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In Petrich, in the South West of Bulgaria, an association of homeworkers has been set up – Kaloian. It brings together many women doing homework in the town and nearby villages. They mainly stitch shoes for export. Kaloian gives advice and organises local meetings and does advocacy work with the government.
VISIT TO PETRICH - OCTOBER 2010
In October 2010, Homeworkers Worldwide visited Kaloian, the homeworkers’ association in Petrich in the South West of Bulgaria. We had discussions with members of Kaloian and visited seven women doing homework.
After twenty years of ‘democracy’, women in Petrich are once more in crisis and anxious about how they and their families are going to survive. In the mid-2000s, the economic situation began to improve. But the current crisis has had a deep impact. Factories and workshops have closed and it is difficult to find work. While the supply of homework has become more irregular, it is still the main source of income for many families.
Many of the women have been doing homework for over ten years. The main occupation is sewing the uppers of leather shoes for Italian, German or other companies, for export. Typically, the shoes sewn by homeworkers are famous brands, retailing at between 60 and 100 Euros, while homeworkers are paid less than half a Euro for their work.
Other forms of homework include packing socks, making tapestries and assembling carrier bags. Until recently there was also garment work: sewing sequins on blouses and finishing loose threads on jeans.
Homeworking is generally informal, with no employment rights or social insurance. A few homeworkers have health insurance. New legislation is being introduced in Bulgaria in early 2011 which will regulate dependent homework, giving them the same rights as other workers.
Over the last ten years, prices paid to the homeworkers have not increased. But women are facing rising costs and inadequate social security systems. While the old systems have been abolished, new systems have not been put in place. The main problems are lack of good, affordable healthcare and inadequate employment benefits.
Many women and men have lost jobs in formal factories or workshops, some permanently, others on temporary lay-offs. It is difficult for them to find alternative work apart from occasional casual jobs. However precarious and irregular, for many families homework is now the main source of income.
Women in the town of Petrich reported that the situation is even worse for those living in villages, where there is even less work and problems marketing agricultural products.
Survival Strategies
In addition to paid work for factories, many women do some farming, mainly of horticultural products, for their own family’s subsistence and for sale. They currently face problems in finding markets for their products and often have to sell them below the cost of production.
Some women work at home dress-making, knitting or doing traditional handicraft work, either for sale to neighbours or for orders. Others process agricultural products e.g. making honey, producing herb teas, or collect and process forest products e.g. mushrooms, wild fruit.
Most women, and their families, are combining different ways of earning a living to survive, for example, doing part-time or full-time work with agriculture and/or homework. Many of those with full-time jobs, are currently laid off. Others are still working but have not been paid for several months.
Most families have members who have migrated to big cities (Sofia), for daily labour (Greece) or for extended periods of time to other countries (Spain, UK, Slovenia). While some family members remain abroad, others return to Bulgaria with savings to support members of the family remaining there. Since those who migrate are often the younger people, some villages have only older people remaining.
Alternatives
The regulation of homework should bring better conditions for those working for subcontractors in Petrich. However, other strategies are needed to create real choices for women based on the multiple livelihoods that they pursue, including horticulture and related activities. The many different kinds of informal and unregistered work that women do, both paid and unpaid, needs to be recognised. New social security systems also need to be designed round this reality of women’s lives and provide a basis for a more secure, equal and optimistic future.
Find out more
A full report of our Petrich visit can be downloaded from the resources section of our website.
HWW Petrich Report
For more background information on the economic situation we recommend Oxfam's An Invisible Crisis? briefing on women in the European Union .
Oxfam's An Invisible Crisis?