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1. The aim of this paper is to depict the situation of rural women in Southern Europe, giving a current, realistic and critical view of the social environment and labour conditions of this group. This is a somewhat difficult task, given its complexity, the reasons for which I will briefly outline.
2. Rural women make up no homogeneous group within the number of areas we commonly refer to as Southern Europe. Apart from the clear dividing line that can be established between EU-member and non EU-member states, differences within each particular country in question also exist, those of regional identity. Rural zones over the whole of the south-western tip of Europe have more similarity between themselves than with other areas of their own country. Rural women from the Portuguese Algarve or the Alentejo, for example, are more similar to Andalusian women in that they make up a large part of the active agrarian workforce, participating in tasks with a low degree of mechanisation. They are however very different from the women of the Aveiro region, where a widely-spread industrialisation of rural zones has meant that they are generally employed in activities more characteristic of urban industrialised society. (Margarida André I., 1996).
3. This diversity of situations is due to the heterogeneous nature of the Southern regions, the reason for this being the different sectors of activity having importance in each area, the adaptation of these different activities to the dominant economic structures, and, importantly, the links they have with the urban areas which act as centres of decision-making and power. The development of new modes of production and the encouragement of communication and distribution technologies are favouring the establishment of service and other industries in certain Southern European rural areas, these areas having comparative advantages over the more saturated metropolitan areas. However, at the same time and parallel to these new activities, other forms of production which in some cases could be classed as pre-capitalist (agricultural day-labour or manual work in the agro-food industry), still exist.
4. Another specific feature of rural areas is the great degree of state intervention, which affects the rural space as a whole, much more than just the traditional regulation of agricultural activities. A clear example of this is environmental work in rural areas, where lower levels of development have helped large areas to remain almost wild. Alongside Common Agricultural Policy regulations, much of the European Union Regional Development Fund (ERDF), and also some of the European Social Fund, is being allocated to sustainable rural development in the Southernmost regions of the European Union. The regulations concerning the protection and conservation of natural environments and landscapes, architectural heritage, and cultural and social environment, are a counterpoint in those rural areas which still maintain economic development patterns typical of several decades ago.
5. Within the framework of this diversity of situations in Southern European rural areas, and of women’s participation in both old and new processes, some female researchers agree that there have been both noticeable steps forward as well as some examples of complete stagnation (Boeraeve-Derijcke C., 1994; Vaiou D., 1996). The massive integration of women into the labour market since the mid 60s and early 70s has taken place to only a smaller extent in rural areas, where the jobs done by the new women workers have in general been the less appealing ones, with little acknowledgement for their work being received. The low integration of women into mechanised work, the lack of a regular work-shift, frequent deficiencies in the social and health schemes and salaries below the norm have led this integration to be considered as marginal, placing it to all intents and purposes out of the legal labour market.
6. The acceptance of these kind of working conditions is due to a lack of real employment opportunities in rural areas. As Dina Vaiou rightly points out, "women's concentration in informal and atypical jobs is by no means a matter of choice. It is due, to a great extent, to a lack of alternatives (jobs in the formal part of labour market)" (Vaiou D.: 67). But, together with this, it should not be overlooked that this situation is also due to the relegation of women to less important positions in their social and family environment, and their eventual incorporation into a male-dominated labour market.
7. However, in the midst of this disheartening panorama, certain changes are coming about, mainly connected with the emergence of self-employment initiatives. These combine a promotion of traditional rural women’s domestic activities - sewing, embroidery, furniture restoration, pressed flower arranging - with other activities recently taught as part of regulatory courses, including some novel occupations related to computing and telemarketing. All these activities share the aim of promoting women’s integration into an active social and working life, with acceptable conditions and in full accordance with their educational standards and abilities.
8. Some innovating employment proposals which have come from Andalusian rural women are listed below. I have, however, also made reference to activities where female workers are still being taken on in unfair conditions. Far from being an exhaustive approach, this sample aims to be an accurate, though critical, reflection of the situation of representative groups of rural women in their daily life and work. Three case studies have been selected: i) the work of female day labourers, ii) female agro-food industry workers, and iii) women engaged in the rural tourist trade. In all three case studies, the more characteristic and unusual aspects have been highlighted, trying to avoid a descriptive approach which could be repetitive.
9. The day-labour case study focuses on workers' mobility as the key factor for such activity in Andalucía since the end of the 60s and the beginning of the 70s. The second study questions the emergence of small rural industries and their production methods, whereas the third and last case study compares the self-reliance and autonomy with which a group of women decided to restore family houses for their adaptation to the rural tourist trade with the unfortunate categorisation of women in gender-oriented activities typical of this industry.
10. Salaried work on farms is a main feature of the agricultural labour market in Andalucía. A concentrated property structure and single-crop estates (the most salient example of which is the typical latifundio) forced most Andalusian country people to rent out their work doing all kind of agricultural tasks in return for a daily wage. Without social security or labour protection schemes of any kind, they worked on a piecework basis and were paid an amount of money settled by the landowner. Occasionally, they were also paid in kind with food or lodgings at the typical cortijos. The mechanisation of agriculture, which had already begun around the turn of the century, and, above all, the introduction of powerful combine harvesters for grain and industrial crops in the 1970s caused the exodus of great numbers of workers from the rural areas to the cities in search of employment and better living conditions.
11. These transformations brought about a change in the main source of agricultural salaried workforce. From dependence on large estates, agricultural workers went over to depend on specific aspects still requiring manual work: this is the case, for example, of the growing and picking of olives, strawberries, vegetables, citrus fruits and cut flowers (Prados Velasco M.J., 1998 -a). And even though these activities take place in areas within Andalusia, day labourers still need to travel to find their temporary jobs and accumulate a minimum amount of working days per annum and to be entitled to unemployment benefits. The Subsidio de Desempleo Agrario (Agricultural Unemployment Benefit) and, later, the Plan de Empleo Rural (Rural Employment Scheme) have been the main mechanisms guaranteeing entitlement to benefit for a period of three or four months per year, for workers who are able to give evidence that they have worked a minimum of thirty-five days.
12. Welfare policies and temporary migrations in search of employment are the two main determining factors for salaried work in Andalusian agriculture (Prados Velasco M.J., 1998 -a). Although this process has always been explained from an essentially male point of view, it cannot be overlooked that, in Spain, both women and young girls, mostly from the lower classes of society, have always been hired for agricultural jobs doing piece-work or on a daily wage basis, and that those jobs were and still are essential for the upkeep of their families. (Prados Velasco M.J., 1995). The introduction of combine harvesters has therefore had more impact on female day labourers, meaning at the same time their continuance in manual forms of employment.
13. Female day labourers are still considered a substitution workforce and their integration into the labour market depends on the full employment of their husbands. Recruitment of women is normally indirect, usually through their husbands, who travel in groups as advance parties first, and then come back with the whole family once they have checked out the duration of the harvesting season and foresee that there might be jobs for all the family members. In these cases, the families establish their own priorities as far as the organisation of work is concerned: the father is the first to be hired, followed by the children and the mother (Prados Velasco M.J., 1995). However, this kind of organisation reveals an unmistakable form of positive discrimination of the men, who are preferred by employers to perform most farming tasks (tilling, installation of watering systems, harvesting, etc.), whereas picking is still left to the women. This is when the occupation rates are at the highest point and all temporary workers enjoy full employment.
14. The situation has gone from the salary discrimination implicit in piece-work to a new era of labour discrimination: women are being employed exclusively during the harvest, the employers arguing that they are better equipped for this task, although in practice this means limitations on their condition as workers. Therefore, the aforesaid features of employment on casual basis and seasonal income are far more evident in the case of female day labourers (Prados Velasco M.J., 1995).
15. The doubts about female day labourers' condition of full workers have also reached the administration, as the continual changes to the Agricultural Benefit welfare system seem to prove. The Instituto Nacional de Empleo (National Employment Institute) has detected a significant increase in the number of female day labourers, who, from representing just over 10% of the total number of people receiving benefits in 1984, went up to 51% ten years later. The greatest rise took place between 1985 and 1990. This has caused many Andalusian towns to have a larger number of women receiving rural subsidies than men. This difference between sexes in some towns, and, above all, the great increase in the number of women entitled to benefits, are viewed as abuse and fraud as the administration considers that it does not mirror the real participation of women in the agricultural labour market (Instituto Nacional de Empleo, 1995).
16. Women are partly responsible for their own labour and public relegation. In K. Heisel's analysis of the claims of the group formed by Andalusian day labourers in the 1980s, it is noticeable that most female day labourers defend the claims of their husbands, but rarely compete with their husbands' interests in the struggle for a job, or go against the local authorities when they refuse to offer them community work which women could add to their working record (Heisel K., 1990). A similar situation can be also detected with regard to employers, who are not normally reported to the law for actions like failing to comply with the due payments of overtime or hours worked during public holidays. Once again, the reasons given for such behaviour concern the fact that recruitment is indirect and secondary to the recruitment of the husbands. Besides, there are low levels of unionisation among women, who consider trade unionism and social and labour demands as activities to be carried out by their partner. (Prados Velasco M.J., 1995).
17. All these facts reveal a conformist and resigned attitude on the part of female day labourers, whom radical changes and hopes for the future do not interest. Their main worry would appear to be that the mechanisation of agriculture will affect those tasks on which they rely for their day wages, and that if this happened the number of jobs would fall and they would not be able to compete with men in the search for employment. The relative economic self-reliance and self-sufficiency perceived in other female workers in the rural areas of Andalucía seems not to have reached this group, and, despite the fact that they have adapted to the new political and administrative framework, they are still highly conditioned by the segregation of sexes in the family and the social milieu.
18. The importance of agriculture as an economic activity in the regions of the South of Europe has favoured the emergence and consolidation of agro-food industries which allow for them to add value to an already highly productive and diversified agricultural industry. This is the case of Andalucía, where the agro-food sector has not ceased to grow in the last ten years, 40% of total exports being concentrated in 1990 (Delgado Cabeza M. y Román del Río C., 1995). However, this expansion has not been able to prevent some deficiencies from existing, owing above all to the fact that the sector is orientated towards the manufacture of relatively unprocessed goods, its technological development being dependent on labour costs. This is quite the opposite of other Spanish regions such as Catalonia or the Mediterranean coast, where a long-established food-processing sector is less dependent on raw material production centres and which, at the same time, show a greater ability to adopt technological improvements (Sanz Cañada J., 1993).
19. In reality, many of the recently-created agro-food industries established in Andalucía came about through production co-operatives which decided to turn their business towards the elaboration and marketing of crops in view of the interest shown by farm-owners in maximising their profits. These agro-food industries are in the majority of cases the result of the specialisation and intensification of irrigation agriculture, and focus on the first transformation of crops from neighbouring farms with low investments in technology (Prados Velasco M.J., 1998 -b). As S. Hacker pointed out in the mid 70s, first transformation activities in the agro-food industry are commonly performed by women, for whom employment opportunities in the rural areas are always very limited, leading to their acceptance of badly-paid manual jobs. (Hacker S., 1978).
20. The newness of these industries and the unwillingness of employers to take risks are the two factors that explain the low levels of mechanisation and, therefore, the exploitation of a cheap female workforce. As these industries' main activity is the manipulation of fresh products, the two factors of crucial importance for them are the duration and conditions of the harvesting season, Andalucía the temporary employment of female workers. On the whole, the conditions of this activity do not differ from the conditions in which female day labourers from neighbouring farms work: it is an activity conditioned by its seasonal nature Andalucía the perishability of its raw materials. The fact that both these factors coincide in time marks very heavily the seasonal aspect of female employment in rural areas, Andalucía, in practice, reduces women’s employment opportunities.
21. The recruitment system for female handlers is the same as the one for female day labourers, giving an idea of the type of employment in question: payment on a daily wage basis, low qualified posts Andalucía extremely tiring work. A preference for women-workers is consistently justified by the employers mentioning women’s "abilities" in tidiness and cleanliness, their skill Andalucía delicacy in handling the products, and their "final touch". In the employers' own words, "food handling is feminine" (Prados Velasco M.J., 1998 -b). And of course, these "feminine abilities" are considered to be intrinsic to the gender of the handlers, and not the result of a gender-oriented education, so they do not have to be remunerated in any specific way.
22. Whatever the case may be, female handlers are hired for unqualified tasks which can be easily mechanised. Male workers, on the other hand, are always given duties which involve the manipulation of machinery or vehicles, meaning that there is a direct relation between investment in machinery and a more complex hierarchy of work in the industry. In short, female handlers are relegated to the least qualified and worst paid positions for reasons such as their inferior physical strength, their lack of training in specialised machinery, or because they do not have a licence to drive forklift trucks, despite the fact that the women are never asked to meet these requirements when hired.
23. Employment segregation by sexes is openly recognised and, in fact, serves to conceal a system of different payment standards where the men are always favoured, their salaries being 4 to 7% higher than those of their female counterparts, even though the women often perform the tasks assigned to the men (Prados Velasco M.J., 1998). The preference for female food-handlers can therefore be considered an excuse not to pay them a higher salary, despite the fact that women's duties at the factory often involve more than simply food-handling.
24. We can see from this that the employment conditions of women in the agro-food industry are openly unequal in comparison to those of their male counterparts, and are recognised and even justified by the employers. This discriminatory situation comes about not only with regard to the type of tasks carried out by women or the requirements made in order for them to obtain employment in this industry, but also to their rank at work, their type of contract Andalucía their seniority. What leads the women to accept these conditions is their need to work for strictly economic reasons, Andalucía the scarce – or practically non-existent – alternatives to this kind of employment. Although female workers are well aware of the discrimination they suffer with respect to their male counterparts, almost all of them decline to demand any kind of improvement for two reasons: first, the fear that they will lose their jobs and not be hired again if they protest, and, secondly, the belief that they will not change anything by doing so.
25. The assessment made by the women themselves of their work in this industry reminds us again of what has been said earlier about the tasks generally assigned to them. The fundamental difference between male and female labour in the agro-food industry is the hierarchical organisation of the industry by ranks, theoretically of competence Andalucía responsibility but in practice always meaning lower wages for the female workers (Prados Velasco M.J., 1998 -b). Factors such as the as yet unachieved economic consolidation of the agro-food sector and the lack of employment opportunities in the rural areas of Andalucía suggest that there will be no radical changes in the near future. In any case, there is no doubt that the awareness of this unequal situation is a relevant step towards achieving decent and non-discriminatory labour conditions.
26. This is a relatively new activity in the southernmost regions of Europe. If we start from the hypothesis that the rise of rural tourism is connected with the new demands made by urban areas on the rural zones surrounding them, we can logically conclude that the need for leisure time and a well-preserved environment should be felt more especially in the large cities of the North, as the living conditions there are worse. Recent examples show that the rise of rural tourism in Andalucía is quite a recent phenomenon compared to the emergence and development of this activity in other Spanish regions such as Catalonia (García-Ramón M.D., Canovás G., & Valdovinos N., 1995). The most salient experiences date only from the 1980s, when the crisis experienced by traditional tourism and the increase in environmental awareness began to create a more diversified demand. This relative slowness can be considered a result of the growth of an important "sun, sea Andalucía sand" tourism industry during the period of Spain’s opening up to the outside world Andalucía economic growth of the sixties, as well as of the lack of any potential demand from middle-class people living in large cities wishing to take their holidays in non-aggressive surroundings, enjoying nature and life in the country.
27. The most frequent image of rural tourism in Andalucía, even as seen by the rest of Spain, is that of a typical "cortijo" or country estate where the landowners share their home and table with a group of distinguished guests, in the fashion of the "quintas" of the Portuguese Alentejo. The real situation is far more modest, although just as rich in quality and charm. In the majority of cases, it is made up of relatively isolated old farmhouses, with no running water or electricity, which were the first to suffer the consequences of the rural exodus which began in the 1950s. A large number of these farmhouses are being restored by women who see the chance to supplement their incomes and recover their family homes at the same time (Prados Velasco M.J., 1998 -c).
28. These initiatives come from the women themselves who, at a key moment in their lives, have decided to take on the challenge of investing in the purchase Andalucía restoration of a country house, or of sharing the pleasures of the house they already own by destining it to rural tourism. They take this decision on their own, usually with the undisguised reluctance and opposition of their family and friends. The family often advise against the refurbishment of the abandoned house, which in many cases does not meet current standards of habitability. The lack of public support from the regional government Andalucía the management of Community aid through ERDF funds do not favour the starting-up of such initiatives. In an investigation carried out into the conditions of Andalusian rural tourism, these women involved in rural tourism promotion pointed out that it was very difficult for them to obtain bank credits as they had no regular incomes of their own, despite having received an ERDF subsidy (Prados Velasco M.J., 1996). These kind of problems were being overcome by drastic measures such as selling off part of their cattle or small lots of land with the aim of improving the conditions of the farmhouse or remaining estate. Most of these estates are in fact small farms between 2 and 5 ha, non-viable in the majority of cases and which had great problems surviving the drought of the early 1990s, so the risk of selling off part of the estate has therefore not been great.
29. The degree of self-esteem and self-reliance shown by these women has been fundamental to their making the necessary investments for the restoration of the rural dwelling Andalucía also to their opting to dedicate it to rural tourism, despite reticence from their direct family and lack of income. The need to receive an income without leaving their village and the desire to maintain or recuperate their family homes and improve their farms has eventually outweighed these disadvantages in their decision.
30. This is not a common attitude among rural women. Despite the fact that most women engaged in rural tourism come from the areas themselves, the kind of lives they have led are somewhat diverse and, although some of them have never left their villages, most of them belong to the group of population who preferred to return to their birthplaces after a migration caused by their husbands' search for employment. All of them agree on defining themselves as very active housewives and report that they enjoy domestic chores and the tasks they were taught by their mothers and grandmothers: cooking, embroidery, gardening, looking after their patios and gardens, restoration of old furniture, etc. Some of them have even become involved in the recovery of traditional agricultural activities such as poultry-breeding or cheese-making, while some support eco-agriculture (Prados Velasco M.J., 1996).
31. It is not surprising then that they consider themselves well qualified to lodge visitors. In fact, they state that the main requisite for rural tourism is to be able to pay attention to domestic chores while making guests feel at home: they feel it to be a matter of "common sense" (Prados Velasco M.J., 1996). Just as they do for their own families, these women are always ready to meet their guests' needs to ensure them the most comfortable stay. They enjoy entertaining their guests and assisting them when they require any help or just company. The fact that these demands are normally made at weekends or during holiday-time, when the women are freer from daily housekeeping, makes it easier to dedicate this time Andalucía attention to their guests.
32. Most women do not see themselves as carrying out a job, but rather an extension of their domestic tasks and responsibilities, for which they obtain an income and which provides them with a high degree of personal satisfaction. This is so despite the fact that they have to add to their everyday housework "extra" work during holidays, which they obviously would not take on if they did not periodically receive guests in their homes. The satisfaction they get from working in rural tourism comes from doing an enjoyable job, the degree of independence in the decisions they take, the refurbishment of the house they inherited from their parents and the contribution they make to the maintenance of their farms.
33. The rise of self-employment initiatives based on the development of innovative formulas would appear to be an efficient way of improving the work and living conditions of the rural women of the South of Europe. Most of these initiatives make up a picture typical of post-productionist rural areas: rural tourist trade, transport-on-request services, social care or advanced teleworking formulas are some of the specific cases which have already begun to follow the lines set out in the Cork Declaration. Alongside these new occupations, conventional forms of employment -- still the suppliers of jobs – persist, their activity being based on the primary sector Andalucía on industries such as the agro-food industry and others which have sprung from the relocation of other productive processes (clothing, leatherwork, toys, etc.).
34. The most representative cases of the conditions in which women work make one think about the part they play within the social and labour framework of rural areas. Women are considered as an unqualified substitutory workforce, and are relegated to manual jobs because of a gender-oriented education. Their relegation to poorly mechanised sectors does not encourage any social recognition of their work, and their alleged lack of technical training establishes the foundations on which labour and salary discrimination rest. Their labour, salary and health rights are only just within legal limits. And we see this situation again and again in many cases of self-employment: the newness of the initiatives now being developed and their pioneering nature seem to "justify" that these activities remain outside the economic system Andalucía are not reflected in tax or Social Security statistics. Besides, it is not clear whether the alleged recognition of gender qualification is only leading in practice to women’s permanence in a secondary role, both as a woman and as a worker.
35. The panorama is not particularly encouraging in a male-dominated rural world. Rural women must demand the prominence they deserve in rural society, prominence on which the welfare and the advancement of living conditions in rural areas depends to a large extent. For this to come about they must help to change much of the inertia inherent to this society, beginning perhaps with that which is less conflictive from the social point of view. Improvements in education and professional training, greater participation in public, social and political decision-making bodies, and the slow but sure struggle to extend housework to the rest of the family members are some of the most immediate actions necessary. However, we should not overlook the fact that most of these actions are the concern of Administration and Unions: funding equipment for typically feminine needs -- kindergartens, assistance to the ill, disabled or elderly --, demand for the full compliance with labour and Social Security regulations and not tolerating errors in the laws, and other more general measures concerning the planning of intervention programmes and development policies through which women could be integrated on a real equal opportunities basis. It is only through the promotion of development strategies combining local potential with the abilities of men and women that sustainable Rural Development can be achieved.
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