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Catharine is a single mum living with her youngest son Tino in Harare, Zimbabwe. She’s part of Oxfam’s We Care programme where she volunteers in her community to raise awareness of the benefits of women and men sharing care tasks – for Catharine, these conversations began at home with her son.
Before the Coronavirus, women and girls in Zimbabwe were providing up to 11 hours a day of unpaid care and domestic work – more than 3 times than men. During the pandemic, the closure of key public services such as schools, school feeding programs and day care centres, as well as strains on the public health system and increased needs for water and sanitation mean that more care work is being provided in the home than ever before. Women are likely to be carrying out the majority of this additional unpaid work, placing even greater pressure on their time and income poverty and wellbeing.
The project aims to challenge the traditional ideas and attitudes about women’s and men’s household responsibilities, supports the redistribution and reduction of unpaid care work and promotes care work as skilled and crucial to both family wellbeing and economic development.
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