, in transit, on arrival in destination, and in some cases when re-entering and re-integrating in their country of origin [1]. Yet despite these challenges, they remain largely invisible. The lack of access for migrant women undermines individuals and compromises the continent’s achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals including gender equality and non-discrimination for all African women and girls.

Previously in this SIHMA series on the exclusion of migrant women, we have discussed the lack of access to the labour market and the labour-related policy making [2]. The second blog was more devoted to mental and physical health and access to health care [3]. The third article talked about the limited access to education to not only migrant women but also girls [4] and the fourth looked at access to housing for migrant women in Africa [5].  

 

 

1. WHO, 2018. Women on the move: migration and health In the WHO African Region: https://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/274378/9789290234128-eng.pdf
2. https://sihma.org.za/Blog-on-the-move/the-exclusion-of-migrant-women-in-africa-access-to-the-labour-market
3. https://sihma.org.za/Blog-on-the-move/exclusion-of-migrant-women-access-to-health-care 
4. https://sihma.org.za/Blog-on-the-move/exclusion-of-migrant-women-in-africa-access-to-education  
5. https://sihma.org.za/Blog-on-the-move/exclusion-of-migrant-women-in-africa-access-to-housing 

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Categories:

• News

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Tags:

• International Migration