For decades after liberalisation, India’s trade policy was designed around growth, competitiveness, and access to global markets. Social objectives — including gender inclusion — were largely addressed through separate channels such as labour laws, welfare schemes, and social programmes. That division made sense when trade was seen as a technical tool for expanding exports. Today, it is increasingly untenable. In an economy where exports are expected to drive jobs and productivity, and where female labour force participation remains among the lowest in the G20, ignoring gender in trade policy weakens outcomes rather than simplifying them.
Why gender has re-entered the trade debate
Trade is no longer peripheral to India’s development strategy. Export-oriented growth is expected to absorb labour, integrate firms into global value chains, and enhance India’s global economic standing. Yet evidence from India and across the Global South shows that trade affects women and men differently because markets operate within existing social and economic inequalities. When these differences are ignored, trade policy underperforms on both equity and efficiency.
The illusion of gender-neutral trade rules
The multilateral trading system was built on the assumption that uniform rules apply equally to all economic actors. Agreements under the do not explicitly refer to gender, reflecting the belief that markets would allocate opportunities efficiently and that distributional issues lay outside trade policy. India broadly shared this view in its early WTO engagement, prioritising development space, agriculture, and equity between countries rather than inequalities within them. Over time, this neutrality has proved misleading. Trade outcomes are shaped by unequal access to land, skills, finance, technology, mobility, and time — constraints that markets do not correct automatically.
Where women are located in India’s export economy
Women constitute a significant share of employment in India’s export-oriented sectors such as agriculture, textiles, garments, leather, and certain services. Survey data show that women account for a majority of employment in apparel manufacturing and a large share of informal agricultural exports. Despite this, gender considerations have remained largely absent from trade strategy. As a result, women’s participation in exports has expanded without being systematically supported or upgraded.
How trade barriers affect women differently
The gendered impact of trade operates through multiple channels. Women are disproportionately concentrated in sectors facing higher trade barriers and intense global competition:
- Agriculture and food processing face stringent sanitary and phytosanitary standards.
- Textiles and garments encounter tariff escalation in developed markets.
- Leather exports face regulatory and sustainability-related constraints.
These barriers limit firms’ ability to upgrade, keeping wages low and productivity gains uneven. In textiles and apparel, millions of women remain confined to low-skill, labour-intensive roles, while higher-value functions such as design, branding, logistics, and management remain male-dominated. Employment expands, but economic mobility does not.
Non-tariff measures and women-led enterprises
Certification requirements, customs procedures, and compliance costs impose fixed burdens that fall hardest on micro and small enterprises, where women are over-represented as entrepreneurs. Across South Asia, women-owned firms face longer border clearance times and higher transaction costs even after accounting for size and sector. In India, where over 95 per cent of women-owned enterprises operate at micro scale, these frictions can determine whether exporting is viable at all.
The employment paradox in export growth
Trade has also been a powerful engine of women’s paid employment globally. Exporting firms employ a higher share of women than non-exporters, and global value chains have generated formal jobs in garments, electronics assembly, agri-processing, and IT-enabled services. Yet India presents a paradox. Despite export growth, female labour force participation declined sharply from the mid-2000s to the late 2010s, with only modest recovery since. This reflects deeper structural constraints — care responsibilities, skill mismatches, safety concerns, and social norms — that trade alone cannot resolve.
Beyond jobs: the question of value capture
The core issue is not merely job creation but value capture. Women contribute a substantial share of labour embodied in exports but capture a smaller share of domestic value added. They remain concentrated in low-wage tasks, while men dominate technology-intensive and managerial roles. This limits both equity and competitiveness. Firms upgrading technologically demand new skills, yet women are less likely to access training or promotion pathways. Without deliberate intervention, global value chains risk becoming cul-de-sacs rather than ladders for women.
Aligning trade policy with labour-market realities
The solution does not lie in turning trade policy into social policy, but in aligning trade more closely with labour-market conditions. Export strategies must be complemented by domestic measures — skills development, access to finance, childcare infrastructure, safe mobility, and workplace standards — so that women can progress rather than stagnate within global markets.
Reducing asymmetric trade costs
Simplifying customs procedures, digitising border processes, improving transparency, and easing access to trade finance can disproportionately benefit women-led enterprises without altering tariff schedules. In an MSME-dominated export base like India’s, such reforms could unlock significant participation gains.
Strategic integration into global value chains
Evidence from apparel and electronics suggests that technology upgrades and improved logistics reduce informality and physical intensity, making factory employment more accessible to women. Trade policies that encourage upgrading rather than pure cost competition can quietly but decisively improve job quality and inclusion.
What to note for Prelims?
- Gender-neutral assumption in WTO rules.
- Sectoral concentration of women in India’s export economy.
- Role of non-tariff measures in shaping trade outcomes.
What to note for Mains?
- Why gender inequality in trade is an economic constraint, not just a social issue.
- Link between trade policy, labour markets, and value capture.
- Policy measures to make export-led growth more inclusive.
The debate over whether trade affects women differently is settled. The real question is whether India designs trade policy for the economy it actually has. A strategy that ignores gender will underperform on exports, employment, and productivity. A strategy that integrates it will be more competitive, resilient, and credible — not as a moral choice, but as an economic necessity.
