Context:

• Women’s labour force participation rate (WLFPR) in Japan has grown by ten percentage points, from 64.9 percent in 2013 to 75.2 per cent in 2023. This is not only the fastest growth in Japan’s WLFPR in the past few decades, but also the highest amongst the G7 countries in the last decade.
• As India embarks on a path towards women-led development, a few clear lessons emerge from Japan’s experience in enhancing WLFPR to push the country’s GDP.
• India and Japan share several cultural similarities — one that stands out relates to the social norms surrounding domestic work. Among the G20 countries, India and Japan have the widest gender gaps in unpaid care.

Lessons from Japan:

• Long-term public investments in care infrastructure: First, interventions for bridging the gender gaps in domestic and care work have a significant impact on WLFPR. Japan saw its highest gains in WLFPR when it committed to long-term public investments in care infrastructure and services, especially childcare.
• Breaking Gender stereotypes in childcare: Second, changing people’s mindsets around social norms is as important as formulating progressive regulations. As is evident from the Japanese experience, legal entitlement to gender-neutral parental leave is not sufficient. Enhancing uptake among men requires an employer-led approach that dispels gender stereotypes around care work.
  • Japan made disclosures of paternity leave uptake mandatory, introduced flexible work, and encouraged companies to demonstrate that taking paternity leave would not hamper career progression have helped in boosting paternity leave uptake from 2 per cent in 2012, to 17 per cent in 2023.
• Investment in Elderly care infrastructure: Third, it is essential to invest in a wide range of care infrastructure and services solutions — covering not only childcare, but also elder care, domestic work, and long-term care for highly dependent adults to reduce dependency and access the silver economy. 
  • For instance, Japan has leveraged some private sector partnerships for investments in affordable senior living and care services. 
  • As the share of elderly persons in India’s population is expected to rise from 10 per cent currently to 20 per cent by 2050, India, too will need to prioritise elder care infrastructure and service investments.
• A five-pillar strategy has been developed by leading organisations based on best practices from the world to unlock business opportunities in India’s care economy, with a focus on the following: 
  • Gender neutral and paternity leave policies; 
  • subsidies for availing/providing care services; 
  • enhancing investments from both the public and private sector in care infrastructure and services; 
  • skill training for care workers; and 
  • quality assurance for care services and infrastructure.

After nearly declining continuously for five decades, India’s WLFPR has begun showing a rising trend, increasing from 23 per cent in 2017-18 to 37 per cent in 2022-23. To keep this momentum going, we will require a continued long-term focus on the care economy for unleashing NariShakti to achieve a Viksit Bharat @2047.