south-america / Chile
Mapping has been done by AnaClara, a women's training organisation, in Santiago. AnaClara has supported the formation of new local trade unions and informal groups of women homebased workers in several districts of the city.
At the beginning of the programme, AnaClara set up a research team who trained homebased workers to carry out surveys and do follow-up work with homeworkers. As a result of this work, informal groups were established and some were later formally registered as trade unions. AnaClara has developed extensive leadership training programmes for the women, using popular education methods.
AnaClara has focused on urban homebased workers, some of whom are own-account, doing handicraft or food work for sale locally. Others work for local companies or intermediaries while others are doing piece-work for the garment and leather footwear industry.
Outside Santiago, AnaClara is also working with indigenous women doing traditional handicrafts in the North and seaweed collectors on the coast in the South.
CECAM
CECAM – Centro de Capacitacion, Estudios y Asesoria para Mujeres Trabajadoras – Centre for Training and Education for Working Women – is the HWW regional centre in Latin America.
CECAM also supports the homeworkers’ organisations in Chile, as well as working with other organisations of informal women workers.
See the links section for details on contacting the CECAM organisation.